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(C) Control
Aug. 3rd, 2011 10:45 pmThis is one of the most interesting, and fun anime series I've watched in a good while. I wouldn't have believed that a supernatural Pokemon-battle based on economic systems would be fun, but this actually is great.
Kimimaro, a struggling college student, gets sucked into the magical world known as "The Financial District" - where you put your future up as collateral for vast sums of money. The people who can access this place have magical ATM cards and are forced to battle each other, once a week, and gain money (or lose money) from the battles. That said, the show avoids the "fight of the week" trope, that it could have easily done, and instead skips most duels or cuts them short and comes back to look at the fallout of these duels.
Each "Entrepreneur" has a magical spirit, known as an "Asset" who fights alongside them. The Assets can use magical attacks which take money directly from the person's savings. Successful attacks cause the opponent to spew black money which looks a lot like blood the way it geysers forth, and that adds to the attacker's account.
If you're ever forced into bankruptcy, you are ejected from the Financial District, and then, since the money was "your future", reality rewrites itself to make your life wack and the lives of friends and family around you, also wack.
This actually solves one of the big questions that comes up- how do you have these massive influxes of money without screwing up the economy? And the answer is, reality is constantly rewriting itself around people who make money through this.
The story revolves around Kimimaro trying to figure out what's going on with all of this, while major groups in the world are attempting to game the system - either to simply make themselves rich, to improve society, or, at least, to reduce the negative reality re-writes that occur with massive wins/losses, that end up completely reshaping economies, and, countries.
Although it seems like it's about money, the show is actually a fun look at the literal question of "borrowing from the future" and what does it mean? How do you prioritize living life in the moment, as tomorrow is never guaranteed, vs. planning and making long term life choices?
There's only 11 episodes and it's up on Hulu. If you're up for something fun to watch that moves quickly, this is a great series.
Kimimaro, a struggling college student, gets sucked into the magical world known as "The Financial District" - where you put your future up as collateral for vast sums of money. The people who can access this place have magical ATM cards and are forced to battle each other, once a week, and gain money (or lose money) from the battles. That said, the show avoids the "fight of the week" trope, that it could have easily done, and instead skips most duels or cuts them short and comes back to look at the fallout of these duels.
Each "Entrepreneur" has a magical spirit, known as an "Asset" who fights alongside them. The Assets can use magical attacks which take money directly from the person's savings. Successful attacks cause the opponent to spew black money which looks a lot like blood the way it geysers forth, and that adds to the attacker's account.
If you're ever forced into bankruptcy, you are ejected from the Financial District, and then, since the money was "your future", reality rewrites itself to make your life wack and the lives of friends and family around you, also wack.
This actually solves one of the big questions that comes up- how do you have these massive influxes of money without screwing up the economy? And the answer is, reality is constantly rewriting itself around people who make money through this.
The story revolves around Kimimaro trying to figure out what's going on with all of this, while major groups in the world are attempting to game the system - either to simply make themselves rich, to improve society, or, at least, to reduce the negative reality re-writes that occur with massive wins/losses, that end up completely reshaping economies, and, countries.
Although it seems like it's about money, the show is actually a fun look at the literal question of "borrowing from the future" and what does it mean? How do you prioritize living life in the moment, as tomorrow is never guaranteed, vs. planning and making long term life choices?
There's only 11 episodes and it's up on Hulu. If you're up for something fun to watch that moves quickly, this is a great series.
