Kami no tó

Imagine a cake where you use good quality flour, home-grown eggs and season it perfectly, but at the same time you add a splash of sour milk, throw in half-rotten apples, do not even preheat the oven, and after ten minutes you take the half-baked goop out of the oven and present it immediately to the poor guests for consumption. That is roughly how the anime adaptation of Tower of God comes across. I had the privilege of reading the Korean original a long time ago, and the extent to which this adaptation has shown itself formidable in conveying the spectacularly mysterious atmosphere of the original manga, along with a reasonably-paced dispensing of the story, sent a shiver of surprise down my spine. All the characters are about as solid as marshmallows, their depth is comparable to that of a puddle, and it is hard to muster up sympathy for any of them. They shuffle about like figures in a panopticon, the audience learns little more about any of them than their name, there is very little to discuss regarding any of the internal development of the characters, and if the characters are not screaming at you, the pace and suspense of the story definitely are. The level of the drawing regularly reminded me of the early days of my experiments with the Paint app, but at least the animation saves it a little, and so does the soundtrack. So, for the soundtrack and a few good moments that remind you that the original Korean manga draft is several light-years ahead in quality I give it 2 stars. (16/10/2020)