Recap

Fifty takes Kanye to a meeting with the Amagi Development Group, represented by the evil Chris Tucker. Kanye learns the full extent of Maple Land’s dilemma, but will sympathy alone be enough to convince him to join as manager?

Jel’s thoughts

This show is weird. It has essentially turned into Code Geass but instead of leading a revolution of the oppressed Japanese people, A boy named after Kanye West is leading a group of magical living amusement park mascots. He even has a cerebral, one use super power and the ability to give some over the top, dramatic speeches. The only thing missing at this point is the voice of Jun Fukuyama, who I imagine might not be taking calls from Kyoto Animation after the awful Chunibyo season 2.

For the most part, I think Amagi’s weird streak is a good thing. I am not sure I would have liked the episode’s climactic scene as much had it played out with regular people. It would have felt too heavy for the tone of the rest of the show. Throw in a blue mascot crying literal crocodile tears though, and there was just something bizarrely endearing about the whole process. You genuinely care about them succeeding, but you also feel confident that they’re never going to take this too seriously.

In the bigger picture, Kanye makes for an interesting main character. He’s kind of cold at the moment, but there’s a lot of room for growth as he gets more emotionally involved with Maple Land. Again going with the Code Geass comparison, my favorite part of that series was seeing Lelouch use his powerful but limited ability to maneuver and outsmart his opponents. I could see that happening here from week to week, obviously with lower stakes and less people dying (probably), and it would set an interesting stage for the characters to play off each other. Mixing some silly and absurd concepts with a dash of drama and heart is a winning recipe in my book, and that seems to be where Amagi Brilliant Park is heading.