Nobunaga Concerto

Nobunaga Concerto (信長協奏曲) is a 10 episode historical fiction based on the manga of the same name by Ishii Ayumi.  The series originally aired in Japan during the summer of 2014.

    Saburo, an average and unacomplished high school student, finds himself in the Sengoku (waring states) period.  He falls from the sky in the presence of a young and sickly Oda Nobunaga.  Seizing the opportunity before him, Nobunaga convinces Saburo to act as his stand in for a while,  so he can rest and gain his strength.  Saburo, only partially understanding the situation, decides to do it.  The impostor Nobunaga shocks everyone with him enthusism,  sudden quirkiness and odd speech patterns.  Time passes and Saburo finds himself beginning to lead the way towards unifying Japan under the Oda family banner.  Armed wth his high school history text book and complete confidence he leads armies into battles and builds alliances.  Will he be able to live up to the historical Nobunaga and can he ever return to his own time?

    This series crept up out of leftfield and I was a little hesitant about it.  The character animation really bothered me.  The technique used was motion capture cell shading, a style I have little love for.  Someting about using real people and their movements to help in the animation process tends to make it less natural looking.  The character movements are jarring and creepy...like the animatronic robots at Chuck E Cheese.  Beyond the character design and movements the artwork is rather high quality,  with finely detailed backgrounds and clothing.  Artwork aside,  I like time travel stories and this one was interestingly done, if a bit unconventional for the genre.  Typically characters who time travel without their own consent try everything they can to reverse their situation and the story focuses on that goal.  This show instead pushs all that to the side and focuses on the monumentous history the character finds himself the focal point of.  Saburo's character is kind of flawed.  He's positive and enthusiastic beyond anyone else.  Even when his life is in danger he doesn't show much more emotion than blind faith and positivity that everthing will work out.  He acts as if he's not participating in the events but only spectating, even though hes the one making many of the decisions. 

    The story its self is rather interesting and has spurned me to want to learn more about this incredibly important moment in Japans history.  Through the show we follow along with highlights of integral battles and decisions in Nobunagas campaign to bring all of the daimyo in Japan under a central ruler,  himself.  Given these are real historical events a large cast of historical figures make apperances through out the story.  Not entirely familliar with what these powerful men were suppose to look like, I really wonder if the shows representation of Tokugawa Ieyasu as a fat cherub is accurate.  One of my favorite boardgames, Shogun, takes place during this period of time, so I was midly familair with many of the people and places mentioned in the show,  if completely unfamiliar with the events and their significance. 

    Don't go into this show expecting all sorts of epic and bloody combat though,  there is very little.  Instead the focus is on the character interactions and the negotiations and strategies deployed.  There are some probelms as well beyond the main characters personality quirks.  Through out the series I continued to wonder why those around him never attempted to kill him for being possesed. He doesnt hide the fact he's not from their time that well and whenever he uses Englsh based words everyone stares at him in confussed wonder.  When he offered his wife instant ramen he had...priceless. The passage of time is not really understood as well.  You have to know when the key events take place to get a feel for that.  The series covers close to 20 years worth of events though and none of the characters appear to age.  They gloss over Saburo instantly being a badass on a horse too...

    With its flaws this was a good series, unfortunatelly, like Nobaga's unification goal, we don't get to see any sort of conclussion.  The story ends rather abruptly with no resolution to Saburo's situation or Nobunaga's campaigns.  Spoiler; Nobunaga never succeeds,  Hideyoshi Toyotomi picks up the job but he also fails to complete the task.  Tokugawa Ieyasu picks up after Hideyoshi and does succeed, ushuring in the 250ish year Tokugawa shogunate.  If you like informative historical stories this is a good one.  But the story is also quirky and the main character is fun to watch so more tan history buffs can enjoy it as well.  This was a good show with its flaws and I wish there was more.  There is word of a pending OAV follow up but I have no information on that.

    The series was simulcast via Cruchyroll.  Given the tepid North American response I doubt it will see a commercial disc release.  The manga is not commercially available in North America either.