The past few seasons have been a slew of disappointments for me, but in comparison, the start of 2019 is pretty promising. One of the shows on my list to watch is Dororo. The concept is pretty straightforward: A noble sacrifices the body parts of his son to demons to gain power, so the son is on a quest to regain his humanity. The first seven-ish minutes of episode one detail the boy's birth and how his father went about the sacrifice. This opening sequence provides the unique setting: feudal (or similar) Japan where Buddhism has great influence, and battles do exist between fiends and monks.
The story proper begins several years later when the boy has grown up, and already uses prosthetics to replace many of his body parts. A girl named Dororo is introduced, with her selling several expensive items in the street. It is revealed the goods were stolen, so she runs away. A wonderfully ironic scene happens next where Dororo tells a begging puppy that it should learn to fend for itself. I find it funny that Dororo sounds similar to "dorobou" (泥棒) meaning thief.
The boy meets Dororo and saves her from a demon, regaining the skin on his face in the process. When trying to thank him, Dororo is shocked by his predicament, and questions whether he is human. A lot of what I find interesting about this story is how when it is explained, it sounds a lot like the classical epics about things like the creation of deities, the birth of demigods, etc. A classical epic playing out in anime form may sound strange at first, but I'm sure it has potential. The strength of the motivation is going to keep the show on track, if only to make the main character, well, grow.... I mean, having to stab fish with a sword-arm is not something normal people do. His senses are crap too. It's hard to work with a character that can only see a haze around living things.
One of two things is going to happen with this show: either this dude gains enough of his humanity back to get a personality, which would be fun to watch, or he'll stay a vegetable and fight monsters while barely knowing what he is even doing. Both sound not the best, but you can hardly say the show so far has bad writing. I'm optimistic that however it turns out, the result will be a good show.
