Season 1 |
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Episode Guide
Highway
Heartbeat
Grip
Mask
Compass
Tokyo
Tokyo Override is the latest Netflix animation, split across 6 episodes and featuring some rip-roaring action and a nicely realized world. Despite an intriguing set-up, the show does suffer from lackluster characterisation, mostly brought about thanks to frenetic, rushed pacing that really holds this back from being better. This is such a fascinating futuristic world too, backed by some gorgeous visuals, that it almost feels like a wasted opportunity given the potential here.
The story is a simple one, with your classic rebels-take-on-the-system story. However, to understand all of that, we’re whisked off to a very different Japan in the future. Following a devastating earthquake, Japan is now split into three districts, each separated by digital walls. The original citizens live in the West. New citizens live in the East, while the Mid district (mid for middle not mediocre here!) is made up with a mix of West and East residents.
Traceability is all over the city, blanketing Japan in a digital canvas. This powerful location-based technology allows for a post-privacy era where everybody is tracked all the time. For those that played Ubisoft’s Watch Dogs, the core premise here of hacking into the system and an uber-connected world feels relatively similar, although Tokyo Override is far more colourful and vivid.
The worldbuilding has some really nice nods too, including one specific instance where the group look over a traffic light as an ancient relic, baffled over how people would be happy to just stop rather than continuously pushing forward and working.
These little moments are great and the visuals help to make this world pop. The colours are awash with neon shades of blue, yellow and pink, while the background details, showing residents going about their day or snapping photos, help to give this world a living, breathing core. The there different districts are all quite unique with their aesthetic, but there’s nowhere near enough time to properly dive into each and get a feel for how they operate together – or even against one another.
The character animation is generally pretty good too and you can see the influences of the Spider-verse all over this. There are nice little animated splashes when bikes hit traffic, plenty of zoom stripes while the gang are moving quick, and through it all the camera tracks smoothly through the chaos, especially during big chases which are easily the highlight of the whole show.
Our protagonist here is a plucky orphan hacker who’s not part of the system (colloquially referred to as an untagged) called Kai. She works as a runner, helping to ferry drugs or goods between the districts by hacking into the Walls and evading detection. All of this eventually catches up to her when she finds herself in the clutches of a drug run and the authorities, called the NARCs.
With the NARCs after her, Kai finds herself unwittingly joining a rebellion group who are pinned for the murders of untagged individuals cropping up in the districts. The rebels need to clear their name, but unfortunately the nefarious leader of the NARCs, Lizard, is closing in.
As the show continues, these two storylines inevitably converge into a plot about the wider world and a bigger conspiracy, where home truths are revealed and a nice twist toward the end shows the true dystopian core of this world, hidden beneath the glossy, bright façade on the surface.
It’s a decent story that serves its purpose, but unfortunately the characters here aren’t given enough time to really develop. There’s a good chunk of cast here too, including fellow hacker Watari, lovable oaf Hugo, cool and calm Spoke and talented rider Amarin. They all work together doing various Deliveries, which is overseen by government official Leuji.
The characters are all distinct and unique, with Father thrown in here as comedy relief, Hugo used as a kinda mentor and rallying cry for Kai, showing how far she’s come in such a short span of time. The others have their own individual little subplots but mostly remain subservient to Kai, who’s the main focus here.
Her arc is the meat of this show, and very much what drives the narrative forward. Her arc is a good one and it’s effective enough but everyone else is kinda left by the wayside.
Where the show slip up most is with its antagonists. I won’t go into details here as I don’t want to reveal the twists, but suffice to say it all feels quite generic and there’s not much of a conflict with Kai individually, which potentially could have been worked better into the story had there been one.
With all that being said though, Tokyo Override is a fun ride while it lasts. It has some serious issues with its frantic pacing, and nowhere near enough time to flesh out all the characters, but it’s undoubtedly good value if you’re after an action-packed anime romp.
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Verdict - 7/10
7/10