Review of Lazarus
Unpopular opinion, I like Lazarus. A lot. That’s not to say this show is perfect or even a masterpiece, but it was a very enjoyable watch for me and a lot of the criticism levied against this show tends to fundamentally misunderstand what it’s trying to accomplish. Yes, there’s flashy fights done by the legendary Chad Stahelski, but that’s not the main point of this show. It’s supposed to be a slower introspective piece on the sins of humanity, how we(generally) prioritise profit over the greater good and whether or not humanity is truly worth saving. Now, If you actually go into this series expectingthat sort of philosophical questioning, you’ll enjoy it. If you go in expecting cowboy bebop, space dandy or any of Watanabe’s other legendary series, you’ll be disappointed. This falls short of those, but then again most shows do. That’s why they’re considered masterpieces. Lazarus sets out to answer a singular question “is humanity worth saving” and by the end, we reach a conclusion. Again, that’s not to say this show is perfect. There’s some very valid critiques of it, especially surrounding the episode count, a few holes in the logic, the dub voice acting, etc., but people acting like this show killed their mother or something or like it’s the next Ex-Arm are ridiculous.
Lazarus was awesome to me because I’m a huge fan of that early 2000s late night toonami style of anime. Your Bebops, The Big O, etc. Those sort of subdued, mature and thought provoking series that let you know you were up way too late if you were awake when they came on. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Lazarus has that sort of energy since it’s literally produced by Adult Swim and comes from Watanabe. The aesthetic really just does something for me here to pull me in, but the cast, music and story are what hooked me. I absolutely loved the entire Lazarus team. Even though I would’ve really loved to have seen every single character get their own little 1-2 episode development arc(most do) the little time we got with them and their backstories was enough to make me care about them. There’s this nice found family dynamic going on and I’m a sucker for social rejects coming together to form a team and do something greater than themselves, thanks Jamss Gunn. They all have their own strengths and compliment each other’s weaknesses very well. It’s nowhere near Bebop levels of character writing, but it’s solid for a one cour show. Every scene with the full team on screen together was awesome too. The banter and way they tease each other as the season goes on and they get more comfortable.. awesome. I really fell in love with this group.
The story is the other big draw for me here. You need to set your expectations going into it though so as to not disappointed. Again, this isn’t a straightforward story. Yes, the goal initially is to find skinner and get a cure for the HAPNA situation, but it’s quickly made apparent that there’s much more to skinner’s actions than previously thought and that everything he’s done is with the intention of making the characters retrace the steps he took, seeing all the bad stuff humanity has done, ignoring climate change advice, putting profits over people, caring more about covering up illegal experiments than saving lives, etc., and have them meet him knowing everything he knows before they ask for a cure. That’s why the story doesn’t go from point A to B and often sidetracks, it’s supposed to. This is show is about people at its core. The good, the bad and the ugly. That requires.. spending episodes with people, getting characters’ backstories, going into homeless camps, slums, visiting islands affected by climate change, etc. You can’t make a judgement on humanity or the world if you haven’t seen all it has to offer. To me, this was obvious after like 3 episodes so I really don’t understand how people misunderstood the show, but a lot of criticism about it would instantly be eliminated if people realized what the show’s narratively and philosophically trying to do. It does it consistently and well in my opinion. That doesn’t mean you need to like it, you can absolutely just not like skinner as a villain and find his actions reprehensible or maybe you just don’t care for the cast, couldn’t connect with any of them and didn’t find them compelling. That’s totally fine and I’m not here to force an opinion on you, I just want people to understand where this show’s coming from. There’s plenty of objectively well written shows that I don’t like as well. It happens.
The third most important thing for me here are the production values. This show looks amazing. I love the subdued colors, the realistic character designs, the incredible soundtrack, which shouldn’t come as a surprise because Watanabe’s works always have great ones, the choreography from Stahelski and the voice acting(JP). I’m a huge fan of the more natural sounding dialogue style they went for in this. From what I’ve heard, the dub sounds very awkward so I would definitely recommend sticking with the Japanese here if possible. MAPPA brought their A-game to all the big fight scenes as well. Phantom Killer’s introduction is going to live so rent free in my head for a while.
This was just such a fun series to watch. It just had a way of really gripping me every week in an almost mesmerising fashion. Christine and the rest of the cast stole my heart, the story was solid and really the only thing I’d change is making it 16 episodes or so just to get more of the team hanging out. Happy with what I got, though.
Lazarus gets 8 out of 10.