What are we watching: Kino’s Journey
What’s it about: Kino, a 15-year-old traveler, forms a bond with Hermes, a talking motorcycle. Together, they wander the lands and venture through various countries and places, despite having no clear idea of what to expect. After all, life is a journey filled with the unknown.
Throughout their journeys, they encounter different kinds of customs, from the morally gray to tragic and fascinating. They also meet many people: some who live to work, some who live to make others happy, and some who live to chase their dreams. Thus, in every country they visit, there is always something to learn from the way people carry out their lives.
It is not up to Kino or Hermes to decide whether these asserted values are wrong or right, as they merely assume the roles of observers within this small world. They do not attempt to change or influence the places they visit, despite how absurd these values would appear. That’s because in one way or another, they believe things are fine as they are, and that “the world is not beautiful; therefore, it is.”
Studio: A.C.G.T.
Director: Nakamura, Ryuutarou
Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDm6cLP83us
Where can I watch it: https://twist.moe/a/kino-no-tabi-the-beautiful-world/1 https://www12.9anime.ru/watch/kinos-journey.3012/ep-1 https://nyaa.si/view/1069013
I liked this series, but I honestly had a problem with this as a last episode. This story was clearly originally intended as a subversion of the Kino origin story, and it was just kind of phoned in as some sort of a bittersweet end. /u/mablak has been pretty consistent in his messaging about Kino not being willing to change anything, and I think that's incredibly obvious if you cut off the last section of this episode. Really, I think this series as a whole tries to explore philosophy while dodging the fact that most philosophical points require you to take a position. The only consistent position that I got out of this series is that "war is bad, killing is also bad (except in self defense)". Not as compelling as I remembered it, but pretty fun to watch still. 7/10
Side note: The visuals are unbelievably dated compared to similar things that came out around that time.
I don't think it was a subversion of Kino's origina story.
I think the intention here was honestly just... Something horrible.
This is, to Kino, the place that she has visited that most felt like home to her. It was the only place of anywhere she has ever been that she was going to break her rule for. It was, in her short time there, the home she had to run away from but without the evil that she ran from.
I don't think the series is trying to give you the position to take, it's trying to lead you to asking the right questions and I think that in criticising it at times it intends for that outcome to occur, it intends for the audience to criticise the show for being neutral, or Kino for taking on her neutrality position where it is obvious to us that intervention is the moral good.
Interestingly Sakura, who obviously is a parallel to Kino, in the japanese version was the first voice acting role of Aoi Yuuki, who later went on to voice Kino herself in the 2017 series.