My Final Thoughts on Bungou to Alchemist
If you’ve been watching the show and following it since it came out, then you should be aware it ended today. I felt like sharing my final thoughts on the anime, because ratings wise it may have not been the most well liked show, but it had a powerful impact on me. (and i loved the op-)
That being said, if you haven’t watched the show or aren’t caught up on it, there will be spoilers. It’s also my first time doing something like this so bear with me if it’s more of a ramble of my thoughts.
I, as well as probably a lot of people, started watching the show because I am a massive fan of Bungou Stray Dogs as you can tell from my profile pic and a lot of my content. It was incredibly well written, interesting, and first introduced me to Japanese literature. I went to BTA expecting something of the same sense, something based on real people but its own story entirely.
Moments into the first episode I immediately realized I was wrong. This wasn’t handling people based on authors, this was handling reincarnations of actual deceased authors. There were comedy episodes, story episodes, and episodes meant to make you feel. I cried with Ango’s episode, I felt pain when the kid killed himself, and these last two episodes had me bawling. This was an entirely different anime from Bungou Stray Dogs and I realized pretty quickly that comparing the two wouldn’t be worth it. Despite being massively different, BTA still has become one of my favorite anime.
The reason I had such a strong reaction to certain episodes has a lot to do with the characters themselves. They aren’t characters written to be human, they’re people written to be characters. Even though they lived in a different era, all of these people and their struggles were scarily human because they were all real at one point or another. Yes it was dramatized, yes it was made to be entertaining, but it as also meant to at least get you a glimpse into their real stories. And the human emotions and actions are what I could find relatable.
I personally am I writer. Most of it is roleplay and fanfiction but I also have my own stories. Things I pour research and development into just so I can get a message across, even if it’s a self-indulgent message, or just a concept I thought people would like. I look at Akutagawa in these last two episodes, and that’s when he really became someone I related to. Here’s where we have really big spoilers, you have been warned.
Speaking of Akutagawa and human emotions, throughout the series he always seemed to me like the ideal author in a way. He had been there a while, he was powerful, he could remain calm in a dangerous situation, he was respected by everyone and highly renowned for his works, and a kind senpai towards Dazai. He just seemed on an entirely different level from everyone else so even I found myself respecting him. He seemed untouchable, that is until I learned a bit more about him. I learned Akutagawa rebuked his earlier works and that he killed himself. I learned he suffered with every novel he wrote and felt like he couldn’t be loved by anyone not even himself.
And that’s why there are two Akutagawa’s in the series. Akutagawa created a version of himself inside his mind to love him when he thought no one else would. That version of Akutagawa is who we follow through the series and is later revealed to be a taint. He’s driven to hate literature, knowing that if it had never existed, the real Akutagawa would have been happy. He never would’ve committed suicide. He never would’ve given up a piece of himself with every novel he wrote.
Learning all this, oddly enough, is what made me relate to him more. As I mentioned earlier, I am a writer. Almost two years ago now, I was in the same situation as Akutagawa in a sense. I felt like no one would care about me if I were to disappear and that this loose sense of friendship with the people i knew threw writing could disappear at any second. So, I did what he did. I created someone who cared, and not just one person, multiple people. I put in my head that the characters I wrote existed. I would even talk with them and get into fights with them, much like the two Akutagawas in the show as show when he was alive. They existed to replace an actual person for me. I’m doing much better now though, but watching this all played out reminded me of how true everything they were saying could be for people. Literature saved many people but also cursed some people. I’m someone where I’ve had literature do both. That’s why I ended up bawling at the end, because I could feel how real Akutagawa was.
That’s a lot of the main thoughts I had. The music was great, the character designs were great, and the friendships.
Don’t get me started on their friendships. More things more real than I could probably see in a lot of anime where the cast are just characters in a show, nothing more nothing less. Everyone had amazing friendships and I could do an entirely different things about their interactions and dynamics because that’s how strongly I feel about it. I’m not going to put that here because this is already getting long. I did come out of it with some ships too of course, and no one of them was not Dazai and Chuuya
If anything, if there was one major thing I was disappointed with, it’s that I don’t remember Tanizaki showing up. I was looking forward to seeing him.
Anyways that’s about it for me, thanks if you actually took the time to read all of this and if not,
TLDR; Despite its poor ratings, I thought Bungou to Alchemist was an absolutely amazing show. It’s not comparable to Bungou Stray Dogs, but it’s great in it’s own way. The characters are written in such a real and human like way that each pain they experience could be relatable to somebody. It’s definitely worth checking out.