A bag full of heavy objects slowly sinks into Tokyo Bay, and to the dull sound of water, walrus-like taxi driver Otogawa wakes up from a nap. He took out a bottle of tea from the storage compartment that had long since lost its temperature and drank it, and the unwashed stereo played the missing button of the female high school student in the training horse area. The walrus driver changed channels, and the noisy comic artist "Homo sapiens" talked boring passages on the radio. He started the car and disappeared in the moonlight of Tokyo.
This is the scene at the beginning of the critically acclaimed July original KitKat Taxi. If we were to talk about the best original animation of 2021, I think the so-called "Brahmins" would definitely vote for Kit Kat Taxi. This unremarkable July fan before the broadcast first looked like an animal-themed young bubble noodle fan, but as time progressed, this work gave many viewers an unexpected surprise with a strong script, strict narrative logic, although hand-drawn but vivid light and shadow painting and wonderful lens language - in the first half of this year, most of the original fans (even those with well-known producers) large-scale overturning background, "KitKat Taxi" not only landed smoothly, but also ended perfectly.
I only paid attention to "Kit Kat Taxi" after watching "Strange Egg Story". The former's hasty unfolding and poor ending in the later stages make people sigh for the good setting and characterization of the first few episodes, while the often said "Otogawa must be seconds big love" just proves the degree of satisfaction of the latter in terms of plot.
Just last week, All 12 episodes of the work were listed at Station B; after watching KitKat Again, I wanted to talk about this wonderful story.
Overall, Kit Kat Taxi is a vivid group portrait drama. It tells the story of what happened between more than a dozen people involved, based on the "Disappearance of a Female High School Student in Nerima Ward, Tokyo." Among them, there are gangsters in factional battles, idols and economic companies that are about to debut, comic talent groups that have been hot for a while and are now in a bottleneck and facing dissolution, doctors with a sense of justice in private clinics and nurses with many hidden feelings - and the taxi driver Odogawa as the protagonist skillfully connects everyone with the story through this convenient profession, and performs a complete urban suspense drama under the skin of all the staff Fury.
Yes, Kit Kat Taxi is essentially more like a live-action TV series than traditional animation; in addition to the hand-drawn animal skin, the work has a traditional Dorama style from plot setting to editing to lighting - which also has a lot to do with the animation production company. In fact, the main plannerS P.I.C.S. and director Akira Kinoshita had never done TV animation before, and they were barely aware of the traditional production process of the animation industry, and the entire series was largely based on their and their partners' experience in the field of live-action images.
Miraculously, it is this cross-border attempt that brings good chemistry: the traditional Dorama production process allows "Kit Kat Taxi" to avoid the old problems that were often found in the previous original fan and cannot be released and collected, while the real society with animals as the main body, as the core narrative method of the work, can only be expressed through the form of animation, which can be said to be a wonderful win-win.
Kit Kat Taxi gives viewers an experience like reading a speculative fiction. Seemingly unrelated characters carry out different lines of life, and as the story progresses and the truth of the case gradually surfaces, these characters are closely linked through early foreshadowing and unobtrusive coincidences, and finally they are stripped away, and almost all the mysteries and questions are answered - in an animation of only 13 episodes.
Because of the realistic background depicted in the animation, the work also truly reflects many social issues. Unlike the adaptations of imaginary comics and light novels, the reality depicted in Kit Kat Taxi is more real and cold. Here, you'll see idols who can't help themselves, uncles who are carried away by vain romances, policemen who collude with the underworld, internet celebrities who lose themselves in popularity, funny artists who can't find their place after their formerly thought that they are lagging behind their partners; of course, in contrast, you will also see justice in a dirty world, true love that is desperate for himself, trust far above 1 billion yen, and unbreakable friendship in tribulations— these parts are more heartwarming in contrast.
I think this relatively independent story from episode 4 of Kit Kat illustrates this point. This episode follows the trajectory of the life of Internet clerk Tanaka: he competes with classmates at a very young age to collect unique erasers. There is a rare eraser in the shape of a dodo bird, but it is completely inferior in number to the erasers collected from various places by the parents of another classmate. In order to satisfy his inner desire to compete, Odanaka accidentally came to see the "Swallow Eraser" auctioned on the Internet, "there is only one piece in the world". He secretly wrote down his father's credit card, used his computer to participate in the auction when his brother went out, and auctioned the eraser for 100,000 yuan after countless price increases at any cost, but never received a courier again. In the East Window incident, Odanaka was beaten half to death by his father, but he did not understand where the incident began to be wrong.
Back to reality, Tanaka began playing a mobile game called Zooden called Zooden, farming animals. Coincidentally, the game has a dodo that once became the beginning of his heart knot. He began to pay for the lesson, the unlimited money, and once again fell into the obsession with things, just to extract the rare animal. Just when his life was in a mess and he was about to lose hope, Tanaka finally drew a dodo on the way to work, but it happened that Otogawa, who was driving wildly for some reason, roared past him, and his mobile phone accidentally fell into the water. After the joy of grief, he falls into an even greater despair - while burying the dead pet parrot, he finds the pistol hidden in the park by the villain "Gutter", so the crazy idea of "revenge on the driver" comes to mind, and Tanaka becomes a dangerous criminal.
In this short 20-minute story, you can see the impact of campus atmosphere and family education on children, and you can also see the general fact that mobile game tuition affects the concept of consumption, and you can also see the formation of antisocial personality under the influence of these factors and in infinite coincidence, which has educational significance beyond general animation, which is worth thinking about and reflecting on; at the same time, this pistol and that eraser have also become important foreshadowing, running through the story line of the late animation. From the details of a single small story to an important factor affecting the direction of the story, it is amazing.
Every character (or animal) in KitKat is vivid, alive, and three-dimensional. Past experiences, present identities, and future expectations create each person's complex personality, and the animation tries to make them all clear. I think even years later, audiences will remember the soprano porcupine that spoke with rap and the mighty Brazilian war dance of Miss Alpaca.
When the story comes to an end, Otogawa rides a taxi loaded with 100 million yen from the unfinished bridge and freezes in the middle of the full moon. And the image of him falling into the water evokes a similar picture in the hearts of all the main characters - this wonderful montage brings the whole series to a perfect end; and as Otogawa gets up from his hospital bed, the whole world changes dramatically...
With the exception of one or two insignificant bugs (such as Tanaka and False Miya's process from acquaintance to cooperation), Kit Kat Taxi takes away almost all the volt lines and explains all the character endings; while the rest is conveyed through the information provided by a voice recorder in the radio drama, explaining the unknown dark side, allowing people to see the whole story from another perspective.
"Kit Kat Taxi" is the name of Otogawa and Gutter's last action, and it does represent this story full of coincidences. I think people should pick a rest day afternoon to calm down and watch Kit Kat Taxi. Sip two cups of coffee in the reassuring theme song スカートと PUNPEE, then gently lie down and dissolve in this wonderful Tokyo with only one taxi, dissolving in the laughter and anger of all sentient beings.