Sagrada Reset

Episodes 13-14

Hey ya'll. You might be wondering why there was no Sagrada Reset writeup last week. Well, that's because I was part of ANN's Anime Expo coverage team this year and have been Extremely Busy both before and after. We're back on track now, and in some ways combining discussion of these episodes is actually useful, since the arc's second episode was pretty much just buildup for the third. So without further ado, let's get back into it.

So far, One Hand Eden has been Sagrada Reset's best arc in that it might actually be interesting if I cared about the characters at all. Unlike the other storylines, there's actually a decent existential dilemma at the bottom of all this nonsense. Honoka can make a paradisal land out of her dreams, which could turn into a giant lotus-eater machine that sucks people in, so the Bureau locks her away to prevent that from happening. Of course, this type of isolation is emotionally devastating for the young girl. In an attempt to cope, she splits her consciousness up into several parts and tries to forget what's happened to her. But of course, this isn't really possible. While she pretends to be an innocent girl named Michiru, another part of her beats against the bars of her prison by manifesting as a giant monster and destroying the town every night. This is actually a well thought-out account of what might happen to a person psychologically in this situation.

And of course, the Bureau finds a way to make it all worse. They take a peek inside, realize that Honoka's brain is a maladjusted nightmare land, and decide to blow the entire place up. Allegedly, this is in the hopes that her next coping mechanism will be better somehow. I just don't get why they're expecting this outcome when they're the ones causing her torment in the first place? You can't just yank away her security blanket at this point! It's all still setup for Kei to Have All the Answers to This Woman's Emotional Problems (probably), whenever he has to deal with Honoka directly. I presume that will happen in the next episode.

There's also some character stuff for Haruki, but it's mostly depressing. It turns out that she's afraid Sumire will steal Kei from her, and that's making her realize that she has feelings. Really, she just wants to keep being useful to Kei, but these pesky personal desires (as well as another more useful lady) are complicating things. It's super lame that this young woman's journey towards self-actualization is all about how awesome a dude is. If I'm recalling this correctly, Sumire also angsts about how she'll never get Kei, meaning that our two female leads – who have barely even interacted – are just vaguely antagonistic love rivals, because Kei is just that desirable, I guess. The first step to fixing this show would be to make Kei a real character rather than a Perfect McWomansaver self-insert. The second step would be differing facial expressions for anybody, but that's an entirely different issue.

In the end, Kei performs well enough in his conversation with Chiruchiru to gain access to the script, an entirely accurate account of the past and future made ages ago by the cat guy. The page they're looking for details the origins of abilities around 30 years ago. Cat girl also meets up with cat guy, who it turns out once scared Honoka real bad by telling her that her paradise is actually a torture chamber. People keep doing that, actually. Someone should cut this girl a break. Y'all are the ones keeping her in here, so there's no need to rub salt in the wound.

There's also this new Bureau guy who's been showing up. He's totally sketchy and I bet he's the main villain. There are also more barely relevant thought experiments along the way. You know, for people who claim not to ponder over the nature of friendship as a category of relationship, these folks sure don't shut up about the idea. It doesn't seem to hurt their chances of making those friends, at least. These characters are over-intellectualizing weirdos, but at least they aren't lonely over it.

Grade: C+

Sagrada Reset is currently streaming on Amazon's Anime Strike.

Gabriella Ekens studies film and literature at a US university. Follow her on twitter.