Yahoo News Undead Murder Farce review: A surprisingly grounded thriller
Undead Murder Farce is a Sherlock Holmes-inspired anime about a young woman and her two companions solving crimes in the 19th century.
Oh – the young woman is actually a 900-year-old disembodied head and her companions are a half-demon, half-human warrior and a maid wielding a huge rifle.
You'd be forgiven then for thinking this new anime from studio Lapin Track was going to be something of a slapstick comedy, but if episode one is anything to go by we're actually getting something pretty grounded.
In fact, the series premiere is thoughtful rather than absurd, and in place of slapstick physical comedy we get an engaging and well-choreographed fight scene.
Undead Murder Farce's first episode does a competent job of setting up its world and stakes, and introducing us to some principal players.
The show takes place in a world similar to our own, except that it's also populated by a large number of demons, monsters and spirits. In the fiction of the show, Japan was home to a great number of these beasties, but as part of a 'Westernisation' project the vast majority were hunted to extinction in The Great Purge.
We're introduced to Tsugaru, a professional Oni Slayer who fights and defeats monsters nightly as part of a circus troupe. He also happens to be 'half human and half Oni' himself, although flashbacks in the episode reveal this is because of experimentation rather than a result of his parentage.
We see that the world of Undead Murder Farce treats Tsugaru with hostility thanks to his visible Oni mutations, and these interactions definitely suggest the show has some interest in exploring broader themes around prejudice.
As the episode progresses we also get introduced to Shizuku, a maid with a mean left hook and a seriously impressive rifle/sword situation.
Tsugaru and Shizuku's first interaction ends in the episode's sole action scene, but plenty of fluid movement and some interesting composition choices make the short sequence stand out, especially given the show's premise and tone didn't suggest we'd get this sort of martial-arts display.
Undead Murder Farce's animation across the board is impressively cinematic, which should come as no surprise given the show's creative pedigree. The show is directed by Mamoru Hatakeyama, most known for his award-winning adaptation of Kaguya-sama: Love Is War. We particularly lauded that show and its spin-off films for having a big-budget theatrical feel, and those sensibilities are already at work here.
Environment work throughout the episode also conveys a lot about the show's tone. The dim lighting and foggy streets surrounding the circus are richly drawn and imbue the episode with a chilly atmosphere that nicely mirrors Tsugaru's mood, while later splashes of colour and more abstract scenes give everything an otherworldly feel.
Those more surreal moments come when we're introduced to Undead Murder Farce's third protagonist Aya Rindo, the aforementioned disembodied head.
We learn that Aya is actually an Immortal, a one-of-a-kind supernatural monster that has been alive (and 14 years old) for more than 900 years. It turns out Aya wasn't always just a head though, and is now on the hunt for the person who stole her body. Luckily for our three main characters the mysterious European responsible was also to blame for the experiments that turned Tsugaru into his half-Oni form.
Although she doesn't get the most screen time, Aya Rindo manages to quickly become a compelling character thanks to a strong performance from Tomoyo Kurosawa. This is complemented by some striking visuals – particularly in the scenes when she proposes an alliance with Tsugaru, as her long hair is silhouetted by bold-coloured backgrounds and we see her lying among a bed of roses.
Overall Undead Murder Farce's first episode shows some real potential, and we're excited to learn more about the world of the show and its mythology.
Teasers and key art for the series also suggest that the majority of the show will take place in Victorian London, and we're excited to see how the grime and grunge of the city is brought to life.
Undead Murder Farce is available on Crunchyroll, with new episodes releasing every Thursday.
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