Two Shows

I want to take a moment and talk about two anime/mangas that have taken up my interest. First is Kusuriya no Hitorigoto or The Apothecary Diaries. Set in some...era in China I'm assuming, a young girl named Maomao gets caught up in the incidents and crimes happening in the royal palace. Maomao is a captured servent girl who becomes the royal poison tester, a dangerous job that she takes to like a fish to water. In her previous job, she was the apprentice of a medicine man so her interests in poison and chemicals is a natural high for her. If you know anything about the typical royal palace, you know that it's filled with drama, death, and politics. Maomao has to navigate these incidents without drawing too much attention to herself. Her interest is in the medical aspects behind the poisoning. In fact, she's not only willing to be poisoned, she wants to study the effects. She's akin to a female Dr. House in her zest for life is in the disease, not the person afflicted. She's almost insane in her lust for information, so much so that she performs a dance when she's bought from the brothel with a sample of a cordycept rather than gold. It's this cat-like dispassion for other people and this sole interest in medicine that makes her such a wonderful protagonist. It's this clash with other "normal" people in her life that makes each scene humourous, charming, while uping the tension in the palace. In one scene, she plans for her own execution. Being a commoner means that offending the wrong people could make her meet the executioner. She asks her master if she can be poisoned to death so that she can study the effects as she's dying. After thinking about it, Maomao decides that hanging or beheading is fine since it's impudent of her to have a preference for execution. This scares several people around her as she casually talks about death as if she doesn't care. It's honestly hillarious to see how other people respond to her interests. I've always had a facination with the drama behind the different royal families, especially the ones in China and Japan. Adding a Dr. House element was a brilliant choice on the writer's part. It also pokes at the societal norms from that age. Maomao can read and write, a rarity among the common people. As a detective she's often the smartest person in the room which lines up with the detective theme. 

The second series is called Sousou no Frieren or just "Frieren." You know the story by now. A hero rises up to fight the Demon King/ Monster/ Dragon and brings a party with him. But what happens after the adventure is done? Frieren, the elf mage of the party, is destined to live long after her human and dwarf comrades die. There four of them, the Hero, the Warrior, the Priest, and the Mage, are able to defeat the demon king and save the world. But what happens next? The first chapter starts with Frieren attending the funeral of the Hero. In an interesting twist, the story of the the hero's party is told through Frieren's memories. She not only remembers her own party but of the heroes that came before it. Being over a thousand years old has its advantages for the story. Frieren soon picks up a human apprentice named Fern and the human apprentice to her Dwarf friend named Stark. Two seasons have come out which flesh out Frieren's experiences. Instead of relaxing after defeating the Demon King, Frieren continues with her hobby of collecting spells despite how pointless they may be. Such as a spell that removes the rust from statues or one that prevents egg shells from entering the bowl when you open them. Such is her hobby. But the real draw for me is how the story takes place after the final battle. There's still things to do like monster's left over to defeat and of course Frieren's training of her apprentice Fern. It's like the sidequests in a game you forgot to complete. If I were to place a bet on how the series will end, I would guess that it will end with Frieren attending Fern's funeral after she's lived a long life. That's the curse of Frieren's longevity is that she will see friends and comrades die before her. And she will go on living. Sounds like a sad ending but I think Frieren's goal, besides collecting spells, is to watch over her apprentice for how ever long she lasts. I'll have to wait because the author and artist are on a sabatical due to health complications.