Of Swords and Parasols

I recently said that this anime is what happens when Kaori Yuki watches too many gangster movies and throws in a couple slashers. On reflection, I realize I was wrong. Baccano! is what happens when Kaori Yuki and Hiroaki Samura go out drinking then go on a weeklong gangster movie binge while discussing their respective creations, and get joined about halfway through by Kohta Hirano.

Set mostly between 1930 and 1932, Baccano! is about an AU prohibition era US focusing on gangsters, immortals, thieves, hustlers, assassins, and at least one homunculus. There are at least twenty major characters and I think six or seven major plotlines set in at least three different time periods, and five couples. (Here's an example of what counts as a "getting to know you" conversation.) The opening credits kindly provide us with the names of a number of the characters, and scenes that shift time periods include dividers clarifying the year. I’m sure everyone who has watched this was extremely grateful for the above, even though the series is still hopelessly complicated and crowded until near the end, when everything comes together nicely. The bulk of the plot is resolved in the first 13 episodes, which are the main series, and the last three episodes, which were direct-to-DVD OVAs wrap up the remainder, as well as provide most of the personal and emotional resolution for the characters.

The approach to the series is a gleeful embracing of violent insanity, amorality, and straight up violence with an intense, joyful love and adoration of violent psychopaths that I would say was unmatched if it weren’t for Certain Manga that I’ve read. There are jaw dropping declarations of violently bloody worldviews, and a number of scenes that I am verygrateful took place outside a train at night so that I couldn’t make out all the violence. And yet, you end up loving most of them.

Then there’s the series idea of romance. On the one hand, you have a pair of dimwitted but very goodhearted thieves who, despite being wise enough to better virtually everyone they come in contract with (no, seriously, every single character they meet loves them*), who don’t notice that they’ve become immortal for the first 70 years that they’re immortal and a pair of hustlers with hero complexes who are together for ten years before sharing their first kiss, because he’s such a gentleman. To be fair, I think they’ve been together since they were about 12. Also, she ended up with scars all over her body and lost an eye in an explosion, so he tattooed a sword on his face so that they’d both always get strange looks. At the other end of the spectrum, you have a beautiful masochist in love with a gangster who expresses his love by declaring that he’ll kill her one day, and a chatty, mass murdering ex-trapeze artist/gangster assassin in love with a mute, seemingly emotionless assassin. Somewhere in between, there’s a teenaged gangster in love with the immortal homunculus daughter of an evil immortal trying to kill other immortals, and create more immortals to kill. (The immortals can only be killed by other immortals, and when they die, the one who kills them gains all their knowledge.)

The first five minutes of this clip may be the best explanation for the appeal of the series. It’s from episode 12, and only really spoilery for a maiming. (There are a lot of maimings. Not all of them last.) It might reveal a mystery character’s identity, but I’m not sure about that, as I’m not sure he’s recognizable from how he’s seen before.

Plotwise all you need to know is that there are about 5 rival groups on a train, trying to kill each other, and everything is figuratively and literally going “BOOM!” (Don’t watch after the divider if you haven’t seen the series. It’ll just confuse you.)



At the point that a character leaps off the train to catch a rope and uses the water tower to flip back onto the train, I may have yelled “OMG ANIME I LOVE YOU FOREVER!” and scampered to Amazon to see how much it wanted for the DVDs as soon as the episode was over.

*I have a theory that Isaac and Miria are the show’s equivalent to a puppy and a kitten, and that they frolic through the show with about as much awareness as a puppy and kitten would have. Therefore, not liking Isaac and Miria would be the same as not liking a puppy and a kitten. And, at heart, almost everyone on the show secretly likes puppies and kittens, even if they keep it buried deep, deep down.