I expected to be completely confused, but I left pleasantly surprised.
I know that I said in my review for the first, half-hour long Kyousougiga that I wasn't interested in seeing more of it, but the possibility of shedding some light on the crazy characters and plot line was enough to get me watching again. Overall, Kyousougiga 2 isn't very different from it's predecessor; the highlight is still the animation and the creative setting, with storyline and character arc taking a distant back seat. But while I still can't tell you what kind of story Kyousougiga is, let alone what it's trying to accomplish, this short series of ONAs (five minutes at the shortest, twelve at the longest) do pull back the curtain a little bit on Toei's reimagined Alice in Wonderland.
The story loosely follows a girl named Koto who apparently has connections to the spirit world and can summon familiars. She finds her way into the "mirror world" to search for clues to her mother. From there, it's an eclectic mix of characters (human and inhuman), a backdrop that's old Kyoto mixed with futuristic sci-fi, and impressive visuals to match. Like its predecessor, there's not much of a story to Kyousougiga 2, and it gets even more random when condensed down into these shorts. One episode focuses on the white-suited mafia that act as security for the town as they search for their boss' PSP; another is about "trash day" in this strange town (what is decided to be "worthless" just flies away). What is clear though (if you've seen the first release) is that these shorts seem to be intended as prequels, filling in some much-needed information about the characters, their motivations, and their place in the world, which makes the previous release much easier to understand in retrospect.
That said, for every question answered, several more pop up. Kyousougiga 2 assumes that the viewer is reading heavily between the lines, and it still relies heavily on symbolism for storytelling, making me very unsure whether the assumptions I made about the story and the characters are the truth or just another visual metaphor. What can be inferred also doesn't shed a lot of light on what the "end" of the story would entail; is it over when Koto finds out the truth about her parents? What's up with the White Rabbit? And we still don't know what's up with the Koto lookalike in the fox mask, although it's easy to assume that there's a connection with her "master"... My point is that there's still a lot to get confused by in Kyousougiga, but it seems to be content with its style of drip-feeding information. The cryptic "to be continued" message at the end does leave it open for a sequel, but it's unclear whether its next incarnation will be an actual conclusion or more shorts to fill in details about the world.
But there are still moments that make Kyousougiga 2 worth watching. The fourth and fifth episodes in particular are very well done on an emotional level. The last episode only has a few lines of dialogue and some on-screen text--the rest is told through visuals and music. It may be true that this series was conceived mainly for Toei to create a new prize figure line, but after glimpsing a bit of the heart behind Kyousougiga, now I'd be happy to see more if they continue to expand this world.
Images from YouTube.
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