Thursday, April 28, 2011

Tiger & Bunny - ''Fear Is Often Greater Than the Danger''

Note the Pepsi sponsorship on Blue Rose's arm!
Spoiler Level: High

In this episode we get to learn about one of the other heroes, Blue Rose.  Blue Rose is really school girl Karina Lyle, whose dream isn't really to be a hero at all, but to be a singer.  She's only become a super hero because it's supposed to be the best path to stardom.

In previous episodes she's played the enthusiastic hero, but now she's obviously grown tired of it and would rather focus on her real dream of playing piano and singing.  This of course brings lots of speeches from Kotetsu on the nature of being a hero, which is counterbalanced by Barnaby's more cynical desire for fame. The result is a lot of discussions examining personal motivations, why we do what we do, and the dilemma of choosing between what we want and what's expected of us.

The episode works well for me, because even though we're not seeing a lot from the camera's perspective, we are seeing how this world of super hero reality TV affects people's lives, as Karina has to juggle trying to satisfy her television obligations, pursuing her own dreams, and still have a social life and go to school.  She thinks she knows what she wants, and it's not being a hero-- but as Kotetsu points out to her, helping people isn't something one can just choose to stop doing.  It's the usual anime dilemma, but with a super hero twist, and it works well.

As always, this episode is available to watch for free at http://www.vizanime.com/tiger-and-bunny.

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