Gachiakuta – Episode 1

Content Warning: State violence against children, internalized classism

What’s it about? Rudo lives in a shantytown for “tribesfolk” on the edge of a great Pit, where all the trash accumulated by the rich and all criminals are thrown into. He despises the casualness with which trash and people are thrown away–but his hatred of it may be dangerous.

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Gachiakuta is an angry show. It is about an angry boy, who lives in a world with a lot to be mad about. It wields its political allegories, which blend Shinto beliefs with a strident critique of consumerism, apartheid, and environmental catastrophe, like a sledgehammer. More than just the state of the world, however, the show is angry at the way oppressed people blame and police themselves for their oppression. 

The world of Gachiakuta is sharply divided into the world of the rich, who dwell in houses and walk on streets as white and clean as dry bone, and the world of the “tribesfolk,” who live in shantytowns with almost no resources, reminiscent of those in Apartheid South Africa or now in Gaza. Those in the world of the rich look at the tribesfolk with unmasked hatred, while the tribesfolk mostly accept the blame for their conditions and direct their anger at each other rather than at the system that locks them in an open air prison.

Rudo is framed by the narrative in this way as an outsider for his willingness to critique. Rudo sees parallels in the rich’s constant accumulation of products they just throw away when inconvenient with their willingness to throw humans away. This is, in a sense, a Shintoist critique–as Rudo sees all things as being imbued with spirit, and worthy of respect. 

Framing Rudo as exceptional in his critiques feels strange to me, as in all of my work with young people living under violent conditions of racism they have almost always been the ones ready to critique the violence they see in front of them—almost always the least likely to believe in the narratives that they deserve it compared to adults. I suppose in a society that is truly totalitarian such critiques could potentially be stamped out, and what we see in Gachiakuta represents a bit of the ecosystem of indoctrination that is necessary to incept young people with such self-blame through the execution system. By being encouraged to participate enthusiastically in the killing of their own rebels, their own rebellious spirit could be purged. The cruelty of Rudo’s would-be Aerith feels like a demonstration of this, if anything, and was one of the most effective and shocking moments of the episode.

However, these kinds of narratives always give me the sense that they don’t understand the ingenuity of the cultures that arise from resisting oppression—compare it to something like Dorohedoro, where the the “Rose that Grew from the Concrete” gyoza shop is a place of joy and resilience. I am curious if this will change over the course of the series, but I haven’t seen much indication that it will. There is a vague sense that Rudo’s adoptive father was a part of some kind of resistance force, but otherwise there is little else to indicate that Rudo is not just the Chosen One to destroy this world.

In that way, Rudo is a classic Oppressed Edgelord Protagonist, and Edgelord protagonists tend to either outgrow their edginess or completely succumb to it. I strongly prefer to watch the former, personally. It is hard to imagine the series sending Rudo into an even darker territory than he already is: wishing death upon the whole world.

The moment where he was framed for his adoptive father’s death was honestly a bit surprising to me in a good way, given that the series had done so much to set up the world that I thought we would be inhabiting. The series has left me curious about what he will find in The Pit—will he find communities of solidarity and resistance? How will The Pit be visually represented is a lingering question, as our cast spending the entire show walking across fields of trashbags sounds borderline Beckettian in its unrelenting grossness. I have little doubt the show will find ways to remain beautiful, as this first episode is gorgeously animated, courtesy Studio Bones. I just wonder if the show will be able to match that visual beauty with a protagonist whose journey is worth investing in.