Love After World Domination… high concept, low returns

I liked the general idea

I really dig the main concept of the show. It’s tokusatsu, but the leader of the good team is courting a senior villain from the bad team. For the average Westerner, imagine Power Rangers, but the red ranger and a much younger Rita Repulsa are secretly dating. That’s basically it.

But the high concept is about the only thing going for this series.

It was a connect-the-dots situation

It could have been way better, had it not devolved into generic cutesy genre tropes. The two leads are completely insufferable in their willful obsequiousness. They are just utterly servile to each other, but unwilling to take a major step forward for six hours (12 episodes) of this series.

One of those two main characters, Fudo, is also so damn generic, from his character design down to his personality. It’s just infuriating, and the humor just never quite lands.

I desperately wanted to see some subversion. You know, there should have been something to latch onto, but there was nothing there. My favorite aspect of anime is that there’s no slavish obsession with being moored to reality or genre conventions. This show, unfortunately, played connect-the-dots for the rest of the way.

Not likely to save itself

I’ve also heard the manga (this show’s source material) was recently canceled. That doesn’t bode well for a new season of this show. Frankly, I think there was some hope that the ship could have been righted here. The central concept allowed for some real blurring of lines between good and evil. I remember Venture Bros had a lot of banal evil amongst the henchmen.

The cancelation also likely means that the inevitably rushed manga ending isn’t likely to hit the air either. We’re left with what we have.

Not for me, but maybe for others

Here’s a key factor that I’m considering in my rating: I’m likely not the target audience. Not every piece of media needs (or should) appeal directly to me. There is probably a decent swathe of anime fandom that is perfect for this type of show.

I’m envisioning the type of fan that likes quirky and light comedy, and just needs some unique canard in the show summary to be roped in. If that’s you, you’ll love this. I, however, did not. I wanted to like it, though. The idea left some opportunities for innovation upon the standard good vs. evil story.

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