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In her country's attempt to ward off an unnamed superior invading
nation, Chise has been designed to be the ultimate living
weapon. Her designers are soon to discover that puberty and
power are not a good combination...
She
The Ultimate Weapon: Another Love Song, could have made
the mistake of trying to do a follow up to the excellent original
show Saikano: She The Ultimate Weapon, thankfully they
decided to explore some of the back story instead. Some of
the original characters are either referred to or seen briefly
to keep continuity with the first story, but only Chise plays
any major part in the proceedings. The success of the first
Saikano have allowed the makers to add a slew of other
projects, including both this two part anime and the excellent
live action movie.
The
show tells the story of the original ultimate living weapon,
Mizuki, a war weary veteran who agrees to have the implants
after her battalion is destroyed. The creators of the show
have an obvious problem, right from the start, as anyone who
has seen Saikano (and if you haven't, why not, it really
is one of the most touching stories committed to anime) will
know that Chise is the only one around, therefore it's a foregone
conclusion that Mizuki must get it in the head at some point.
Rather than spend their efforts on a paint by numbers show
Another Love Story takes another look at why people
kill.
There has always been a strong thread in the shows which examines
the reasons behind why people will go off to war. In this
portion of the story Chise and Mizuki are used to contrast
two such reasons. Chise is, as ever, a reluctant warrior who
kills in defence of those that she loves - so reluctantly
that she is wracked by doubt and guilt, eventually loosing
her humanity to her machine components. A metaphor if ever
I saw one. Mizuki has no such doubts, as she has agreed to
become a cyborg in order to exact revenge on those she holds
responsible for the death of her friends. If love is Chise's
weakness then hate is Miuki's.
It
is within the interactions between these two women that both
come to understand a little better the world in which they
find themselves. Chise looses much of her innocence to the
war, and Mizuki finally recaptures some of her humanity. In
the end the show does not try and give simplistic answers
to the question of why people fight, rather spending its time
on the individual and very personal consequence of war.
There
is not much in the way of extras on the disc except for the
original Japanese promo and some production artwork, plus
the inevitable set of trailers for other shows. The original
Japanese release had more, including a bunch of interviews
with the show's creators and cast. The picture quality is
top notch, with the option of an English or Japanese 5.1 audio
track with subtitles. Both sets of voice actors do a splendid
job with the show.
Although
these two episodes are meant to fill in some of the gaps from
the original show, the story works well as a stand alone.
Fans that have not seen Saikano will not be lost as
the show, whilst being referential to the original, does not
rely on it for either structure or context.
Overall
a great addition to an underrated franchise, now all we want
is the live action movie.
Charles
Packer
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