This Week in Anime

The Strangely Dark World of Unico

Micchy
Nicky, for all the discussion around the late Osamu Tezuka and the impact he had on early anime/manga, there's one thing about him that until recently has been overlooked. Sure, he's remembered as this titan of manga, but once you look past the reputation you might notice a curious trend of featuring cute/sexy animal people. Now you could say it's rude of me to accuse Tezuka of being a covert furry, but to that I raise you: catgirl maid.

Ah yes, Sanrio, the company that brought us Hello Kitty; Aggretsuko; and Ringing Bell, the cute sheep movie that scarred a generation of children. But we're not here to talk about either the metal-screaming red panda or the vengeful murder sheep. We're here to talk about the cute pink unicorn who saves people with the power of love. His name is Unico (because he's a unicorn) and he is most definitely not a My Little Pony.

Considering it goes from "everyone loves Unico, the baby unicorn that spreads happiness wherever he goes!" to "we regret to inform you that the gods are displeased with him for making their religion obsolete" within five minutes, yeah, it's kind of a lot!

But like in every other story where the powerful try to force someone else to do their dirty work for them, West Wind half-asses the order. She's all like "nah, oblivion sounds like a step too far, how about I drop him on this other, much closer island with nobody on it? Surely that's an acceptable compromise that doesn't require me to fly 1000 years?"

Turns out that "someone" is a smurf troll with daddy issues. You know, the kind of guy you totally want for a roommate.

Demon kid is set on following his dad's example in being the world's most miserable hermit, but unfortunately for him, living alone on an island gets pretty boring. And the promise of a unicorn friend to hang out with/bully is really too tempting to pass up!

He's not exactly the nicest playmate, no. But can you really blame him for being rough around the edges when he was raised by Mr. "I hate everyone so much I'm gonna bugger off to an island in the middle of nowhere" Demon of Solitude I?

It may not be an excuse, but it is a little easier to forgive the lil stinker when he struggles to comprehend things like "not being a jerk" and "helping people in need."

Demon kid then has Babby's First Moral Dilemma when he struggles to decide whether it's worth getting his tail wet to save his one and only friend (?) from drowning. On the one hand, he's not supposed to be nice. He's a demon, after all. But on the other hand, he does kind of like having Unico around, and besides, he did promise to give the horn back at the end of the day. He may be a jerk, but he's a jerk with integrity. Solitary upbringing versus the power of friendship...Okay yeah, power of friendship it is.

@ the gods:

Luckily, since Unico has the power to befriend pretty much anything that breathes, it's not long before he finds a new playmate in the form of a very bratty cat in need of a reality check.

To be fair though, Chao is really cute.

Look, Chao has it all planned out. Step one: find a witch. Step two: become a witch's familiar. Step three: infinite wishes! Maybe marry a handsome prince somewhere in the middle, eat a cockroach or two, and then complain about how people just don't appreciate her culinary taste, it's perfect.

She uh, seems to be having a bit of trouble with step 1.

Can't say Chao's quite ready to be a human yet though. For one, she doesn't seem to get that people are bipedal.

She also doesn't know to suspect the ominous aristocrat who asks for her address, social security number, and the digits on the front and back of her credit card. SMH Chao, she was never going to make it.

Oh, who could've predicted that the man named Baron Ghost and accompanied by dramatic music doesn't have Chao's best interests in mind?

So yeah Baron Ghost invites her over, roofies her drink, and carries her off to a bed to prepare to... metaphorically date rape her? I think? This is about where the movie starts going off the rails a little so I'm assuming Baron Ghost is a vampire or some shit rather than an actual literal rapist in a family movie.

Yeah, remember how Unico was afraid Demon-kun was gonna break his horn? Never mind that actually, Unico's horn is now a combination sword/weed whacker/jackhammer.

Baron Ghost falls off a roof in Disney villain fashion, gets impaled on a spire of his own castle, and the day is saved! Except oh no, we forgot to mention that Baron Ghost is undead. Oops.

Up until this point Fantastic Adventures of Unico is a relatively straightforward movie about friendship and the power of unconditional love, but then the undead vampire count turns into a physical manifestation of aristocratic rot and everything turns on its head. It's honestly incredible how quickly the Ghost/Unico conflict becomes a battle of everything good and healing versus the hegemony of old, this looming shadow of wealth and power and darkness threatening to squash out the hope our small heroes offer.

Taking down the incarnation of all evil in kid-friendly way: by throwing him into a pit of lava and watching him crumble into ash. Yes this is a very wholesome movie.

Real happiness is the friends he makes along the way, but they are just that: along the way. In the end the happiness he brings is bittersweet; he has all the friends in the world but gets to keep none at all.

Unico's one of those things that deals in platitudes but sticks to them hard enough that they ring true again. It's creepy at times, adorable at others, and most importantly doesn't end in murder sheep. Only minor kid trauma here, not the nihilist horror of that other infamous Sanrio thing.

We'll just leave it at "friendship is magic," shall we?