Casshern Sins 1: End of the world 「終末のせかいで」

As Casshern has been made into an anime series a long time ago and a live action movie recently, the series must have quite a following to have a new installment. I haven't seen the older series nor the movie, so I wonder if the story will be different here.


The episode opens with Casshern claiming he's going to kill a girl, Luna. After the opening song, which consists of mostly still shots, Casshern is shown to fight with a bunch of robots. The world is rotting, and it seems there aren't many humans left in the world. The robots all want to kill Casshern, since there is rumor saying that the rotting will end if Casshern is exterminated. The robots don't really believe the rumor, but they don't want to die without doing anything. As expected of our main protagonist, he easily disposed of the robots.



Later on, Casshern meets a girl who is collecting shell on the shore,named Ringo, who is not afraid of him. She wonders if Casshern is a robot or human. Casshern himself doesn't know though. After some talk, the girl is leaving to find her grandpa as he might be worried if she leaves too long. As a final thought, Casshern said that he doesn't think (the world?) is crumbling. Ringo is happy to hear it, so she gave the best shell to Casshern. Before far though, a robot attacks her thinking a little girl like her should just be eliminated. While the girl claims she's a robot too, the robot doesn't care. Casshern managed to save Ringo and shreds the robot into pieces, but this makes the girl afraid.




Thankfully for Ringo, her grandpa came by and pick her up. After they left, a new girl is making an appearance and said that Casshern is the cause of all the rotting in the world because of what he did in the past. Casshern is happy to find someone who knows about his past, but before he can ask to many questions, he has to fight the girl...



Impression
The character design has an 80s feel to it, which may throw some people off. While the action sequences itself is quick, the pace feels slow, probably to emphasize the dark theme. In fact, most of the episodes has gloomy colors, apt for a world that is nearing an end. You might like this if you want an action series that feels different to what is the norm recently. But if you want a Geass-like breakneck speed on plot progression and action, probably better see something else.

Casshern SINS 「キャシャーん　SINS」　official website
Opening theme:Blue flower (Aoi Hana) 「青い花」 by Color Bottle
Ending theme:reason by KANA