Resonating terror is a legacy of Japan's war trauma

Produced by MAPPA in 2014, Terror in Resonance is directed by Cowboy Bebop’s Shinichiro Watanabe, with music by collaborator Yoko Kanno and character designs by Kill Bill: Vol.1’s Kazuto Nakazawa. The experienced talent behind the anime did not disappoint – even 9 years later, the series still holds its ground as a high-quality film armed with a deep story, empathetic young cast of characters. and relevant topics explore technological obsolescence and Japan’s war trauma.

Set in the same year of its release, Terror in Resonance deals with a series of terrorist attacks perpetrated by a pair of 17-year-olds who call themselves the ‘Sphinx’. Teasing the police with puns and clues, the Sphinx places a number of bombs around Tokyo, expecting the armed forces to find and neutralize them. Former detective Shibazaki, asked to investigate the case, is the first to notice a link between the clues and the location of the attacks, piecing together an ominous puzzle that leads him to uncover a new project. government’s appalling judgment. As the mystery is gradually unraveled, the weight of Japan’s loss in World War II and the trauma of the atomic bomb returns with shocking force as an unshakable legacy of those who lost their lives. ahead of contemporary Japan.

The younger generation pays the price for the sins of their fathers

Like the inmates in the concentration camps, the young members of the Sphinx do not have names, instead having the experimental numbers Nine and Twelve. Cold-blooded and hyper-focused, Nine is the man behind the terrorist campaign, while Twelve assists him with his warmer personality and physical skills. Haunted by flashbacks to the past, they are trying to expose the government project that turned them from four-year-old orphans into guinea pigs to develop highly intelligent agents. Regardless of age or vulnerability, they were locked up in an institute as children and fed an experimental drug that enhanced their intelligence. Only three of them survived, Twelve and Nine were the only ones to escape.

Dr. Mamiya, the man behind the project, is eerily calm as he justifies his actions as Japan’s way of recovering from the humiliations of World War Two. The villains in Terror in Resonance are the warring generation — an aging group of dying men who once led the country and sacrificed the younger generation to their own dreams of domination. In the anime, parents are absent or unfit, symbolizing Japan’s abandonment or disregard for their children, leaving them to fend for themselves. Inevitably, fathers’ sins fall on their children’s shoulders, bringing to them a cold, intolerant world where technological advancement has replaced warmth, affection, and meaning.

Offering a significant departure from the thesis, Detective Shibazaki is the bridge — both epochal and ideological — between the Sphinx and the warring generation that destroyed their future. He acts as a catalyst for their stories to be heard, against both their violent actions and the unjustified atrocities of the war generation. Shibazaki embodies the generation in between — those who had the chance to protest and be heard before this was almost impossible.

Japan’s War Trauma Nurtures a Technological Dystopia

At the beginning and end of the series, the atomic bomb looms menacingly as a reminder of unresolved trauma. Trying their best to be heard, Twelve and Nine steal the prototype of an atomic bomb and threaten to detonate it in the middle of the city. Theirs is a cry for help as they battle their fabled fathers with weapons the latter so desperately desires. The atomic bomb awakened the horrors of radiation and destruction that Japan tried to overcome but was never really able to do. The entire anime is a technologically backward world where bombs go off in the heart of the country – a reminder that this is what made it and what the country chose to kneel before. .

The Sphinx’s fight is against the legacy of war that has turned the older generation into power-hungry monsters who put their wounded pride before the future of their children and grandchildren. In this respect, the final installment of the series sums up its message clearly — after the bomb detonates, an electromagnetic pulse is generated that disables all technological devices, and for a moment , Twelve, Nine and their friend Lisa play together in a patch of grass that looks like it represents a post-apocalyptic utopia. Their idyllic moment was short-lived but touching in the children’s simple, technology-free happiness.

Long before Terror in Resonance was released, animated classics like Akira and Ghost in the Shell were delving into the same issue with powerful, thought-provoking works depicting the trauma of war like nightmare of bodily horror and technological chaos. Visually overwhelming and close to the wounds they try to banish, they can be physical, violent, and definitive. Terror in Resonance, perhaps because of the passage of time, seems to explore that same trauma in a more contained, metaphorical form, where bombs explode and buildings fall but the real pain comes from silent cries for help, the desolation of an empty room, and three children playing ball in front of the forgotten graves of their lost friends.

Significantly relevant and artistically admirable even nine years after its release, Terror in Resonance is one of MAPPA’s hidden gems definitely worth rediscovering. Capturing viewers with elements of mystery and thrill from the very first episode, the series tricks them into following an exciting story that delves into its hidden message. While audiences enjoy solving puzzles alongside the police and trying to figure out the terrorists’ motives, the film puts them in the midst of a decades-long battle against the trauma of a failed war. defeat destroyed the country. Once viewers realize this, it’s too late to turn back. What remains on the other side of the experience is a new, painful awareness of the power of violence that is ravaging generations with its potentially tragic consequences. As one watches the credits after the final episode, a bittersweet hope for a better future begins to emerge, like the first breath after a thunderstorm.

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