“i fear the teen terrorist had a point…”

"i fear the teen terrorists had a point…" – as penned by G.

first episode. we’re starting with stolen nuclear bombs and teenage terrorists lol. welcome to As Penned by G."terror in resonance" is one of those anime that flew under the radar…and honestly? it had no business being that good. nine and twelve are out here blowing shit up with a plan, a past, and generational trauma. fhe fbi shows up. things get worse. and somehow, a girl who can’t make noodles is the most relatable character in the whole thing.G breaks it all down — the mystery, the politics, and why this show hits different right now.spoilers throughout. you've been warned nie lol..

long time no write? well, about anime that is lol.

i honestly watch anime in this odd fashion.

there’s the obvious recommendations from friends. then, there’s the anime pages and blogs i come across on instagram. those pages will be like, “these anime are not what they seem” typeshit.

and then there’s the random scroll-and-read on crunchyroll. this has been my way of finding some of the recent anime i’ve seen.

but one anime, “terror in resonance,” was found via social media but forgotten until as of late.

i’ve sorta binge-watched this single-season series.

the outset – nine and twelve.

the first couple of episodes start with some classic mystery elements. ya know, disguises and masterplans. break-ins and breakouts.

spoiler: our main characters steal fucking plutonium (or an atomic bomb, at least that’s what i understood it to be after watching *shrugs*).

our characters are teens with trauma, of course.

nine and twelve. 

their names are numbers, which represent their hardship. they part of child experiments trying to create artificially-made, savant-level individuals to use as weapons.

lol spoilers. but they have a point.

i like that we really don’t know the true motives these two have. i like a good mystery.

what intrigued me was how the threads started to weave yet unravel at the same time when it came to the plot. nine and twelve are, essentially, terrorists in japan. they believe it’s for good reason while revenge seems to be sprinkled within it.

that’s what drew me in.

why steal an a-bomb? why the random, yet targeted, attacks within the public? why the youtube videos lol?

they were seemingly professional teen terrorists, referring to themselves as “sphinx.” they had targets and skill. you could say those experiments worked, but at what cost?

later, as i watched, the police get involved, but it goes beyond the locals.

the midpoint – five.

here comes ‘murica.

the fbi takes over, showing the “true power” of the US.

watching this also made me think about the society i’m currently living within. in essence, the states are meddling in affairs that the japan police claimed to have control over…until secrets are exposed.

and today, we have a government that meddles in international affairs haphazardly because of some secret interest or demand. my mind wanders to the questions around america’s nuclear anxiety and “prevention” in the middle east..

as for “terror in resonance,” maybe the US had reason to trace the a-bomb? if so, why send what becomes the most unhinged fbi agent with special ops ties?

nine and twelve, or sphinx, basically get fucked whenever things turn into an international concern. and of course, i had some distaste for this special agent, five.

she was a bit deranged…for somewhat of a good reason (not excusing her though lol). five was a great example of what happens when things escalate.

five is what happens when you “successfully” weaponize human intelligence.

as a kid, she was among the class with nine and twelve. the boys remembered her and just how berserk she was during the experiments—they even tried to help her escape with them.

i won’t drag on about five because she was still the “bad guy” in the end.

spoiler: she knew she’d die soon as a result of the experiments, so she was basically giving the boys hell to see them one last time.

her character seems like a great embodiment of how far someone would go to win a game whether, in her case, that’s a game of chess or chance. today, i think society sees just how far government would go for a “win” lol.

moving on…

the denouement – lisa and shibazaki.

i kept watching, and i started to see the underlying truth reveal itself via two characters, former detective kenjirou shibazaki and lisa mishima.

lisa is a floater.

i like her character because i think she speaks to the more emotional side of being a terrorist, even though she’s not fully involved in the overall plans by the boys.

lisa is a runaway.

she finds some solace in these guys and shows that they are all human and teenagers at the end of the day. 

no one is perfect, and everyone has their “why” for what they do, even if that means blowing shit up.

with all the big schemes and plans at play, i found lisa to be somewhat of a grounding force. the boys are ready, equipped, and proactive while she’s just trying to learn how to make noodles, ya know!?

it’s a lot when you feel like you’re always in the way. maybe that’s why i felt her energy on a subdermal level!?

but as we get to the final episodes of the anime, our voice of reason, kenjirou shibazaki, really starts showing his ass. he gets into the heads of the teens, figuratively.

as the teen terrorists go public and release enigmatic messages and puzzles, shibazaki starts to see their direct objective and the true mission the boys have.

through his skills and some “luck” from a colleague, the former detective reaches the kids on a different level.

so much so that he ends up working with the boys in order to get their message across.

spoiler: i believe the boys had plotted to have him reveal the secrets anyway due to his former partner being connected to the experiments.

i say he’s the voice of reason because when things get spooky for the boys after the fbi gets involved, it’s shibazaki who starts to see that the boys are not only being framed for deadly fbi actions, but misunderstood.

in one of the latter episodes, he literally tells a colleague:

so he can see that, while they seem to not have a moral compass, sphinx actually has solid reasoning behind the bombings.

ultimately, shibazaki is the one to uncover the secrets of the child experiments that five, nine, and twelve suffered through. 

i like his character, though his timing was a hair off. maybe that was anticipated? the americans being one step ahead the whole time once getting involved?

maybe murdering twelve, who was the only one killed by us law enforcement, and nine dying of the long-term effects of the experiments was all part of the plan? perfect timing!?

G’s bottom line – reflective rating.

as the series came to a close, nine wanted one thing to be clear. he wanted sphinx’s story to be remembered and told correctly by shibazaki and lisa. that speaks to today too, right?

what side of history will you be on when it comes to who was the actual wrongdoer? do you blame the masses for rising up against oppression, or do you hold officials accountable for deliberate subjugation?

“terror in resonance” gets a rating of 8.7 for calling these themes into question while serving some good action scenes. i prefer more gore in my watches, but the short storyline makes up for that.

-signed g the e.