Reel Tastes & Travels – a light dose of entertainment to wake you up

Phew…that’s quite a mouthful of a title. The animation is based on a Japanese mobile game co-created by Disney and Aniplex. Hence the tongue twister of a name. Wordiness aside however, the concept teased in the trailer was intriguing enough that I decided to give it a watch. Now I have never played the game, so I went in completely blind and it was a lot!

The story, best as I can figure, revolves around Yu, a student who gets pulled through a mysterious portal to Night Raven College, an academy for mages sorted into seven Houses modeled after seven iconic Disney Villains. While Yuken is still grappling with all this, the entrance ceremony is disrupted by Grim, a fire-breathing cat-monster who wreaks havoc in an attempt to force his way into the academy, before he is stopped by Riddle, the housewarden of HeartsLabyul (inspired by the Queen of Hearts naturally).

After a brief introduction to highlight Yu’s credentials as a protagonist (good athlete, determined, bit of a hero figure to his Kendo teammates), we are dumped right into the thick of action with one character after the other thrown at us. It feels like there’s an assumption going in that viewers are familiar with the game and hence character intros aren’t necessary. On the one hand, this does make the episode go quickly so I’m not against it. If the number of characters briefly highlighted is any indication, proper intros would have led to an episode that was twice as long and half as engaging. On the other hand, I did find it very confusing keeping track of who’s who and would have appreciated at least a name card at the bottom to help with future reference. On the whole though, I feel the pacing benefit wins out and it was amusing seeing the absolute chaos instigated by Grim.

It was also a great way to shine a spotlight in a very short time on the characteristics of the different housewardens as indicated by their differing reactions to Grim’s antics. Here are all the ones I managed to spot (Disclaimer – it did take me several rewatches to catch all the names + a bit of googling to get the list of houses since the episode passes by too fast to take it all in the first time round) –

• Azul who uses the opportunity to try and play nice with the headmage and get some brownie points – my guess is he’s from Octavinelle (Ursula’s house) given his use of the phrase ‘poor, unfortunate soul’
• Lilia who seems to be enjoying the chaos – I first though this might be inspired by Hades but considering the purple tones in the character design, I revised my guess to Maleficent’s house Diasomnia
• Leona, who’s uninterested and just laying low till the whole affair is over – clearly Scar inspired both in costume design and dialogue, so has to be Savanaclaw
• One character (name unknown) who speaks with a French accent and admires the mess Grim has created – I’m unsure about this one. I thought it could be related to Doctor Facilier from the Princess and the Frog. But given the pedigree of the other villains, that feels a bit too recent and not nearly iconic enough.
• And of course, Riddle from HeartsLabyul who is outraged that his experience has been tainted by Grim’s mischief and who is out for blood.

The episode ends on a bit of a cliffhanger with Riddle, enraged that Yu dared presume that he needs help, advancing menacingly on him. All in all, a promising start. A bit light on actual story but that’s understandable given the need to set the plot up. Hopefully, the next couple of episodes will strike more of a balance between moving the story forward and the action scenes.

Stray Musings

• Why was Yu brought here when he doesn’t have any magic? And if the houses are modeled after Disney Villains, does that make the entire academy (and by extension all the main characters) evil? If so, what does that then say about Yu who is introduced as a prototypical hero figure?
• What is that mysterious floating tablet providing commentary on the events as they unfold?
• I loved the interpretation of the Red Queen’s infamous ‘Off with their head!’ pronouncement as spell that inflicts a magic-inhibiting collar on the target
• I also loved the short post-credits scene which explained how the actual welcome ceremony was supposed to go. And the meta joke about everyone forgetting to invite the housewarden of Maleficent’s house to the practice run.