“You Aren’t Already Dead” – Fist of The Blue Sky: Regenesis

Alrighty, let’s throw this out there quite frankly, this show isn’t amazing. Partially out of stubbornness and partially out of my insanity, I’m continuing to watch Fist of The Blue Sky. Surprisingly, the last episode was actually interesting enough for me to pass it on a 3-Episode test. We left off with Fei-Yan voiced by Takehito Koyasu comically crying after a supposedly touching moment between Erika and her recently departed mother. I say comically because the animation was just very janky, and the lines in the scene are  terrible, pure “WTF,” and campy, but also because of how they were delivered, I was left laughing uncontrollably. We then have Fei-Yan essentially spend the first half of the third episode deciding to arbitrarily go on a murder spree (because “friendship” really), and we see how Shanghai is soon going to become an international hotbed of violence with the French and Germans fighting one another and a Japanese Imperial Army officer being assassinated.

Regardless of the fact that Yù-Líng spent 5 minutes trying to explain that Fei-Yan and Kenshiro could probably work together and we had a brief explanation not of what the List of Hope is, just that it’s Erika and that it’s hard on her to know the list, he goes off and just starts shit for the sake of starting shit (again, because “friendship”). Kenshiro arrives on scene to try to put a stop to his rampage, and does a rather good job of countering Fei-Yan’s thousand fists. At this point I realized something and it scared me a bit. I was enjoying this show. Not because of its terrible pacing, or it’s action, but because it was some how keeping me watching, like a train crash or garbage fire. There were so many face palming/groan worthy moments and yet there I was, amazed that Kenshiro was able to beat Fei-Yan, because he had One Thousand and ONE hands. Seriously, the below is the highlight of the fight.

The entire fight I was just waiting with baited breath to hear “MUDA MUDA MUDA” countered with “ORA ORA ORA.” I also realized that mindless, pants-on-head level of being evil really fit the typecasting and probably found more entertainment from this than I should have. The worst part by far of this fight was that we had moments where Yù-Líng and Erika. We have Erika complaining about Fei-Yan then eventually wanting to be with him at the end and a moment where they are racing to the fight scene in a car. A few bullshit Hokuto Shinken moves later, we have Fei-Yan about to gouge out his throat and proceeds to monologue and realize that “Hey maybe I will choose life for this girl’s sake.” This may have been a bit more meaningful if I wasn’t distracted by the fact he had a GAPING HOLE IN HIS CHEST THAT HE SURVIVED FOR 5 IRL MINUTES.

Me trying to figure out “HOW???” completely made up for this to me. Then I remembered, you don’t watch Fist for plot, nor well delivered lines, nor solid animation. You watch for the sheer insanity. You watch for men who ride elephant sized horses, deflect thousands of arrows through willpower, and can survive to monologue after getting literally fisted through the chest. You watch for lol-worthy moments and a wild and crazy ride. And that’s why I’m still going to watch this show, because I’m not expecting a Ghibli level animation with a plot on par with a Madoka tier twist. I’m watching because omae wa mou shindeiru. So let me know if you too are interested in this mad ride of insanity, or if you can’t get past the 10 FPS and horrid lines.