Forum - View topicEP. REVIEW: Joker Game
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SailorPluto1313
Posts: 118 |
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I just can't shake the feeling that Maki isn't really dead....
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Hansond Jaysond Lee
 Posts: 57 |
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Don't use a spoilery thumbnail like that, jerk.
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Sacred Blood
Posts: 38 |
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Joker Game has been my favorite anime of the season by a landslide. I'm not a huge fan of stand-alone, episodic stories unless they're very well-done and Joker Game has proven to be just that.
Episode 11 was another great episode as a self-contained story but for the first time I was slightly disappointed for two reasons. First, I expected the last two episodes to be a coherent, two-parter to bring a sense of closure for the series and secondly, I was looking forward to Miyoshi's (Maki) story the most since he was introduced as the suave yet sardonic, poster boy for the D-agency but his role was very anti-climactic for someone who stood out from all the other D-agency boys. Anyway, onward to the finale. While I still wish the last two episodes were a two-parter, I hope Joker Game goes out with a bang. It's been a great ride. I don't see this getting a second season because it seems like those one-time works and has very limited appeal but I'll be very grateful to the fujoshis if they can make the series a commercial success out of love for all its pretty boys, if nothing else. |
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Merida
 Posts: 1945 |
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Is this show actually popular with fujoshi? I'm not completely averse to shipping pretty boys with each other just for the heck of it, but our d-ageny spies have so little personality that i find it really hard to imagine them to have any interests in anything outside of...well, spying. 
As for this week's ep., could they have made those nazi officers any more blond and blue-eyed?! Poor Maki, like others i expected him to rise from the deathbed any given moment, but it was almost a relief to find out that our superspies are mortal human beings in the end (but of course, even in death, they outsmart their enemies...). |
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Zhou-BR
Posts: 1456 |
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I'm terrible at telling the D Agency's spies apart or remembering their names, but because "Maki" was voiced by Hiro Shimono, I realized that he was actually Miyoshi, the agent who was prominently featured along with Sakuma in the first two episodes. The fact that such a character could die like that really drives home how impossible it is to plan for every eventuality, even for a spymaster like Yuuki.
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zztop
Posts: 649 |
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The anime's website has a chronological timeline of the episodes.
The anime's events occur between 1939-1941, episodes aired in non-chronological order. http://jokergame.jp/story/ 1937 Autumn: D-Agency is formed. 1939 Spring : Eps 1-2 (with Sakuma), Ep 12 (finale) 1939 Summer : Ep 6 (Asia Express with Tazaki) 1939 Autumn : Ep 5 (London with Kaminaga) 1940 Winter to Spring : Ep 7 (Cruise ship with Amari, Emma) 1940 Spring : Ep 10 (Yuuki beats Price), Ep 3 (Shimano in Nazi France) 1940 Summer to Autumn: Eps 8-9 (Formation and failure of rival Wind Agency) 1940 Autumn : Ep 11 (Miyoshi dies, Colonel Wulff investigates) 1941 Summer : Ep 4 (Hajime in Shanghai) |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11513 |
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Hold up, the passenger manifest in episode 7 said the date was June 21, 1940. That's not winter to spring.
Not sure how I feel about the jumping around in time. Can't decide if it matters to me or not, but I'm kinda thinking I don't like it. 
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MarshalBanana
 Posts: 5467 |
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Beobachter
Posts: 18 |
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I think people's problem with this has less to do with the episodic format and more with the lack of characterization. We, as the audience, are used to a show feeding information on its principal characters' backstory, motivation, and detailed personality ('why would I care what happened to 'X' if I don't get to know him' line of thinking), so Joker Game's deliberate choice to withhold all that information and establish a group identity feels alienating.
I personally don't mind that, I could enjoy a narrative that's much more plot/theme-driven than character-driven. The only problem with that is when I found the plot/story itself isn't that interesting, which happened with most of JG's middle episodes. Fortunately, the last three or four episodes have been very engaging, with a strong direction to boot. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11513 |
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Episode 12
Wow, we got a real name for one of them. Not the outcome I expected, nor the type of episode I'd expect them to go out on. But oddly, that gives me hope for another season. Nice to see everyone together again though, alive and well. And I loved all the little smirks on everyone's faces while Odagiri was being grilled. I wonder what Takahiro Sakurai has been up to this season. He used to be in everything, but he's only had minor roles in a handful of series lately. Do they think he's aging out of the fangirl demographic or something, or has he got some other big project going on? |
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wolf10
 Posts: 914 |
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If the presence of Miyoshi (and all of them together, really) wasn't enough of a clue, the final episode takes place immediately after episodes 1 and 2, timeline wise. So it's actually before the rest of the series.
Personally, I found it odd that after spoiler[all the stones thrown at the Japanese military over the series' run], the final anime episode ends with spoiler[a character deciding he can't be a "monster" like Yuuki or his merry band of technical pacifists, instead choosing a life in the "normal" military. That military. You know, the proto-Nazis? The ones with the institutionalized disregard for human life, friend or foe? That we've been throwing stones at the entire time?] I'm going to need some time to sort out exactly how ironic this episode was meant to be. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11513 |
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^ In Manchuria, no less. Apparently he was hoping to hook up with the actress there? Dude...
Perhaps a second season would help to clarify the author's intent. For all we who haven't read the novel know, he could come back to act as the vehicle for commenting on what went on there. But even if that was in there, I wouldn't expect it to be detailed in an anime beyond saying it was awful. |
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wolf10
Posts: 914 |
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Oh, it's not author's intent, it's the director's. This is an adaptation in the same vein as Kino's Journey or Humanity has Declined (or even The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya), where a number of short stories that were presented out of sequence in the source material are adapted in a different order than originally presented.
Just trying to wrap my head around the "why" of it all. Here's hoping for a second season. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11513 |
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Sending him to Manchuria to join the army he so despised wasn't the author's idea? I thought that's what we were talking about. (the "dude..." comment was aimed at Odagiri, not you)
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wolf10
Posts: 914 |
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Oh, no, I assume that part was.
I was more commenting on why this particular story was used as an end point. I have a feeling it fits better into context in the novels. |
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