Goomba Reviews: DISSECTING SCENES - The perfect filler (Beyond the Boundary, Ep. 6)

There’s a word that’s brought up frequently in anime or TV series discussions: filler. Usually used with a negative connotation, what is exactly a filler? There are two definitions. The first, considered its origin, refers to episodes or events in a book or manga adaptation that are not featured in the original work, such as fights absent from the manga of a shounen anime. Some fans take that definition as the only valid one.

The second definition considers a filler every dispensable events that adds nothing to the story, episodes that you can skip and it won’t make any difference. Those are extremely common in shounen series with more than 100 episodes, such as Dragon Ball, Bleach and Naruto, to name a few. The episode I’ll be analysing fits that description.

This month I started watching Beyond the Boundary, a 2013 anime by Kyoto Animation, a studio I always write about here. It’s one of their most thematically unique works, since it’s filled with action and fantasy. There’s an association that combats monsters from another dimension and the protagonist can transform her blood into a big sword. It’s clear that this isn’t your ordinary KyoAni slice of life show, even though there are plenty of slice of life elements in it.

The protagonist also lifts the moe flag the studio is known for since K-ON!.

Plot development was going nicely until it arrived in episode six. Then the plot came to a complete halt. Why? Because KyoAni wanted to present us with a new addicting dance, that’s all. Is that a bad thing? Not at all. This episode succeeds in every field I deem necessary to make up a perfect filler episode.

If the studio wants to make a filler episode, I think they should strip out all connections with the main story. No half-filler half-story episode bullshit – the episode needs to be standalone, in a way you can skip it if you don’t feel like watching it. Another requirement is to make the episode offer a different experience than what you get in normal episodes, showing stuff such as a side of the character’s life we’re not used to see or showing them in situations that wouldn’t fit normal episodes.

When the sixth episode of Beyond the Boundary begins with Mitsuki’s cute mascot dancing and the girls bathing, you can notice right away it isn’t a common episode. In the worst case scenario, it could be the fanservice episode. Given its premise, calling it that wouldn’t be wrong as its plot revolves around a monster that is horny for attractive girls.

While Mitsuki takes a bath...

...the furry animal dances.

KyoAni’s got a background of going overboard on the fanservice in some series, but this doesn’t happen here. There’s only some shots of the girls bathing that don’t show much and Mirai doing sensual poses to the perverted monster. The premise is of a fanservice episode, but the execution makes it stray away from being one. +150XP to the episode.

With a pose like that...

...it's easy to understand the monster's reaction.

I believe fillers work better when they’re funny. KyoAni’s staff probably shares the same opinion, because this is one of their funniest episodes, starting with the monster the characters must defeat. I said fillers need to feature something that can’t be found in normal episodes and this monster fits the bill perfectly.

As if its affection for high school girls wasn’t enough, its defense mechanism when attacked is exploding and expelling a liquid that makes the characters smell like trash. Besides that, its design contrasts with the other monsters of the anime that are all menacing, while this one is a floating eye with a pink-dotted purple body, some plant roots in his inferior and superior parts and lots of oranges as its hair, not counting the carefree expression of his look.

He’s even shown fascinated by a butterfly. This monster’s a joke.

The monster’s ability to make the characters stink is what makes up most of the episode’s humor. This may seem like childish humor, but again the execution is here to save the day. Beyond the Boundary overall is full of comedy moments, but in this episode everything is dramatic and over-the-top, almost like a slapstick comedy movie.

Almost all characters’ dramatic reactions are accompanied by those dashed visual effects of impact surrounding them, enhanced by hefty sound effects that make them even more dramatic. In some segments freeze frames are used with more saturated and contrasted colors and strong lines to amplify what’s already exaggerated. The best example is when Mirai and Akihito, after a fight against the monster, walk by a barking dog and the image freezes on him like that, then it cuts to the scenery and the distant and echoed sound of the animal barking in agony after smelling their stench.

"I have made a terrible mistake".

The scene that makes better use of all these dramatic and exaggerated gimmicks is the one where all characters are bathing. Mirai gives a tantrum because she can’t stand the putrid smell anymore and asks Mitsuki to stay away from her because she’s the one who stinks the most. A conflict almost rises up between them, when suddenly Hiroomi and Akihito give a poetic speech, insanely clichéd and with an inspirational background music. The girls get emotional and everyone is now motivated to defeat the monster once and for all. It’s so cheeky and ridiculous and that’s what makes it funny.

Another great detail is the clearly intentional plot holes, made explicit by the characters’ dialogues so that we notice them. It’s said the monster is only attracted by human girls, but the one that makes him excited the most in the end is Ai Shindou, a yomu. Yes, she appears to be a human, but the girl makes it explicit in a prior dialogue that only genuine human girls attract him.

Facing such cuteness...

...the monster loses his mind.

Mitsuki is hit by a special liquid that would activate the monster’s ability whenever she’d be near him, but this never happens whenever they meet again. Besides that, this liquid gave her the most unbearable smell of them all, to the point Hiroomi throws up when he sees her without wearing a mask as everyone else does, and the smell would only be removed if the monster were defeated. What’s funny is that all her friends gradually wear less and less protection close to her, almost as if her stench was vanishing, which contradicts what was said prior.

First they use a mask when close to Mitsuki.

Then they put her into a plastic ball.

Then she creates a spiritual cage to lock the smell.

And then they simply forget about the smell and there’s no protection at all.

Mirai doesn’t knows how to sing. In her first try to capture the monster’s attention, the girl deafens us with an out of tune singing that makes the enemy explode instantly. However, after one single week, she miraculously sings like an angel and captures all our hearts – literally in my case, for reasons I’ll explain now.

Visualizar esta foto no Instagram.

Uma publicação compartilhada por Kyoto Animation Everyday (@kyoanieveryday) em 28 de Jun, 2018 às 2:35 PDT

But before that, let me approach two of KyoAni’s characteristic meticulous details. The first happens at the 9:54 mark when Akihito talks to Ai and she reacts in a way I can’t imagine any other studio making the same in such a trivial dialogue. Instead of simply turning her face to Akihito, she kind of gets startled when he starts speaking, then she smiles and looks in his direction. It’s something completely insignificant, but it makes their interaction feel more genuine and heightens her charisma.

There’s no sound in the gif, but she makes a noise when she gets startled.

Then at the 16:42 mark we see a nice attention to sound design when Mirai starts to give tantrums and Mitsuki enters the frame inside the shower stall she’s bathing in. You can hear her running steps as she gets near the stall’s door and a thump in the door as she reaches it. This provides a sense of distance and of how big the stall is, since it reveals the girl was far from the door and had to get near it to talk to Mirai directly. It’s a detail that makes the scene realistic and adds depth to it, because they managed to convey Mitsuki’s desperation solely with her intense footsteps and her strong thump in the door.

This is the same scene from the 12th paragraph.

We’ve finally reached the main event of the episode, the reason why it exists. After many absurdities, it all culminates in the only way to defeat the monster – an idol dance to deactivate its defense mechanism. Gentlemen, this is one of the most addicting dances I ever watched in my whole life. When I first watched this episode, I rewatched this scene repeatedly for almost two hours and it was already midnight! Forget Haruhi Suzumiya's ending dance or Lucky Star’s opening dance – this right here is the best dance KyoAni ever produced!

Besides being tremendously catchy, the technical accomplishments of the dance are amazing. At the time Beyond the Boundary aired, idol animes like Love Live! and The Idolmaster were very popular and used CGI in its dance scenes, both for the backgrounds and the characters. In Beyond the Boundary, only the backgrounds are CGI, because the characters were animated traditionally. This makes the fluidity of their movements even more delightful to look at.

And regarding the characters’ attires, the studio didn’t try to simplify the process. They actually made it more complex! All characters use extravagant clothing with elements that need to be animated separately, especially Akihito with his jacket and Hiroomi with his scarf which is certainly the trickiest of them all. This only adds even more merit to KyoAni’s work. They didn’t take any shortcuts to deliver their fans a dance worth of being watched more than 100 times in which every time you watch you find new details hidden in the animation.

Speaking of Hiroomi, I’d say he’s the star of this dance, even if he stands behind the girls. His movements are fabulous! It seems like he was born to be an idol. His sister Mitsuki is also a natural talent. That movement she does with her hand and her head in the beginning is very satisfying to watch. But Mirai and Akihito also got some wicked moves – it’s not difficult to understand why the monster loses his mind with the girl’s wink.

Look at Hiroomi’s moves, man! This guy rules.

It’s difficult to resist...

And when Ai storms the scene, overflowing with moe expressiveness and fluid movement, the monster is no more.

And as a good parody of idol animes, there are several inserts interspersed with the dance that shows the characters’ hard training before the performance. These are hilariously kitschy, showing the most clichéd situations you can imagine, accompanied by beaten backgrounds such as a beach by the sunset and a rainy day. Most of these inserts are images with that strong colors aesthetic to amplify how difficult was their training.

The training begins...

The perverts invade the room...

Jogging at the beach...

Fatigue...

Sweat...

Water...

Lots of water...

But the ridiculousness reaches its peak when the dance is nearing its end, with inserts that shows moments of conflict between the characters, obviously set in the rain to further drama, but everything is solved easily and everyone smiles and hug each other, followed by an image of them in a starry sky observing a shooting star passing by. That’s how you make an over-the-top parody, guys. Take notes.

All is lost...

You're weak...

You blew it up!

But we're friends...

Everything will be all right!

Our wishes will come true!

The dance became so iconic that the studio produced a standalone version of the complete choreography without inserts and dialogues as a blu-ray bonus of the series’ recap movie. It’s the definitive version to watch countless times, as I did and continue doing so, and also to learn all the choreography. I may be stiff as a rock, but this song makes me want to shake my entire body. I’ve been listening to it nonstop the past two weeks, wherever I am.

Who would’ve guessed the best episode of Beyond the Boundary would be a filler? Not only that, it’s also one of the best episodes of any work done by Kyoto Animation. It may not have the emotional depth of their most praised episodes, but it definitely got the power to make you want to dance like an idol. It’s a very profitable job. Wanna give it a try?