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Kusunoki's Garden of Gods Episode 1 Review - Power of Handwriting
I honestly was intrigued by this anime because I like anything that revolves around supernatural creatures and it also gave me a bit of Natsume Yuujinchou vibes. To my surprise, it’s a cozy supernatural fantasy story about a guy hanging out with gods. It doesn’t get any cozier than that!
That’s basically the story: Minato Kusunoki becomes the temporary caretaker of a house a distant relative used to own. However, Minato is rather unique in that he can see spirits and supernatural beings, but only the good ones. His grandfather once said that it can help him in the future—and it does, as he befriends the Mountain God (Yamagami) who is grateful towards him for exorcising evil with his handwriting. Because of that Yamagami decides to hang out at Minato’s house often.
There are two sides of this story, the cozy aspects with Minato and the darker, evil spirit exorcising aspects with Harima, who is an onmyouji (an exorcist). It does make me curious about how these two sides will clash. Both sides are interesting in that Harima does seem to need to rely on Minato’s powers to get his job done.
Yes, the special power for this story is that Minato’s handwriting is very powerful. Whatever he writes, evil spirits get exorcised, but the writing fades away after some use. It leads to some hilarious stuff when Harima comes to Minato’s house thinking he’s using some sort of talismans, but it’s just a shopping list. The way Harima spit his tea out when Minato wrote a bunch of sweets on paper was hilarious. Regardless, I don’t know if Minato works or has enough money to live on his own, but selling the papers to Harima does make some decent money on his end.
Anyways, can I talk about Yamagami? He’s so fluffy! The way he gets smaller and cuter just squeezed my heart as a dog lover. I’m surprised that he can produce martens as minions…does this count as asexual reproduction? The one thing I like about the gods so far is that they seem to have different tastes. Yamagami likes Japanese sweets and water while the martens like western sweets. Minato definitely needs to start working because feeding four mouths and himself is no cheap task. Sweets are also expensive!
The voice cast is interesting! Minato is voiced by Shogo Sakata who voices Rosei in Agents of the Four Seasons, Ikari in Tougen Anki and Anzai in Windbreaker! He’s clearly a name I’ve been seeing a lot lately. Yamagami is voiced by Shinshu Fujii who voiced Shigeki Suwa in Buddy Daddies. Seri, the blue tailed marten is voiced by Shinnosuke Tokudome who voiced Wada in Let’s Go Karaoke. Torika, the red tailed marten is voiced by Minako Kotobuki who voiced Blue Rose in Tiger & Bunny and Serah Farron in FFXIII. Utsugi, the yellow tailed marten is voiced by Makoto Koichi who voiced Rio Sonidori in Medalist and Hamaoka in Go For It, Nakamura!
For the exorcists, Harima is voiced by Yuuchiro Umehara who voiced Nanba in Hana-Kimi and Togame in WINDBREAKER. Horikawa, his female colleague, is voiced by Yu Shimamura who voiced Jellymon in Digimon Ghost Game and Briar in Pokemon Horizons. Katsuragi, the older male colleague, is voiced by Hiroo Sasaki who voiced various supporting characters in various anime.
Anyways, I enjoyed the first episode so far and I hope the tone stays consistent throughout the season. Let me know your thoughts on this episode if you have watched it!
