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This Week in Anime
Is It The Beginning Or The End for TBATE?
by Christopher Farris & Lucas DeRuyter,
Chris and Lucas look at what went wrong enough in The Beginning After The End that the original creator felt the need to say something.
Disclaimer:The views and opinions expressed by the participants in this chatlog are not the views of Anime News Network. Spoiler Warning for discussion of the series ahead.
The Beginning After The End anime is available on Tapas.
Chris
Lucas, this is a first. In my time as an anime critic, I've had to watch a lot of mediocre isekai adaptations. But I can't the last time a creator came out and apologized for one of those.
What sort of topsy-turvy world have I seemingly reincarnated into, that this is a thing?
Lucas
Chris, I hope you, our audience, and Anime Jesus will forgive me for TurtleMe, the author of The Beginning After The End disavow the anime adaptation, even as he is directly and indirectly benefiting from its release.
Even as production shouting out internal issues or giving their unfiltered opinions on a work becomes more common, it's still WILD to see something like this; though it did motivate me to see what all the drama was about!
"Disavow" is a strong word in this context, as TurtleMe is mainly asking for fans to be patient and understanding of the anime adaptation...while acknowledging that he's had little control over how it turned out compared to TBATE's original novel and comic versions.
As someone who doesn't keep up with this particular genre/medium scene, all of this made me wonder if it was worth this much hoopla. As I said, mid-isekai anime are a dime a dozen, so it can seem an odd outlier that this particular one prompted such an outcry.
I might be getting a little spicy with my verb choices, but this is an industry where Junji Ito didn't say a peep about the widely panned anime adaptation of his magnum opus Uzumaki. No matter how good or bad an anime is, it's rare to hear the original creator say much more than, "I was consulted on this and I hope you watch it!" This is an unfathomably rare occurrence, though, after watching more of the anime and reading a bit of the comic, I understand why TurtleMe felt the need to speak out.
The The Beginning After The End anime is such a departure from the The Beginning After The End webcomic in both style and tone that it almost feels like an unrelated work!
I will say that from what I checked out of the TBATE comic, it's not like the work really resonated with me in that form, either. I it it looks a little better scrolled through on a smaller phone screen, as is the intent of the medium, but in general, this isn't artistry free of jank. Folks can lament that the early episodes of TBATE lack the polish of something like Mushoku Tensei, but I don't know that the adventures of this Funko-Pop-looking baby cried out for an anime with a ton of glitz.
Granted, the tonal and adaptational changes at work are their own beast. I'm not going to complain about the anime getting through Arthur's exhaustingly detailed infancy a little quicker, though the decision to frontload later details about the sci-fi world he hails from and the specifics of his kingship is a more interesting move.
Neither of these versions of this work is particularly appealing to me, but at least the quirks of the comic feel more human and endearing. The art in the TBATE comic isn't phenomenal, but at least it has the feeling of the illustrator, Fuyuki23, getting the hang of the art style and direction in the series. By comparison, the poor blocking, effects work, and anatomy in the anime feel like the product of a production that didn't have the time, budget, or inclination to give the project as much care as they could have.
The story beat changes in the anime are pretty baffling. I don't think either version of TBATE is particularly well written, but I'm far more interested in what this reincarnated baby goofball gets up to in the comic, compared to the stoic, murderous reincarnated king baby in the anime.
I will also say that the comic version of TBATE does seem to have a better handle on using the scrolling style of the 'toon format than some other examples I've seen. Fuyuki23 does cool things with long scrolling segments, conveying motion and perspective. I'm still not a believer, but there are spots where they make it work, and TBATE certainly feels a bit more brisk than other comics like this I've checked out.
Relevant to our pursuits here, TurtleMe talked with ANN in an interview this past February about how he wrote all the scripts for the comic adaptation and worked directly with the art team on its creation. That's a level of input that lets the adaptation adhere closer to the creator's vision in a way that can convey it beyond any looser artistic abilities. Notably, in that same interview, TurtleMe its some trepidation with the inherent unknowns of going into the anime adaptation process. Ruh-roh!
While the TBATE comic makes the most of the medium conventions, I'm staring down the big 3-0 in June and have an aversion to any work of art, or interface, that looks like it was explicitly designed for phones. It's rough that TurtleMe's instincts were right on the money, and the anime adaptation is even more disappointing after learning about the amount of care he put into the webcomic adaptation. Tonally and stylistically, the anime does not understand what made the original work appealing to its audience!
Had I been one of the dedicated TBATE fans following this adaptation in the run-up to its premiere, I could have told you the result was probably not going to be a stunner. The main animation duty for the anime fell to Battle Game in 5 Seconds.
A wonder these guys don't seem to have improved beyond their early days on my beleaguered, beloved Transformers: Energon.
Expectations for the TBATE anime should have been set below the floor! Especially considering most anime based on webcomics have failed to impress. While webcomics were initially hailed as a wellspring of new material that would revitalize the anime industry, the reality has been much more of a mixed bag.
While I think it's fair to say the most successful anime based on a webcomic has been Sword Art Online back in the day after watching Solo Leveling.
You're talking to the guy who called the first cour of Solo Leveling the worst anime he watched that season, so you're preaching to the choir here.
It doesn't help that the webcomic space is chock-a-block with the same kind of isekai-adjacent power fantasies that have fueled so much of the light-novel-adaptation glut of the past decade and change of anime. Solo Leveling and TBATE are both included in that category, to the point that you'd be hard-pressed to guess they were based on a fresher form of source material if you didn't already know.
I knew I was in good company, but the cynicism behind the TBATE anime feels a cut above what we're used to seeing in isekai now that I've read the comic. With the removal of almost all levity present in the source material, it almost feels like the production team was banking on works in this genre resonating with edgelords. They made the opening darker because they assumed that's what the audience wants to see.
Part of me doesn't mind the TBATE anime going all-in on showing King Gray's previous grimy sci-fi world life compared to how the comic paced it out. It more immediately lends the story a little of its flavor. When it's otherwise a paint-by-numbers early day reincarnation opening that isn't showing off via production values, this series needs everything it can to help it stand apart from its peers.
Besides, it's not like the TBATE anime has excised the goofier moments. I think it's just that I've sat through too many other iffy isekai that used cynicism and/or irreverence as a crutch to worry about them cropping up again in this example.
Also, not for nothing, but Makoto Furukawa doing his deep-voiced narration over baby Arty's antics is sometimes funny.
I understand what you're saying, but the change in the anime didn't work for me. I had a hard time caring about Arty's baby adventures, after learning that he fully sucked in his life as King Gray. Though I will it that anime does use the voice actors to their fullest, and the narration has helped elevate the anime more than once.
Speaking of King Gray's sci-fi world, am I the only one who thinks it's weird that Arty's original world is supposed to be a sci-fi setting but is more steeped in the markers of a fantasy setting than the world he reincarnates into? This is an issue in both the comic and the anime, but I'm tripped up every time Arty comments on swords and magic being a surprising thing in this new world, when we're introduced to his old world via sequences with swords and technology that's so advanced that it might as well be magic.
TurtleMe confirmed that TBATE was his first story, so you get a sense of him writing by the seat of his pants as he figured out the contrasting styles and systems between the past and present settings. Sometimes it works for a slow pull-back, like the reveal of what Gray's "King" status meant in his world, and how that factored into the worldview he reincarnated with.
I am frankly uninterested in the superpower systems at the heart of these worlds, or how Gray/Arty's lifetime of experience gives him a leg up on manifesting them. But the idea that he's getting a chance to learn empathy and grow into a better person over a whole bonus lifetime is the germ of a concept, and a decent use of this oft-used reincarnation conceit. A lot of the time, these reborn mediocre Melvins can't even gesture at the idea of personal growth that isn't simply getting super-powerful and enslaving a few people.
You make a strong argument, and the anime's choice to establish Gray as a bastard earlier makes more sense if you ultimately view TBATE as a redemption story. But then the crux of the story is about a dude who sucks trying to suck a little less, and that is such a boring narrative arc in my personal opinion. For it to be done well, an author needs to have some serious writing chops and ground everything in experiences that are universal to the human condition, and we rarely see those qualities in an isekai storyline.
This seems to be the overall thrust of TBATE's approach: following Arty's life as he grows across those experiences and interactions. It's a conceit ostensibly built for the long term and for those who have been following it since the beginning (after the end) to be able to assure you how much better it gets as it builds up more layers behind it.
With that in mind, I can see the concerns from fans about the anime adaptation not putting its best foot forward to hook people with the story still in its infancy. It needed the sheen of Mushoku Tensei's lavish treatment of its protagonist's bumbling baby times to get viewers to care.
That Jobless Reincarnation comparison is apt. Maybe I'm being a bit reductive in thinking this, but it feels like a lot of popular webcomics draw heavily upon other successful anime, manga, and light novels, without being able to capture what makes those works so special or find a hook of their own that's as compelling.
That being said, I think we can all agree that, even if he did literal war crimes during his life as Gray, Art is way less of a chud and infinitely more likeable than Rudy from Jobless Reincarnation.
Arty does at least clear the shockingly difficult anti-slavery bar, putting him ahead of many of the more maligned isekai protags out there.
A point is, though, that even as TBATE compares favorably, story-wise, so far to the likes of the aforementioned Solo Leveling and Mushoku Tensei, its apparent popularity seemingly got a lot of fans hoping that TBATE would receive a similar level of standout production on its anime. Which is not what they ended up experiencing.
Real talk, my reaction to the first episode of TBATE was "Eh, this is low-key but I've seen worse," while by the second episode I was like "Ooooohhh, now I see why fans of this franchise made this go viral."
I should learn how to post GIFs to chat, but thankfully posting a still image of a fight scene from the TBATE anime has the same impact as posting a video! It's nothing but slideshows!
Also, shoutouts to whatever stock asset bank the production team pulled the magic glow effects and action line layers from. Those are doing a LOT of work to make poorly framed and animated shots seem even slightly exciting.
It's just cheap and low-effort all around, and as I said, hardly unexpected from Studio A-Cat. Let's hear it for their most regular guest-stars: unholy CGI homunculi!
They're planning to keep this going for two cours, somehow.
Now, all that said, this is where I put on my old-man perspective hat and bring up that the fan response to the TBATE anime's shortcomings was perhaps a bit overzealous. As I said, crusty-looking isekai adaptations have become a central feature of modern anime, with prior well-loved series like Arifureta getting the short end of the stick.
TurtleMe may be apologetic over the state of the TBATE anime, but at least he never petulantly demanded that a production throw out a bunch of finished work.
Between all of the piss scenes, anal sex allusions, and general misogyny, I forgot about this particular bit of ArifuretaChainsaw Man anime), but I promise you'll be happier and more fulfilled in life if you take the L on this one and find other stuff to be excited and joyful about.
The nature of adaptation, to say nothing of the razor-thin operations of modern anime production, is that there are always going to be whiffs. People waited decades to get a Girls' Frontline anime.
Honestly, I respect TurtleMe for being willing to wade into a subreddit's worth of angry, disappointed fans to try to assuage things from his side. It isn't his fault. Hopefully, his love for his story shared with readers can salvage something to bond over. A learning experience of the sort that young King Arty could benefit from.
I say this every time a lackluster adaptation of a fan favorite series airs; no matter how bad it is, it can't take away from what made you appreciate the original work so much. Even if the TBATE anime fails to bounce back throughout the next 20 or so episodes, and web novel and comic that appealed to so many will always be around and you can keep on recommending that version of the series to people instead.
Alternatively, you can always hope for the reboot route sooner rather than later! Fans, look forward to The Beginning After The End: Re-Rebirth, coming in 2030!
By 2030, The Beginning After The Beginning After The End Ended is on track to be a pretty tame title for an isekai anime based on the genre trends we've seen so far!
Honestly, I have to presume that we'll have finally moved on from isekai as an omnipresent trend by then.
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