[00:02] finally got around to watching uh the most recent Umamus film, Beginning of a New Era. And I don't want to talk about that film necessarily, but rather about
[00:14] certain things within Umamus as a whole that I thought of while watching it because at the moment we are in an era, let's say, that um is seeing a boom of
[00:26] fans of Umamus. game itself that uh the whole franchise is kind of revolving around. Just released its global version about a month and a half ago or so. I've been spending far too much time in it, depending on who you ask anyway. And I
[00:40] gotten back into the franchise a little bit. I did follow the franchise when it first came out. Um specifically when season 1 of the anime came out, but that was like in 2017. And I wasn't all that impressed by the
[00:55] first handful of episodes of season 1. I'm still not to be fair, but now that I've gotten into other Umamus media, I've played the game, I've watched Cinderella Gray, I've seen the new film, um, I wanted to go back and try and
[01:10] figure out, all right, well, why didn't I like those first couple of episodes of I like those first couple of episodes of season 1? And some of those reasons I season 1? And some of those reasons I found have sort of been dealt with in
[01:22] later adaptations of this setting. The biggest one of course being the whole idol thing. Still don't get it. And I mean I get it from a meta perspective. If you actually look into some of the history of Umaamus, the
[01:36] voice actors going and doing idol related things as their characters in lie of the game actually launching cuz the game was behind. The game did not launch when it was supposed to. My best guess is that everything was
[01:51] supposed to come out at roughly the same time. The first season of the anime came out in like 2017, but the game itself didn't come out until like 2 and 1/2 almost 3 years later. There were problems, man. And the only thing kind
[02:03] of keeping the franchise afloat for a while was the voice actresses going around doing a lot of idol things. But it's that sort of thing that kept the franchise alive. Now though, it's one of those, okay, well, why is the whole idol
[02:15] thing here? And most of the time, we just kind of forget it exists cuz it's not logically consistent. Being an idol has always been sort of displayed, especially in anime media, as a full-time job. Like when you watch anime
[02:30] about idols, they spend a lot of time doing dance choreography, doing singing lessons, all of these things. And then to apply that to the Umamus universe, well, the the UMAS like they are spending all of that time that they
[02:44] would be spending as idols instead practicing racing, you know, getting better at the thing that they're supposed to be good at, which is racing. to then say, "Yeah, by the way, after every race there's going to be a winning
[03:00] concert where the the top performing racers will then also sing and dance." And it's just like, okay, they make a joke a couple of times about how the
[03:12] characters of whichever version of the story that you're following happens to be absolutely terrible at singing and dancing. And I'm like, well, yes. Why would you think that they had any time
[03:25] to get good at that when they've been busy practicing for their race? And the fact that now more recent seasons and even films just kind of ignore that portion of this reality is a little bit hilarious to me. Beginning of a New Era
[03:40] didn't really bring up the whole idol thing at all until the end. And when all of the characters got on stage and started dancing and singing right before the the credits rolled, it seemed much more of a this is like a Bollywood sort
[03:53] Everybody's just going to break out into song more so than hey, this is an actual diagetic thing. That was one of the bigger things. The other thing was that season 1 has a lot of problems from a narrative perspective, I would say. So,
[04:10] if you try to look up Umamus right now and you try to look up the franchise as a whole, who in this franchise is the main character? I'll give you a moment. not familiar with Umamus. And the answer
[04:24] probably is going to be Special Week. She is the poster child for the franchise, and it's not hard to see why. She's pretty upbeat. She's easygoing. She is a happy golucky main character
[04:37] and she fits very well into the position of franchise mascot. Beyond that, however, you get into season 1 and she is our main character. She is our uh POV
[04:49] character, the point of view. We see the world through her eyes and through her experiences as we go through season 1. And on my more recent rewatch of this season, as I rewatched that and then actually got to seasons two, three, and
[05:02] actually got to seasons two, three, and the movie, um, I realized that she is a POV character, but she is not the protagonist, and that's a bit of a problem. So, what is the difference between main character
[05:15] and protagonist? A main character can be an important character in the story. multiple main characters. That's perfectly fine. Everybody knows that. But the protagonist of any particular story is kind of the one who drives the
[05:30] plot and they are not always necessarily the POV character. We don't always see the story from the point of view of the one who drives everything forward. And
[05:42] in the case of season 1 of Umamus, special week does not drive the plot. The plot is driven solely by silence Suzuka in that season. That is her season. Special week kind of has her place within the narrative of season 1,
[05:59] but it's her friendship that she develops with Suzuka that's really what is attaching her to the rest of the narrative as a whole. And as I continued through the season, not only did this realization kind of get more and more
[06:13] solid to me, the more things that happened that were like not really important to Special Week, but to other characters, that just kind of cemented it for me. You get to the later seasons, and Special Week fits very comfortably
[06:29] and Special Week fits very comfortably into a position of tertiary character. Even I know throughout Umamus anytime that they like start to focus on one character it makes sense for the other characters to become either secondary or
[06:41] tertiary. Maybe they will be like Kapu and you can't have a cafeteria scene without her being in the background somewhere. You're not allowed to do it. after season 1, Special Week barely appears. And that's kind of a funny
[06:55] thing to me. Like it's not just a matter of, well, she's not the focus of the season anymore. once we get into season two, we're going to start spending more time with McQueen and Teao. And I'm like, that's fine. We can do that. But
[07:08] then you get to season three and I would expect the same logic to apply. But no, expect the same logic to apply. But no, I mean, Tokai Teeo and Maga McQueen actually have reasonable supporting cast roles in season 3. They show up more in
[07:22] season 3, the season that is not their forte after season 2, than special week does in seasons two and three combined. Special week is not an interesting character from a narrative perspective or at least they are not building her as
[07:37] one. She could be, but it's just not there. Nice nature. I love nice nature. She is a great character. Nice nature fits the supporting character role perfectly. And even she feels like she's far more prominent throughout all
[07:52] seasons of Umamus than Special Week. If in season 1, she would be barely important at all. And for, you know, the franchise mascot, this is a little funny, but also it's
[08:06] not the precedent. My mind actually goes to a different franchise that has a very popular gotacha game from Japan, uh, Fate. So, who's the protagonist of Fate? the Fate franchise, who's the protagonist of Fate? The the poster
[08:20] child, the one on like all of the key art. Who is it? The answer is Arturia Pen Dragon, Saber herself. Um, here's the thing. Saber is almost never the
[08:32] main character, with maybe a couple of weird exceptions considering the massive size of Fate as a franchise. She's not a protagonist that pushes the plot protagonist that pushes the plot forward. Uh, not that one. Uh, this one.
[08:46] In Fate Stay Night, the original Fates Day Night, she's prominent. She's Look, she she's right there. She's kind of front and center. Um, she's not as large front and center. Um, she's not as large as the the other two uh main characters,
[08:58] main female characters of the Fate game, but this is the game that Saber has the but this is the game that Saber has the most prominence in. And even then, she is only the main character of the very first route, the Fate route, the one
[09:11] that never got a proper adaptation and probably never will because it is the least interesting route of the three. It is the least good. One could consider it just a very extended prologue. And then you get into the actual story of Fates
[09:25] Day Night where you're going down Unlimited Blade Works and Rento Saka or you're doing Heaven's Field with Sakura. And outside of this game, Saber is rarely a main character. And even then, she's still not a protagonist. She's in
[09:40] Fate Zero. Um, she is a main character of Fate Zero. She's not the protagonist of Fate Zero. She doesn't move the plot forward. She reacts to the plot. She reacts very well to the plot. uh in in scenes that are extremely well animated.
[09:54] I will give her that. She has a presence, a very good presence, but she's not a protagonist despite being the proster child for the entire franchise. You get to fake Grand Order and Saber never appears like ever.
[10:07] Versions of her appear. It's a running joke that there are like a billion different Saber faces throughout the Fate franchise. And that's fine, but like OG Saber herself barely appears in Fate Grand Order. She is not a character
[10:21] at all in that game. Yeah, you can summon her and use her for fights, but as far as any narrative is concerned, she doesn't appear. This seems to be a thing that I've noticed with certain franchises that happen to contain uh
[10:33] gotcha games. I don't know if these are the only two examples cuz that's kind of only have so much money. I don't play a lot of gotacha games very often. I wonder why. So, like Saber, special week is just kind of there. She had her
[10:49] meager time to shine at a point where she was kind of overshadowed in the narrative by other characters. Silent Soua is a much better character and they adapted uh the story of the real life horse of Silent Suzuka quite well. Um a
[11:04] little bit more happy golucky and happily ever after than uh the real Silent Suzuka, which okay, you want this to be a happy upbeat show. That makes sense. We don't want to depress everybody on the initial entry, but I
[11:19] would say that I don't necessarily hold Special Week's position in the franchise against the franchise itself, especially because I feel like Uma Musame has because I feel like Uma Musame has learned so much. I get to beginning of a
[11:32] talk about this film because I want you to go watch it. It's a very good film. It is very tentatively in like my number one spot of favorite anime films of all time right now. I don't know if that's gonna stick because it's only been um a
[11:47] I'll probably let it cool and be like, "No, actually, it's not as good as these old favorites of mine." But it's a very good film. However, I feel like it managed the balance between main character and protagonist far better
[12:04] because the main character of Beginning of a New Era is Jungle Pocket. It's she is this spunky Umam Musim who decides to to get into the race scene and she's to get into the race scene and she's very good. She's very fast but her rival
[12:19] very good. She's very fast but her rival the protagonist of the film is not her because the real protagonist of that film is Agnes Tachion. The thing is though is that Agnes Tachion is not the POV. We don't follow Tachion around. We
[12:33] POV. We don't follow Tachion around. We follow Jungle Pocket. However, even then, by at least the midpoint of the film, she starts to actually tear back film, she starts to actually tear back the protagonist role, so to speak. The
[12:47] narrative actually allows Jungle Pocket to be the focus in that she might not be like the spark that ignites the plot forward, that propels things forward, but she is the main character and the protagonist as far as showing us how
[13:04] certain people are reacting to the situation caused by other characters. situation caused by other characters. And I think it does that very well. Far better than how it showcased a special week uh dealing with Silent Suzuka. You
[13:18] can't do that much anymore to make Special Week a main character. Her story is kind of played out at least within the Yumamus universe. You can't you she has been tied so intrinsically to Silent Suzuka that it is impossible to detach
[13:33] the two. And Suzaka's story is just far more engaging. It's just unfortunate that there are tertiary characters that are more interesting than special week. Kishi Amazon has more of a presence, if only for the fact that starting from
[13:47] season 2, you question, hey, why is she just a cutout? She spent season 1 in charge of the stopwatch when girls were racing poorly, I might add, which might cutout. But I'm like, that's an interesting gag. And then there's also
[14:02] that one creepy Uma that's everywhere and always watching. always watching.
[14:14] that. Saber is not as interesting as an absolute massive amount of characters that have been introduced into the Fate franchise, both from Grand Order and then other tertiary media. These are mascots that have one job, and they do
[14:28] that one job well, which is look very pretty next to the logo of their franchise while trying to sell parts of it. But beyond that, that's kind of it. going to take anything out of this, uh, go watch Umamus. You can watch Beginning
[14:43] knowledge. Though, it's probably good to have at least some base within Umamu to understand how things work. In which case, go watch Cinderella Gray. I'm not recommending you to watch season 1 of Umamus. Although, seasons two and three
[14:57] Umamus. Although, seasons two and three are very good. So good. It's just very of have to go through season one. And I mean, it's not terrible. It's just I am always a person that will never say, "Hey, you have to kind of get through
[15:11] this not great stuff to get to the good stuff." Even when it is true and there that. Thank you very much to my patrons whose names are going to be scrolling next to my face. I can't continue to create any kind of content without your
[15:26] help. Especially for patrons like Blue Baron 15, Ry and Bonapart, Omar Showman, Ross Emerson, Hector Montto, Mayor, Aiden, and City Yamako. Thank you all so
[15:40] trying to do this a little bit more often, even if it's just me ranting to a better than, you know, me spending two it's not good, scrapping it, and then trying to be like, "Hey, what else can I
[15:54] about special week for a while. So, until next time, stay frosty.