I have to admit, I wasn't sure if I was going to like Plastic Memories when I first watched it. Last year, I was giving the 2015 spring season's titles a cursory run through of their first episodes to see which ones I would actually end up watching, and didn't think highly of the first few minutes of the anime series that I was able to view.
It's a good thing I decided to return to it a few months later, because, apparently, Plastic Memories deserves more than a few minutes of rushed viewing. And while it was more muted in tone than its peers during the season and featured a just-okay animation style (which was my main cause for concern in my first viewing), there were elements to the anime series that make it a must-watch.
Plastic Memories takes place in what could be our future, with humans living alongside human-like androids. While Giftia androids created by the SAI Corporation are able to exhibit human emotions, they have a set lifespan of 81,920 hours. Whether the human owners choose to upgrade to a new Giftia, request for the same one but without the memories of their time together or no longer get a new one, the bottom line is the Terminal Service team will have to contact owners and perform the Giftia retrieval at the end of its lifespan. Since he missed out on taking the college entrance exams, Mizugaki Tsukasa ends up working as part of the Terminal Service team because of his father's connection. As a spotter, he is partnered with his partner Giftia marksman, Isla.
At the start of the series, Tsukasa meets Isla while riding the SAI Corp's elevator before he started working as part of the Terminal Service team. Drawn by the sad expression on her face, he immediately falls for her. He is enthusiastic about their new work partnership, even if Isla doesn't remember that first brief meeting. But trying to get to know Isla is harder than it seems, with her standoffish personality and a clumsiness so alarming, if Tsukasa were a smidgen less attracted towards her, he would have requested for a new work partner just to save himself the trouble.
Plastic Memories isn't an anime series that banks on big, splashy events, however, in order to make its mark on the viewers. It's easy enough to forget the sci-fi elements of the series when you focus on the relationship between Tsukasa and Isla, but it's the science that would actually pose the biggest problem for them. When the Terminal Service teams starts knocking on owners' doors, it usually means that their Giftia's lifespan is near its end, giving owners and Giftia time together before the androids are deactivated. But what they really want to avoid is the Giftia turning into a "wanderer", androids who lose the human aspects of their programming and turn feral. It's not hard to guess at this point that Isla is shying away from making new connections and seems lacking in physical finesse because her own time is about to run out.
There are other characters in Plastic Memories with their own stories, such as the Terminal Service team members, as well as the owners and their Giftias that have to be retrieved. The latter group, in particular, would help Tsukasa in understanding more about the different connections that can be made by humans and the androids. The Terminal Service team are a great bunch, offering commiseration and support in different ways, and you get to appreciate them the more you understand how hard their job truly is on an emotional level. But Plastic Memories is ultimately the story between Tsukasa and Isla, with the former chipping away at the latter's defenses.
There might be a sense of predictability when you watch Plastic Memories. The eventual end of their relationship is one that's easy to guess at while watching, but the series still ends up making an emotional impact on viewers. There's a subtlety with how the story between Tsukasa and Isla is conveyed, which tempers the audacious notion of a human-android relationship. The tone is light for most of the series, in both the comedy and drama aspects, but there's nothing light about the decisions that both Tsukasa and Isla have to make at its end.
Sure, the series wasn't going to be lauded for its visuals. Nor does it really offer a lot of fancy sci-fi stuff. The characters can be a bit cliched, and the gags are ones you would feel familiar with. But, somehow, it all works. In the end, I was glad that I ended up giving Plastic Memories another shot.
Happy viewing!!Labels: Anime, Drama, Must-Watch, Plastic Memories, Romance, Sci-fi, TV
