Anime Column] 100 Anime to Watch by Keyword! 100 Anime to Watch - Vol. 22 "The Land of Jewels" and more!

Drinking parties among anime fans tend to be a game of association. Whenever someone says, "XXX has XXX scene," someone else replies, "Speaking of XXX scene, don't forget XXX. Anime and animation are connected by invisible threads like this. Let's trace the "anime to watch" using keywords as clues.

Jewel Land" is an anime adaptation of the original manga of the same title by Haruko Ichikawa.
It takes place in the distant future. There are no more living creatures on the earth. There are 28 "gems" in the world. Each of the 28 jewels takes the name of its own jewel. The moon people attack the gems to use them as ornaments. The gems have fought many battles with the moon people.

The characteristics of the gems' bodies are measured by two major values. One is hardness and the other is toughness. Hardness is literally hardness, and toughness is the tenacity of the gem. Diamonds, for example, have a very high hardness but a slightly low toughness. For example, diamonds have very high hardness, but somewhat low toughness. This means that diamonds have high strength under gently applied pressure, but are weak against instantaneous force, such as striking with a hammer. The bodies of gemstones also exhibit these characteristics according to their hardness and toughness.

The protagonist of this work is the curious, foolhardy, and articulate fosfophyllite.
It is very fragile, with a hardness of three and a half and a toughness of the lowest level. For this reason, Fosfophyllite was not allowed to join the Moon People in battle, and because he was not particularly gifted, he was considered unfit for any other work. Fosfophyllite is eventually assigned by Dr. Vajra, who unites the gems, to create a natural history book to record things. The characters in this film are basically drawn in 3DCG, and the hardness and softness of 3DCG, which is different from hand-drawing, matches well with the characters of the gems, and the colorful hair, which gives the gems their individuality, is beautifully rendered in a way that only 3DCG can.
It is fun just to look at the various gems in this series.

The theme of this year's exhibition is "Jewelry.

Soul gems are the "jewel-like" items that appear in the hit "Puella Magi Madoka Magica.
In this work, girls make a contract with a mysterious little animal named Kyubee in exchange for a wish, and become magical girls to fight witches. The soul gem is created when this contract is made.

The soul gem is the magical girl herself and the source of her magical power. The soul gem loses its luster each time magic is used, and in order to regain this luster, the magical girl must defeat the witch.

In other words, the beautiful looking gem is a symbol of the contract that binds the magical girls, which is a serious thing that could be called a "curse. The sparkling beauty of the jewelry accentuates its horror.

Jewelry is a treasure. In this sense, the correct use of jewelry is the "treasure" of "Detective Holmes.
The Blue Red Jade" from "Detective Holmes.

This episode is one of the six episodes in the series for which Hayao Miyazaki was in charge, and the director credited for the script is Sunao Katabuchi, director of "In This Corner of the World" (a college student at the time).

The film depicts a great commotion that begins when a pickpocket kid named Polly steals a blue jewel that Professor Moriarty has stolen from a jewelry store. A Pteranodon airplane flies over the city of London, and a chase unfolds between a steam car and a proto-Venz.

The depiction of the "Blue Red Jade," the McGuffin of the film, is also impressive. When the jewel is taken out, a bundle of sparkling blue light shoots out and illuminates the surroundings. Although from the standpoint of realism, this is an impossible depiction, the cartoonish persuasiveness of the scene is overwhelming, and the depiction alone eloquently tells us how special this jewel is.

The last film I will discuss is the movie "Patarillo! Stardust Project". This is a film in which diamonds are the key.

The film is an adaptation of a full-length episode from the manga of the same name (the entire fifth volume is an episode of this film), and one of its attractions is that Mineo Mayo, the author of the original manga, sings the theme song for the film.

The main industry of Marinella, the land of everlasting spring where the hero Patarillo is king, is diamonds. In this film, Patarillo and MI6 agent Bancolin pursue a series of robberies targeting diamonds. The reason why diamonds are targeted is related to the "Stardust Project" of the title. In addition to the beautiful image of the diamonds at the end of the original story, the movie version is further enhanced with scenes of Patarillo's exploits, which is a nice touch.

The animation medium, which is based on outlines and paintwork, does not allow for a wide range of textural expression, but this is not to say that the film version does not have a high degree of coloring. However, this also means that "something that can be expressed with a high degree of color saturation and paint separation" can be presented in a very attractive way. Jewelry is just such an example.

(Text by Ryota Fujitsu)

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