Thoughts on Seirei no Moribito

The 1^st decade of the 2000s was a time where anime was starting to get mainstream recognition in many countries outside of Japan, but at the same time there was little cheap legal access to it apart from TV. Lack of regular access to seasonal anime meant that the shows that managed to linger in the minds of the fans had time to form communities around it, many such shows became “classics” as a result. But this also meant shows that had smaller community around them slowly faded into obscurity no matter how highly they were praised. Seirei no Moribito falls in the later category.

Seirei no Moribito is based on Nahoko Uehashi's Moribito novel series that has won many awards over years. This anime was adapted from the first novel which also got a manga adaptation. The second novel got a manga adaptation of the name Yami no Moribito that takes place directly after the ending of the novel. Having not read the novel or the manga, I can not say how faithful this adaptation is but what I do know is that the material in the first novel wasn’t enough to make a complete 2 cour anime and thus a significant middle portion of the show is anime original content.

One thing that would stick out to anyone within the 1^st few episodes in out lead character Balsa. Over the years there has been some anime with badass female leads but it’s rare to say the least, Balsa fits in her role of a super skilled spear wielder without any added gimmick and it definitely makes for a refreshing experience.
The show follows her journey as she finds way to protect prince Chagum from various threats while the growing pseudo parent-child relationship between them is explored subtly. While some may be lead to believe that this is an action oriented show, that couldn’t be further from the truth. It isn’t even properly character oriented as it frequently prioritizes the folk tale story over everything else. That story might have flowed better in the source but here it falters due to the extra padding.

The lack of action scenes doesn’t mean that what is there isn’t good. On the contrary there are 2 major fight scenes in the show, both expertly choreographed and animated. The fights have a more grounded and weighty feel to them and thus like everything else feels refreshingly unique. The show also boasts some incredibly gorgeous background art which both mesmerizes and immerses you in the setting. While I won’t say the animation is fantastic, it always maintains and steady above average quality for all of the show, something many struggle with. To top it all is the wonderful musical score throughout the show and I’d be hard pressed to find a single bad track in it. It always managed to elevate the experience for me and it’s something I’ll continue to listen to it outside of the anime for years to come. This is the highest praise I can give the musical sore of any anime.

After this point I’ll talk about the story and there will be few potential spoilers.

It’s natural to expect a story that focuses on 2 character fleeing their pursuers to be largely character driven. Surprisingly that isn’t the case here, it’s the overarching plot that largely drives the story forward. However spending so much time with our leads, it’s only inevitable that the characters of ours would be explored. As I said before, Balsa is one of the best female leads anime has to offer. She’s a level headed skilled warrior with a tragic past that slowly discovers her motherly feelings for other lead. Her personality is fully formed when she is introduced to us and thus her character is explored through her backstory while it’s Chagum that gets the most character development. One could even say that this was a coming of age tale for him.

Apart from them there are plenty of other side characters, major and minor that feel well realized and believable as par the context of the story. No annoying anime tropes here which was a big plus for me. But this also made me feel conflicted when I realized that most of these characters are as static as it gets. The nice childhood friend is always nice, the wise old woman remains wise, so on and so forth. There’s little to no conflict to explore multiple facets of their persona and by the end they felt like little more than devices to carry to the plot forward. For a show with such a large diverse cast of believable characters, it’s disappointing to see how none of them explored further.

Let’s talk about the core story now. There are 3 parts to the story that are tangled with each other. On one side we have the slow paced growing relationship between Balsa and Chagum, second we have the political intrigue of assassination of the prince and later about fabrication of the myth by the royal family, both of these are carried forth by the main story of the monster egg inside Chagum. The way the story is paced, different parts of the story focus on different sections and it's quite easy to build an expectation of the story from the first few episodes that is not representative of the whole show. But that isn't such a bad thing right? When dealing with multiple themes and plot-lines it's advantageous to only explore 1 part at a time.

But that isn't the case here. Aside from the fantasy part of the story, nothing the story chooses to focus on is explored thoroughly. We are lead to believe that there would be conflict regarding the prince assassination, but nothing goes wrong enough to create drama. Royal family fabricating myth to establish their rule is prime reason to create doubt among soldiers, but does any conflict arise from that? No, we have to assume the soldiers to too loyal or blind to question anything. You may think I just want some drama in the story but that's not the case, what I want is the thoughts of the characters involved to be further explored, whereas in the anime everyone remains static in their belief and attitude.

Let's come to Balsa and Chagum now. Over the course of the show, the growth of Balsa as a mother figure in Chagum’s life is handled with a deft touch and I found it to be the best part of the show. Going from a luxurious life as a prince, Chagum predicament of being a commoner on the run is understandably vexing. Thankfully the show doesn’t portray him as a comically ignorant aristocrat but as someone who is unfamiliar with the commoner’s way of life. One scene that stood out to me was when he asked Balsa why they needed to pay for the basic privilege of having a shelter and was surprised to learn how much a person’s life revolves around money. His inquisitive nature and a genuine effort to grow as a person was always endearing to watch. It’s easy to see why Balsa took a liking to the kid. While her motherhood is not deeply explored, it’s always hinted at and becomes obvious when she struggles to tell him about the prophesied fate of his demise. This entire arc is really well done from start to it’s conclusion. But the main problem comes in the middle section of the story which is supposedly anime original.

At the start the show brings up Balsa’s past by saying she wants to save equal number of lives as she has destroyed. That’s a reason strong enough for her to take Chagum under her care. But that aspect is promptly thrown aside and in the middle it introduces another story of how her past is quite similar to Chagum’s. Now all things considered, this was a better direction for the story to take since powerful warrior who doesn’t kill trope is way too cliched, and the “new” past does try to bridge the gap between the two but it could not fix the original misstep. This change in her backstory feels very obvious when you factor in the short story of an old adversary. It weirdly portrays her as someone who’s on the brink of being a bloodthirsty monster which is in stark contrast to how she’s shown in the final backstory but makes sense if consider the original one. This brings me to my main issue, the short stories which comprise of the middle section are really not well written. As the pace of the story slows down, it builds up the expectation that we are going to explore the main and side characters but instead of that we get direction less short stories that do nothing to move the plot forward or improve our understanding of the characters. There was potential here, one story about spirit leaving the body briefly even reminded me of Mushishi, but that also came with the realization of how much worse was what I was watching.

Finally we come to the folk tale like fantasy story that’s the main focus of show. The world building is fairly well done as we slowly get to know the inner workings of the kingdom and how it’s myths shaped its world. Underlying themes of how old myths and stories give way to new customs and new "history" is something I quite liked. But the actual fantasy story is very hit or miss in my opinion and I say that as an avid fan of the genre. Maybe if the middle section was trimmed down and the whole plot maintained as constant pace I’d have liked it more but as it stands, I was always bored whenever that part of the story came up. What’s worse is the single minded dedication in which the anime follows it comes at the expense of every other plot element. Where’s the time for character development when most of it spent chasing fantasy creatures?

All my complaints gives the impression that I didn’t like the story, but that’s far from truth. The anime does pick up pace is the final 7 or 8 episodes and even the parts I didn’t care for were fairy entertaining to watch. Add to that a satisfying finale, which is something not every anime story can boast of. One detail I neglected to mention was that the source material was intended for children, so if we keep that in mind the shallowness makes sense. But I could never stop feeling how much better it could have been. Taken together, Seirei no Moribito was less than the sum of its parts.