The activities of Ekua and other escapees will continue! Interview with Hiroyuki Hashimoto, director of "Estab Life: Great Escape

The TV anime "Estabulife Great Escape" has just finished airing on Fuji Television Network. Akiba Research Institute has been conducting interviews with the staff involved in this work, including Keisho Fujisawa, musician, and Choji Gato, series composition and screenplay writer. The director, Hiroyuki Hashimoto, appeared at the end of the broadcast. He talked about the "Estab Life" series from various perspectives, including the worldview, the story behind the creation of the main characters such as Ekua, and the various clusters and guest characters that appeared in each episode.
The "Estabulife" series will continue to expand into other media, including the "Estabulife Unity Memories" game and the "Estabulife Revenger's Road" animated film. Will Equa and his friends appear in those follow-up works?　If you are curious, please read this interview to the end.

Editor's note: This article contains spoilers up to the final episode. Please be careful if you have not yet seen this film.

Over the course of 12 episodes, I hope you will believe in Ekua.

─ ─ The TV anime "Estabulife Great Escape" is the precursor of the "Estabulife" series, which will continue with games and theater animation in the future. Could you start by telling us how you became involved in the project?

Hashimoto: Mr. Goro Taniguchi, who was in charge of the original idea and creative direction, asked me to be the director of the TV animation. I had worked on "Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion" ('06-'07), which Taniguchi-san directed, as an original artist. When I talked with Taniguchi-san at the studio, I told him I was interested in directing. I did so, and he took me to postrecording and dubbing. But we never worked together after that, and when I heard that you were nominated as a director this time, I thought I must have been mistaken for someone else (laughs).

(laughs) ──No, I don't think you could be mistaken (laughs).

Hashimoto: When you become a director yourself, you don't have as many opportunities to learn how other directors do things, so I decided to accept the job because I wanted to learn from Taniguchi-san's expertise in filmmaking since I had been invited to work on this project. But when we started production, it turned out to be very difficult (laughs).

(laughs) ─ What do you mean by "very difficult"?

Hashimoto: First of all, Mr. Taniguchi told me about the world view of the work. There is an AI that oversees the world called "The Manager," under which a number of cities (clusters) have been created, where not only humans but also various subracial groups live. Each cluster is divided and managed by an AI called Moderator, and at the center of it all is Oedo Castle, where The Manager is located. The people living in the clusters are not particularly dissatisfied with the management by The Manager or the moderators, and no momentum has been generated to defeat The Manager and build a new world.

─ This is the basic setting of the "Estab Life" series.

Hashimoto: Each cluster has its own characteristics: some are human, some are beastmen, some are cyborgs, and some are demons. In other words, it is a world where anything is possible. I think the idea was to create a world setting that would be easy to make into a game, but the details of the setting were not decided at all. When I asked Taniguchi-san about the specific clusters and the history of each cluster, he told me that I could decide freely on the TV anime.

───Showji Kato, the series director, said the same thing. You said that many of the detailed settings were decided by the staff of the TV animation.

Hashimoto: That's right, it would have been fine if it was only a TV animation, but we are going to make a game and a theater animation based on the same worldview. So I felt that if the settings we made on our own were not correct, it would ruin the world view. (laughs).


(laughs) ─ Does that mean that he would accept anything?

Hashimoto: I think it was a sign of Taniguchi's confidence, or a methodology to avoid narrowing the world of the story. But for us, the high degree of freedom was rather difficult. This was my first time working with Mr. Gatoh, and we proceeded with the production while keeping an eye on each other, but neither of us had a complete understanding of the story world, so it took quite a while from the start of the project until the first episode was completed. So it took a long time from the start of the project to the completion of the first episode.

─ Did Taniguchi-san have any requests regarding the story?

Hashimoto: He asked us not to close the world because there are future developments with the game and the theater anime. In other words, he asked us not to destroy The Manager or do anything that would overthrow the current world order or end the current world. Then they asked me to bring out the various clusters and show them to the audience. To begin with, the majority of the people living in each cluster are not dissatisfied with the world as it is now. It's not that they want the world to change. However, I think that there are a few people who find it hard to live in the cluster they are in and would like to lead a different life in another cluster somewhere else.

─ ─ The drama is created when the protagonists get involved with people who want to lead a different life.

Hashimoto: As the protagonists help those who want to escape, I want them to think about the world as a whole, asking "How in the world did this world come to be? I want them to start thinking about the world as a whole. However, I wanted to make this film as a character-driven story rather than a story centered on the action of escaping. I think the reason Mr. Taniguchi chose you to direct the film was because he wanted to make a character-based film. I thought that he wanted me to make a TV series with a direction that was different from Taniguchi's previous works, and that is why he called me. After realizing this, I shifted to the concept of not touching on the origins of the world and focusing on the characters. I thought that by doing so, the world would naturally come into view.

─ We learn in Episode 10, "Escape and Escape, but You Can't Escape," that Ekua was given the ability of "Fatal Luck" by The Manager, but she was not working for The Manager, and she has been facing each and every person who wants to escape, which is why we were able to create "Ekua's Fatal Luck. I think it was the story of "Estab Life Great Escape".

Hashimoto: That's right. That is how we depicted the individual dramas, but the most difficult part was how to depict Ekua. Why did Equa become an escapee? Even if he has the ability of "Fatal Luck," why does he continue to work as an escapee, even at the risk of his life? That is the first thing to think about, isn't it? If I had created a backstory that his parents had been killed while trying to escape from the cluster, it would make it seem as if Equa was holding a grudge against this world. I thought that would be wrong.


Hashimoto: Equa does not resent or criticize the current world, which is divided and governed by clusters, does it?

Hashimoto: I wanted it to be that way. That's how I created that open and honest character. In the first place, I thought about what kind of person I would want to help me if I were to escape. I thought it would be someone who believes in what he is doing and is, in a sense, a natural. Equa wants to help people who are suffering from the depths of their hearts, and he believes that by letting them go, he can make them happy. If that were the case, there would be no need to describe her past. But if I did that, I would lose her own drama. Such a protagonist is difficult to portray.

Hashimoto: Yes, that's right.

Hashimoto: Yes, yes. To be honest, it is easier to create such a protagonist, and it is also easier for the audience to sympathize with her. Tomomi Mineuchi, who played the role of Ekua, had trouble creating the character at first.

─ How did you explain this to Ms. Mineuchi?

Hashimoto: "This person (Ekua) is a smiling psychopath" (laughs). He smiles at all times, so much so that it makes me feel uneasy. At first I could not believe it, but when I went through all the hardships and when everything was over, he seemed to be enjoying himself all the time, no matter how difficult it was, which made me believe him and felt relieved. He is the one who makes me feel that way. I made "Estab Life Great Escape" over the course of 12 episodes, hoping that the people watching it would come to believe in Ekua.