Muv-Luv Alternative

Episode 12

The news that the Muv-Luv anime will wait a year before continuing after this season finale is definitely for the best. Not only does it ensure the production won't be overtaxed, it also gives any still-engaged newcomers to the franchise time to go back and check out the original visual novels, so they'll be all the more caught up on things when Part Two of the story kicks off next October. It also provides me with that bit of more motivation to evaluate this episode as an actual season finale, rather than as a mere arc-ender or even just another episode. With a year to wait, this provides a place to reflect on what actually worked about Muv-Luv Alternative, because there were things that did, compared to what the team behind it might want to reconsider their approach to in the follow-up.

The action's still solid enough, for one. As obligatory as the breakdown in negotiations last episode felt, it allows for an expected, but enjoyable mecha-battle climax for the first half of this one. It helps that being the big finish to a storyline like this means we can have just a few more robot-explosions and semi-major character deaths than usual. Irma gets killed early on! Walken faces off against Sagiri and goes down, then Sagiri gets taken out in his final stand against Tsukuyomi! It's the kind of final, stakes-clarifying clearing of the board that helps to communicate the feeling that, even though the side our heroes are on technically came out victorious, there were still a whole lot of losses incurred that they're going to have to accept the aftereffects of moving forward.

For all the gesturing at the glorious past the nationalist rebels are seemingly striving for Japan here, 'moving forward' comes across as the key theme at this point in the story, appropriate enough for something that also necessarily acts as a bridge to the next big story arc. With that negotiation breakdown, most of the involved parties are, at this point, simply clashing on account of their own personal ideals. We're specifically denied any particulars on the manipulative foreign faction within Walken's own ranks, indicating that they've got their own long-term plans for foreign governments like Japan's and making sure we keep them in mind as an element in future stories. Meanwhile, Sagiri's rage breaks down into an acceptance that he's at least stirred the spirits of the Japanese citizens, regardless of whether his 'side' won or not, to the point that country and people will know to take better care of each other in the future.

I think I like what Muv-Luv was trying to do with Sagiri here, but the ultimate drawing of his character is as much a victim of undercooking as most things have been in this season. There's a brief flashback to the incident in Yokohama that provides only the lightest context for where his worldview came from, but for the most part, his supposedly-sincere platitudes elicit the simple response of "Cool motive, still treason". From my viewpoint anyway, he still mostly comes off like someone who passionately threw his life away in a nationalistic death cult, feeling like Japan's pride was necessary in motivating its care for its people. He's raging against that consolidation into the collective humanity because he thinks they used to be a country. A proper country. It's appreciable that even the most culturally-devoted characters on the other side of the conflict like Tsukuyomi have the presence to rebuke his methods, but then the story (perhaps necessarily) goes the route of having Sagiri's whole faction of rebels surrender once he's been cut off as the head, with little interrogation for how other citizens might be stirred to such extreme methods or what might even happen to all of them now.

For its faults at contextualizing that turn in-story, Muv-Luv Alternative has at least used it to effectively communicate the theme of this part of the plot, I think. It's a thesis statement compelling enough that Yuuhi directly asks it of the surviving soldiers she addresses: "Is mankind not able to move forward without spilling its own blood?" That's the kind of broad meditation on human nature I expect from these dense visual novel exercises. It provides an anxiety borne against more universally optimistic stories. Instead it articulates the fear that, even in the face of a unilateral global threat, humanity still might not be able to come together; That we'd still be beholden to our petty tribalistic differences, some people driven so far as to attempt a violent coup on their own countrymen in the midst of the crisis.

Damn, good thing nothing like that could ever happen in real life, right?

As strongly as I think Muv-Luv's ideas have crystalized by this point in its run, it's also only accurate to admit that the telling of its actual story continues to lag, entirely due to the nature of the beast now. The moments between sisters Meiya and Yuuhi, facilitated by Takeru, land with kind of a basic emotional resonance thanks to their competence in presenting them, but the character connection was simply never going to be there on account of how little time we've still spent with someone like Meiya. That sort of issue is made abundantly apparent as we flash around to all the other characters as things wrap up for this season, and we're treated to little beats we assume must be characteristic, but fall flat because they're in service of people we still barely know. The most praising damnation I can pay points like this is that these bits are short so it doesn't feel like it's wasting too much of our time, but as with the same kinds of issues I was grappling with at the season's outset, that kind of dismissive reaction absolutely shouldn't be the one I'm having to content centering on people who are supposedly the main characters.

So here at this stopping point I must come back to the question I asked at the beginning of the season: "Is the Muv-Luv Alternative anime actually good?" It's better than it was, I think. As a promotional vehicle for the original visual novels and the franchise overall, I believe it's done an effective job at communicating the interest of some of its main themes so far, and inspiring intrigue for what's going on in the broader scheme of stories and characters I've been mostly left to speculate on. For the main goal of making me curious to check out the other media and material that inspired it, that probably counts as a win for the committee that produced it. But as a show on its own, I think it's pretty clear from this first cour that this definitely hasn't been the definitive Muv-Luv experience you could recommend a prospective new fan start with.

Rating:

Muv-Luv Alternative is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Chris is a freelance writer who appreciates anime, action figures, and additional ancillary artistry. He can be found staying up way too late posting screencaps on his Twitter.