What Could Make "Akudama Drive" Better?

Note:

 

This was originally posted on DeviantART on September 13, 2022. I don't know when I originally wrote it since I don't have it in my Drafts app. Just like with the Yashahime/Akudama Drive review I posted earlier, I might have just wrote this on DeviantART itself and posted it directly on there. I did that a lot back in 2021 and 2022, whereas now, I prefer to write the posts on Drafts and then post them on the blog and/or DeviantART. I haven't been post any of my newer stuff on DeviantART because it's just too much to work to have to post stuff on here, and then post it again on DeviantART. It kind of gets exhausting. Plus, I thinking of just phasing my DeviantART page entirely, and posting all of my stuff exclusively on here. I don't really do anything on there anymore. The only things I go to DeviantART to do is just look for wallpapers for both my laptop 💻 and my phone 📱. 

Anyway, Akudama Drive. I would say that this was the first anime show that I watched that I truly hated 😡. I've only gotten into anime pretty recently, like I don't think I started watching anime until 2019 or 2020. I had seen the 1988 anime film, Akira, but I hadn't really seen an actual anime series in full. The first anime show I really watched, and watched all the way through was Cowboy Bebop, a show that was an introductory anime for a lot of other people as well. Then, I watched Outlaw Star, which is another space western 🤠 anime akin to Cowboy Bebop. It came out the same year, 1998. But, it isn't really as thought of as Cowboy Bebop, and some people tend to write it off as a Cowboy Bebop rip-off unfairly. 

Even though they're both space westerns 🤠, they are actually pretty different from each other. For one thing, Outlaw Star isn't as westernized and isn't as dripping with Americana 🇺🇸 as Cowboy Bebop is. It has a lot more Asiatic elements, a lot more Chinese-inspired elements, like they use a lot of Chinese names, Chinese words, and Chinese mythology and Chinese philosophy in that show. It's also more of a fantasy and straight up space opera with aliens 👽, genetically engineered dinosaur men 🧬, guns that can shoot magic bullets, immortal beings, mysticism, mechs, and so on. 

The spaceships in the show have arms and they can literally have hand-to-hand combat with each other. The titular Outlaw Star itself has two guns that look like pistols or like Uzis that can it dual-wield with his mechanical arms and shoot other spaceships that it's fighting against. So, it has mecha anime elements, where the spaceships are the mechs, but the show also has more traditional mech robots, or at least one ☝️. The show straight up has a catgirl 🐱♀︎. An alien catgirl 🐱♀︎, but still a catgirl 🐱♀︎ nonetheless. Whereas Cowboy Bebop tries to be a bit more grounded, have things be based in real science and be within the realm of possibility.  

Outlaw Star is a lot closer to Star Wars or Star Trek than Cowboy Bebop is, even if Cowboy Bebop does have a Star Trek easter egg in one episode, in a blink and you'll miss it moment. The best way to describe Outlaw Star is that it's like Treasure Planet, but if they used actual spaceships instead of sail boats ⛵️ with spaceship parts added to them. Outlaw Star is just much more whimsical and comical than Cowboy Bebop, which is a lot more somber and goes for a much darker and bleaker tone than Outlaw Star does.  

Cowboy Bebop has a certain level of melancholy to it, and the characters are so damaged in a way that Outlaw Star and the characters within just aren't. Cowboy Bebop straight up has a sad ending where the main character "dies." It's a bit ambiguous whether or not Spike actually died at the end, but still, it ended on a sad note, with all the main characters broken up, and the main guy dying or being severely injured with nothing to show for it. Outlaw Star has a comparatively happy ending, where all the main characters not only survive, but also go to have more adventures together. 

So, these two shows have a more differences than similarities, despite being vaguely in the same genre, and it's unfair to label Outlaw Star as rip-off or knock-off of Cowboy Bebop. So, I watch those two shows, then I watched Magical Girl Spec Ops Asuka, then I watched Samurai Champloo, then I watched Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, then I watched Black Lagoon, then I watched Cannon Busters, then I watched B – The Beginning, and then I watched Inuyasha and of course, its sequel/spin-off, Yashahime. I watched a few anime movies in-between those shows like Patema Inverted, Paprika, Millennium Actress, Tokyo Godfathers, Spirit of Wonder: Miss China's Ring (although that one was more of an OVA rather than a full movie), The Wonderland, Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, Spirited Away, the Inuyasha movies of course, and the Evangelion Rebuild movies. Not in that exact order, but I've seen all of those movies and shows. 

And of course, I saw the Godzilla anime on Netflix, Godzilla: Singular Point, which I didn't like, but also didn't hate after I saw it. My opinion on Singular Point has soured significantly since I lasted watched it (I only watched it once), and the more I think back about it, the more I dislike it 👎. I also watched the CGI Resident Evil movies and that CGI Resident Evil miniseries if you want to count those as anime. I do since my review of the latest CGI Resident Evil movie, Resident Evil: Death Island is categorized in my Anime tab as well as my Movie tab and my My Thoughts On tab. 

But, out of all those anime movies and shows that I watched in that 2020, 2021, and 2022 time period, Akudama Drive stood out as the one I genuinely hated. I hated it so much that I stopped watching it almost halfway through. I had never done that before with any of the anime that I had watched before. Not even with Singular Point, which, as I said I wasn't crazy about after I initially watched it. I've ever done it once again since doing it with Akudama Drive. I did it with Gamera: Rebirth, which was a horrible show, worse than Singular Point. That was the other time I've done that. I've done that twice, where I completely bail on an anime show I'm currently in the process of watching because I disliked it that much. I also did it with CatDog on the count that it was boring as shit, but that's a cartoon and not an anime, I'm only talking about anime here. 

I haven't watched Akudama Drive since I wrote my review and this follow-up, because I threw away the Blu-Ray copy 💿 I had of it. I didn't intend to, it just got messed up in the rain 🌧️. I talk about this in the main text itself, but I'll go into a little bit more detail about it here. You can use what I said in the main text below to fill in the blanks. 

I put it outside along with other stuff, and it was just sitting there. We were trying to look for the receipt 🧾 so we could take it back to Best Buy and get our money 💵 back, but we couldn't find it. Then, one day, it rained 🌧️, heavily. The case and slip cover got all soaked, and I just decided to throw it because it was all messed up. I hated the show anyway, so it wasn't a total loss for me. Besides, even if I still had Akudama Drive, I still wouldn't have watched it because I hated it that much. 

Now, you might be thinking, why did I even buy Akudama Drive in the first place? Well, I already kind of said it in my review, but I'll go into a little bit more detail here. I bought it because I thought it looked cool. The cover intrigued. This was one of the anime shows that I saw advertised in one of those Amazon ads I received when I was still getting emails from Amazon on the count of my Amazon Prime subscription, which I regret since it messed up my bank account. I don't have a bank account at this time because I signed up for an Amazon Prime subscription. I didn't know what I was doing with my finances back then. 

Anyway, I saw it one of those ads or newsletters that Amazon will send you if you sign up for Amazon Prime, along with Cannon Busters. And I was pleasantly surprised by Cannon Busters, maybe it'll be the same with Akudama Drive. It seemed like it would a be a cool action anime, with these bounty hunter guys called Akudama. Plus, it was way cheaper than the Yashahime Season 1 Part 1 Blu-Ray 💿 that Best Buy was also selling at the time. This only costed 40 some bucks, while the Yashahime Season 1 Part 1 Blu-Ray cost $70 💵 😨. 

So, I gave it a chance, and it let me down 😞. They don't even clearly define what an Akudama even is. Are they bounty hunters? Are they mercenaries? Are they serial killers? Are they terrorists? Are they thieves? It seems like from the episodes that I watched that they are all five. They're pretty much whatever the plot needs them to be. Like, some of the Akudama they introduce seem to bounty hunters or mercenaries, while other seem to be like petty criminals, or high-class thieves and highly intelligent criminal masterminds, or just straight up serial killers. 

The worldbuilding in that show, what little I saw of it in the episodes I watched was a mess. It made no goddamn sense at all. I understood the basic gist of it that it was a dystopian future city with an authoritarian government, or just a really corrupt and ineffective government, which is why they have that police force where the officers wear all white and carry stun batons, and know martial arts. But, the specifics, the specifics made no sense, and I didn't care enough to keep watching to learn the specifics, even if they got into specifics at all. The story didn't engage me and I didn't like the characters enough to keep watching. 

So, I just stopped watching, and that was the end of that. It could've been way better, and I talk about all the ways that it could have been better in this post. So, I'm just going to stop right here, and let you get on with it, because I hate to toot my own horn, but I think I came up with some good stuff on how to make this show somewhat more watchable and tolerable.

 

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(This is the poster or cover art of Akudama Drive.)

 

I didn't think I would ever have to return this show, but a thought came to me recently. I started thinking that the show should've focused more on the two cops than the Akudama and their stupid journey with those two kids. I found myself rooting for them than the actual Akudama that I'm supposed to root for. The Akudama were so fucking annoying and unlikable, I couldn't wait for them all to die, or at least, get off the screen. I wanted those two cops to kill them all, especially that doctor lady who refuses to die 😡.

Plus, I think the female cop would've made for a much better protagonist than the one we got. She's easily the most likable and sympathetic character in the whole show, which is not very good because the cops in this world are supposed to be the bad guys, like they're supposed to be the overly authoritarian, brutal, and cruel police force enforcing the authoritarian and cruel government's unjust and unfair law, while the Akudama are supposed to be our rebellious, likable, Robin Hood-type criminals or vigilantes that are sticking it to the man. But, none of that comes across in the show.

The way it comes across in the show, it's perfectly understandable why they have this brutal police force and why they have all these rules and laws, the Akudama are absolutely dangerous and complete menaces to society. If I lived in this world, I would want all the Akudama to either be killed or locked up, I would be on the police and government's side on this.

Even with our protagonist, it really does feel like she's being held hostage by these Akudama and this talking robot cat 🐈, who's revealed to be this boy who was experimented on by the government along with his sister. She didn't choose to go along with them, and she isn't a career criminal or killer like any of them. She only got arrested because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

If my memory serves me right, she got arrested because she didn't pay something or she had loose change, I really don't remember exactly, but it was something frivolous. It was meant to show how authoritarian and out of control the world had become that someone could arrested for something so small and innocuous. And then, she just makes her own situation worse by lying about her being an Akudama which grabs the attention of that boy with the robot cat 🐈 who may or not have special powers, since he wants to trick a bunch of Akudama into freeing him and his sister from government captivity and take them...somewhere.

I don't know where because I stopped watching this show halfway through, it was so bad. But anyway, she keeps lying and lying until she traps herself in the ruse, and is unable to get out of it. And when you're watching it, you just want her to get out of this situation, leave this Akudama crew, leave this mission, and go back to her mom, who the show pretty much forgets about in the halfway point.

And it seems the only reason she sticks around with them is a combination of Stockholm Syndrome and feeling a sense of obligation to protect these children, if from not from the government and police, then from these Akudama who are complete psychos and morally reprehensible people.

Like, if I were those two kids, I wouldn't feel safe at all with those Akudama, I would feel scared and nervous like my life was constantly in danger ⚠️, and they almost lose control of the Akudama a few times, so their lives were really in danger ⚠️. I just don't have any idea why these kids thought that hiring a bunch of killers and psychopaths to protect them and escort them to where they want to go was a good idea.

That's like if you were kidnapped, almost had your organs harvested, and then you hire Ted Bundy, or Jeffery Dahmer, or John Wayne Gacy, or Leonard Lake and Charles Ng to rescue you and then escort you home and hope that you can control them and that they won't kill you or molest you or whatever.

Anyway, I got off track with ranting about the show some more, let's back to that female cop. Not only is easily the most sympathetic and engaging character in this whole show, but they could've done an interesting story arc with her. Like, they could've had it to where she starts feeling conflicted about helping the government recover these two children who were experimented on, and switches sides and decides to rescue them and help them. Which puts her at odds with her partner, but also the entire institution.

But, I would have it to where she still doesn't like the Akudama and sees the legitimate threat that they pose, but reluctantly decides to work with them to protect these children. Maybe, she can keep the Akudama at bay, and make sure that they don't get out of line and harm the kids. Or maybe, don't make the Akudama protagonists at all and have them be more of an antagonistic obstacle that the female cop and the two kids have to deal with on their journey.

Maybe, you could have the government hire the Akudama to capture the kids and kill the female cop after she switched sides and decided to rescue them. That way you can really show how corrupt the government and police are by hiring these killers, thieves, and psychopaths to do their bidding.

Would any of this make the show any better? Probably not. The show is so badly written that very little could actually save it. But, at least we wouldn't have to deal with the Akudama constantly being on screen 😑. If you were to actually make this show better and make it worth watching, you would have to completely retool it from a conceptual and narrative level.

It probably wouldn't really be the same show, which I can see why the creators or the writers or director wouldn't want to do that. It's their show, their baby, they wouldn't want to tamper with it and losing the core essence. I don't know if this show was based on a manga or it's a purely original show, but that statement still applies either way. I myself would be very protective or something I came up with and created on my own with my own imagination, and would be reluctant to change it.

But, if your show was like this, then maybe you should rethink it and retool it into something else because it's dead on arrival otherwise. Hopefully, if I ever find myself and my work in this predicament, I can work up the courage to change it and make it better if it isn't working. That's all I have to say on the matter, I think the two cops should've been the main focus, and the female cop should've been the protagonist. But, at the same time, I don't think it would've made the show any better unless you fundamentally changed the show, and reshaped it to better fit this idea of the female cop being the protagonist.

In other words, take the Akudama out of the equation, as they're the main thing dragging this show down, even though they're supposed to be what the show is based around. But, if the thing your show's based around isn't any good, then maybe you should completely rethink it 🤷‍♂️. But, as it is, this show is not very salvageable. The only good things about it are the animation, and the design of the futuristic cyberpunk setting.

But that's window dressings compared to what really matters which are the story and characters, and neither of those things were executed well in this show in my opinion. Hopefully, I won't have to talk about this awful show again. Hopefully, I won't have to talk about this awful show again. I still have the Blu-Ray 💿, despite my best efforts to return it. My grandma and I were never able to find the receipt 🧾.

But, the case got messed up in the rain 💦, because my grandma had it in a basket outside along with other snacks and goodies that we were going to give to my sisters. The discs 💿 weren't damaged, but the slip cover and the paper cover art were completely messed up and wet. I think I'll just throw it away, I have no plans to watch the show anytime soon, and if I really want to do a YouTube video on it in the future or if people request it, then I can always buy another one. Hopefully, I won't have to 😞, but I'm not too worried. I never was a big YouTuber, I was always pretty small, and I never got requested to do anything 😌. That's the true benefit of being a small fry YouTuber and not a big YouTuber with thousands or millions of subs and views.