Lazarus: “Goodbye Cruel World” Episode 1 Recap

  Lazarus has been a title that anime fans have been very excited, but very nervous about. This series has been a Toonami original, and so far every Toonami original except Shenmue: The Animation has been panned by professional critics and divisive to the anime fanbase. On the flipside, this series is created by Shinichirō Watanabe, widely regarded as the greatest director of anime television series who ever lived. As of this writing, audiences seem to be enjoying this show pretty well, with a 7.60 MyAnimeList score as of this time of writing. So what happens in this show and how well executed is it? Let’s dig into that.

The episode begins with voiceover narration explaining the basic premise of this futuristic science fiction series. The world has been dramatically changed by a panacea sold in pharmacies everywhere known as Hapna. This drug, it appears, eradicated disease and apparently had no drawbacks or side effects. Dr. Skinner, the man who created this wonder drug mysteriously vanished from the face of the earth after changing society as we know it. We cut to our main character Axel Gilberto, who is our main protagonist and a prisoner. He is greeted by a visitor and he asks the woman if she is his lawyer or another hitman sent to kill him. She says that she is “kinda both.”

They both watch a television screen that was mounted above them and a news report gives more exposition. The mysterious creator of the wonder drug posted a video all over the Internet revealing a dark secret about the drug. The drug was created to kill everybody who took said drug. During Dr. Skinner’s big motive rant, it appears that he believes that humans are bad for the environment and that killing everybody will save the trees or something. Apparently, somehow when in our real 21st century world we have tons of people who don’t trust or believe in modern medicine, it seems heavily implied that almost the entire human race uses the drug and will die. Well, “kill everybody to save the environment” is a very cliche plot and the believability of everybody taking this wonder drug seems kinda farfetched. Anyway, Dr. Skinner, for some reason, gives the world a challenge, find him within thirty days or humanity dies.

This news report appears to motivate Axel to escape from prison and we get our first big action scene, a very well done action scene courtesy of MAPPA and choreographed by the same person who was responsible for the fight scenes in the John Wick movies. Axel is fan of acrobatics and flipping and spinning as he beats up prison guards and runs and jumps all over the place to break out. As expected the action is on point and the musical accompaniment is also on point. The spectacle of the show is just as good as expected.

We have a few scenes introducing us to other characters. We have a college student who decides to quit college because the apocalypse is about to happen, a motorcycle-riding woman, and a guy in a suit. These three people all appear to know each other; the trailers have already revealed that these people are our main team of protagonists who will be on the hunt for Dr. Skinner. Everyone who watched the trailers knows that they are going to recruit Axel.

We have a humorous scene where a police officer sees Axel walking around the city in a prison uniform and doesn’t realize he’s an escaped convict until someone on a walkie-talkie tells him that a convict escaped. Axel steals some clothes from a clothing store and sneaks past this idiot cop. What follows next is the guy in the fancy suit giving Axel another elaborate chase/action scene for the show. Suit guy corners Axel to the edge of a building roof and seemingly has him when the college dropout guy flies a drone around the building. It turns out that Axel decides to ride this drone to the ground safely and it appears that bringing the drone was not the smartest move. Or maybe it was, as it actually leads Axel to motorcycle lady. She asks for a selfie and uses a bracelet with a stun feature to stun him.

Finally, Axel wakes up and the show reveals to Axel what the audience knew the whole time. He was being conscripted into a organization called Lazarus that sought out Dr. Skinner. That’s the end of the episode.

So we’ve established that the series appears to be a vehicle for over the top action scenes with the overarching plot of finding Dr. Skinner. There is really nothing that interesting about the plot or characters and it seems like the style is carrying this first episode rather than the substance. This show’s world and setting are nowhere near as interesting as Watanabe’s previous works, and arguably the coolest thing Watanabe ever thought up was the breakdancing samurai fights in 2004’s Samurai Champloo. Still, this is only the first episode and there’s time for the show to find its footing. Although this premiere wasn’t as amazing as Cowboy Bebop or Samurai Champloo‘s amazing premiere episodes, this was still at least an exciting and action packed episode of anime. The biggest challenge this show has is measuring up the legendary works of Watanabe’s past.