Ergo Proxy S1E1: “Pulse of Awakening”
This review was commissioned by @Iceblocks
Ergo Proxy is a scifi anime that I have seen the first couple episodes of, but it was along with a bunch of other shows that some friends and I were showing each other. So, aside from it having a dark cyberpunk aesthetic and being a generally positive viewing experience, I don't remember many specifics. Too many things all at once. But, I remember that Ergo Proxy was probably the best of the things we were showing each other, or at least one of the bests, so that's promising. I've been commissioned to see the first three episodes of it now, so that should give me a bit more of a solid feel for the show.
So, the pilot episode, "Pulse of Awakening." It starts with a quote that makes that title seem rather more ominous.
It's a poem by Michelangelo, written from the perspective of a statue of a sleeping woman he carved. I've found a few different translations around the net, so if any of my readers speak Italian I could probably use some help on the most accurate reading, but overall I'm getting something like this:
“My sleep is dear to me, and more dear is being made of stone
as long as the agony and shame last.
Not to see, not to hear, is for me the best fortune.
so not wake me, speak softly.”
I remember artificial intelligence being a major element of the story, though not in what capacity. In light of the title and the quote combined, I think I see where this might be going.
We then open on a high tech and very well secured laboratory, where a human (or at least, humanoid) test subject is awaking from dormancy. I see laboratory rather than hospital or cryofacility because they refer to the person in the reinforced cell as a "specimen" rather than a "patient." Also, one of the scientists shouts that they need to keep the subject from waking up at all costs, which doesn't make it sound like they're trying to heal them.
Suddenly, the specimen looks up. Revealing itself to either be a three-eyed mouthless tar monster, or to be dressed in a bodysuit that gives the impression of such.
The giant syringe stuck in through its neck restraint suggests that they've been doing whatever they have to to keep this thing under, and even that turned out to not be enough.
It growls. The scientists react in fear. Then, it tears itself free of its restraints almost effortlessly and dashes around its cell almost faster than the eye can track, cracking the transparent walls dangerously whenever it slams against them, and shrieking horribly. The scientists start evacuating, but some of them dither to make sure the data they've collected is all backed up. The containment cell shatters, and it cuts to black.
I guess they didn't do quite enough to keep the statue in its sleep of stone. Did someone accidentally switch that tranq cartridge with nital?
Move to a woman getting out of bed, showering, and having breakfast in her small apartment, at 9:30 PM. Some of us work night shift, it's a thing. Upon dressing, she leaves the building in what appears to be a minor hurry, setting out in her grimy cyberpunk vehicle under the grimy cyberpunk city night.
We see her fall off of her motorbike-scooter type thing, and a male voiceover pipes up, talking about how the malice of the Creator cannot be resisted, but that "we must punish them." Not sure who the "them" in this case would be, given that the creator was referred to in the singular. A sinister looking, spiky haired man sits in what looks like some sort of clock tower, gazing out from the shadows at the morning sunlight. Not sure if he's supposed to be the speaker, or what either of them have to do with motorscooter crash lady. Title drop.
I hope this isn't going to be one of those "confusing for the sake of being confusing" artsy shows. I doubt I'd remember it that positively if that was the case though, so I'm optimistic.
Exterior shot of the grimy cyberpunk city. I think it's night, but that might just be Blade Runner Smog. A bizarre advert playing over and over urges people to create as much waste as possible, life is easier if they lighten the load. That's...either some third order sarcasm, or a weird religious cult that emerged out of post-consumerism. We zoom into the office of a security official named Raul Creed, who is in the middle of an important-sounding phone conversation when a creepy skinny person in a scary mask steps into the office. I think we saw people like that in the lab, before. Maybe they're androids or something. He asks the creepy person-shaped-creature what's so important that they're interrupting him in the middle of a call, and they answer that "ultimate level intelligence" is about to be disclosed, and he needs to hurry, which he promptly does.
The thing has a monotone, synthesized voice, so yeah, this is probably a mass produced model of android assistant.
Creed and robbit climb onto some sort of high tech aircraft docked inside the building and speed off. Then, tense tribal chanting music starts, and we zoom into a half-buried undercity, where a kid is fighting a group of robots of varying descriptions and just barely managing to survive.
He manages to shoot out a smaller, human-shaped unit, but that gives a much bigger robot that looks like it could be meant for construction or something the chance to smack him with one of its huge limbs, sending him flying across the huge cavern.
Cut to either that kid (who must have somehow survived that attack) or a different one reporting testimony to Creed's agency over videochat. He's told that Creed will handle the case, and then the interviewer hangs up on him.
Cut to someone having either killed someone else, or just moved a dying/dead body, to what looks like the same clocktower that we saw before. It's too dark to make out either of their faces, but the one who's alive looks female and the one who's dead or dying looks male.
Episode title card. Hopefully things will start tying themselves together and making sense now that we're passed the teaser.
Open on an android behind a steering wheel, chatting with a passenger named Re-I while they wait in traffic. Re-I is complaining about how she's not being allowed to visit someone named Regent Donav. Not clear if the android driver is just engaging with service-smalltalk with its masters, or if it actually has a personality with interests and a desire for social interaction. The conversation moves on to new data they're supposed to be reporting to the Security Bureau's new head, this Raul Creed guy, concerning reports of "AutoReiv" androids being driven into violent frenzies by the Cogito virus. Which shouldn't be possible.
Re-I says that this chatter is getting distracting while she's trying to figure out the reports she's reading, and orders the driver to cut the Turing app. Its voice goes monotone as it acknowledges the command, and then it stops talking and stares out the windshield. Guess that answers my last question. She also tells it to adjust their course and head for the temporary immigrants district's AutoReiv disposal facility. Presumably to investigate things, rather than to scrap her driver.
She stops looking at her case reports, and stares out the window, while her inner voice gives us some background information. This is Romdo city, our (humanity's?) final paradise, though it doesn't seem all that paradisaical. Each day seems no better than the last, and possibly worse. The city is built under a protective dome that shelters it from Earth's ravaged environment and toxic atmosphere. Sustainable, but sterile, static, and boring, with no prospects for anything ever changing for the better. As she finishes her inner monologue, traffic clears up and they speed on to their destination.
At the facility, Re-I (what kind of name even is that? Is she some sort of more advanced artificial intelligence herself?) has a conversation with someone about their immigration status that I can barely parse, and then looks at the berserk AutoReiv that the kid shot out during that fight we saw before. It's all punched full of holes, which a technician explains is the only way to make sure that an infected unit won't come back to life and wreak more havoc.
There's some talk of the Cogito virus making robots self aware, though as far as we've seen it just seems to make them violent. Maybe we didn't see the humans who told them they were ugly and stinky who actually triggered the rampages.
Re-I reminds the probationary citizen co-investigator that she just picked up that demonstrating commitment to public safety at all costs will be his fastest track to full citizenship. Also, she makes him throw away the religious totem he's carrying, because things that "smell of Mosk" are not allowed for citizens.
So he'd better ditch it before their audience with Creed.
What a nice lady.
They autopsy the hulk, and a local android helps them extract what they can from the remains of it's memory banks. I'm surprised they're letting other androids even get close to the memory disc of one infected with the DIEMEATBAGS virus, but I assume they have precautions in place. After that, probationary citizen Vincent goes on to his interview, and Re-I's robot PA tells her that he was staring at her.
She stares back at him in turn, and has a very petty internal monologue about how he's exactly the kind of dull, slow-witted drone who this city welcomes.
She follows it up with a bit of self awareness, about how if she hates everyone and everything here maybe she's the one with the problem. But it's not really enough to make her sympathetic, at this point.
Cut to Creed at a military-looking installation, where that kid who I think fought the robots before is also hanging out. They have armed AutoReivs sweeping the area around the scene of the battle for any sign of that big construction robot that got infected with Cogito, but no luck yet. Odd, given its size and apparent lack of stealth.
Cut back to Re-I and her pet robbit (who is named Iggy), as they arrive at a location that the recovered memory data suggested was significant. It's an abandoned government facility that's rumored to have illegal immigrants squatting in it. I think this might be the same building that includes the clock tower where we've seen people posing dramatically and killing each other and stuff? Maybe. They hear a sound from upstairs, and run up there to find some fat guy doing some kind of weird sex play with his female-looking AutoReiv. Iggy demands to see the guy's immigration permit, while Re-I walks out of the room to be edgy by herself for a little while. Suddenly, a robot dives through the skylight and attacks her! She evades it's jaguar-drop and shoots at it as it flees out one of the side windows.
A few moments later, as Re-I is wondering what the hell just happened, either the robot that attacked her or a different one comes crawling up the stairs, and just stands on its knees.
It looks like the fat guy's hookerbot. And, as Re-I watches, it raises its hands before itself, tilts its head skyward, and appears to begin praying.
Re-I isn't sure if this AutoReiv is infected or not. It's not acting normal, but it also isn't attacking. Just then, her attention is taken away by a more important arrival; that construction bot she was chasing comes stomping up one of the wider corridors, and it most definitely is acting infected.
Unlike the kid who was fighting it before, though, Re-I is packing a high powered handcannon. One well placed shot is sufficient to bring the big beast down. Hearing the noise, Iggy finally comes over to help out.
Then hookerbot leaps down the stairwell to ground level, collapsing onto its knees again due to one ankle being destroyed. That was the same AutoReiv that attacked Re-I before, and one of her shots seems to have hit its ankle.
As Iggy arrives, she instructs him to update the department on the situation, send a disposal team to deal with the hulk of the big robot she took down, and to sweep the neighborhood for hookerbot. She then eyes the damage to the wall by the window, where it climbed out before; the impact of its hand caused significant damage. "What was that?" she whispers to herself, implying that either the hookerbot is not supposed to be nearly that strong, or the thing that attacked her first was actually something totally different and just moving too fast for me to tell.
After a commercial break, someone is doing an autopsy on something or other while having a conversation with someone else. This show really likes hiding people's faces. The person doing the dissection, who is slowly revealed to be Vincent, comments that the unit he's dissecting does not appear to be infected, which the woman with the still-hidden face says is impossible. Also, he's operating on an android that looks like a little girl and appears to have either genuine organic components, or else very, very convincing fakes.
He says that he'd like to keep this AutoReiv. There's no protocol for what to do with it if it turns out to not actually be infected, and since the city is giving him and his wife permission to have (or adopt? It sounds more like adoption from how they talk about it) a baby having an extra AutoReiv to help around the house would make things much easier. There's a close-up on a baby stroller. I guess this is at his house?
The woman mutters angrily about stupid immigrants thinking they know the rules better than she does. Also, she identifies herself as Chief Creed's wife...oh wait, that was HER saying she wanted to keep the AutoReiv, not him, they're both talking really softly and the captions are sort of badly synced. So this is the Creeds' house? The gynoid girl he was operating on then looks up, addresses the woman as her mother, and tells her not to be so bigoted. Also, she hasn't done the housework yet, what's dad going to say when he gets home?
Huh. Robot children? Is that what he's planning to "adopt?" Why? And...what's the AutoReiv they were talking about then, if not this one he was just working on?
Back at the warbot base (which looks like a repurposed temple or something, now that I see more of it. Odd), Raul is reporting to a superior. She tells him that it's unfortunate that this Cogito outbreak is happening so soon after he took office, but also lucky that they just got the "Proxy" awakened, whatever the heck that is. Also, there's an ongoing sweep going on to catch "him" as he sneaks his way through the residential areas of the city. Not sure who that might be, as hookerbot was referred to with female pronouns, and constructionbot is disabled. The thing has killed 41 citizens so far, and that's on top of the problems they're having with the Cogito cases, and with no leads yet on who created that virus or why.
Oh, okay, I think I got it. The thing that broke out of the lab at the beginning is what first attack Re-I in the stairwell and broke the wall, and it's got a body count of 41 so far. Maybe it infected hookerbot to use as a distraction or something (and caused the damage to her ankle?). The government has so far been trying to pass this thing's attacks off as just more Cogito incidents, when it's actually something different (if possibly related).
Raul asks for permission to kill this thing instead of continuing attempts at recapture, since it's clear more people are going to die otherwise. Permission denied. A few citizens dying per day isn't a big deal, and they can "produce" more if they have to. Starting to get the impression that EVERYONE in this story is a synthetic life form of one kind or another, with the conflict being between different types.
Raul reluctantly acquiesces to this order, and also asks what the hell the Proxy is? She's talking about it like he's supposed to already know, but um, what?
Before she can answer, we cut back to Re-I and Iggy. Iggy just found four "more" dead bodies. I didn't realize they'd found any here at all, but I guess this might be the next day or something? I don't know. The thing that they're chasing, Iggy has concluded, must be the thing that they've suspected the higher ups of trying to keep under wraps. Re-I, for her part, has concluded that their target is neither an AutoReiv, nor infected with Cogito.
Before she can say why she thinks that or what she suspects it actually is, Iggy's optic scans of a handprint they're inspecting trigger an official warning from the bureau. He plays a pre-recorded message telling her that continuing the current course of action may violate official regulations. She says that she disagrees; she was told to secure the crime scene and wait for reinforcements, and wasn't ordered to not investigate it. Well, I guess he did say it MAY violate official regulations, not that it necessarily will.
Some cool adventure music starts playing, and she says to...erm...
Who?
There's a guy Iggy doesn't care for?
I didn't get the impression he had personal feelings about anyone. Being a servitor robot and such.
Confused.
She mentions that as long as they're quick and make it back before the reinforcements get here, she won't get in trouble with either the city or with her grandfather, who I guess is someone important. There's a brief shot of something with long hair watching them from an air vent overhead, probably the escaped murdersynth.
Cut to Vincent leaving the Creeds' apartment, and telling Mrs. Creed to please submit the papers for requesting a confiscated AutoReiv. She slams the door in his face. He calls his wife to update her. Upstairs, the robodaughter who he just fixed is playing the piano.
Cut back to the ruins of the lab that the creature broke out of, where one of the scientists who managed to escape its rampage is showing the scene to Raul. I guess that monster is the "Proxy," then. He asks why the hell they were studying something like this inside of the city, and she says that she doesn't know why, she was just told to monitor it while they kept it comatose.
An AutoReiv then approaches Raul and tells him that Re-I is in temporary immigrant district D, and whispers some more details into his ear that alarm him. Could he be her grandfather? He doesn't look old enough, but, well, if they're all androids of some stripe then who knows.
Next, we see Re-I returning to her apartment and telling Iggy to compile a document detailing all crime seems similar to this one within the last few weeks or so before letting him drive away. She goes inside, takes off her gunbelt, and sits down to think over the day's events. We see her tablet doing something on its own in the backseat of the car as Iggy drives it away. Then a boy skulking around outside her building that night. Then Ke-I getting ready for a shower, when she notices a message written in the fresh condensation of her bathroom mirror. It must have been done in the two minutes while her back was turned.
Outside, we see the boy running toward a damaged AutoReiv. Then we go back to Re-I's bathroom, a second before the Proxy comes crashing down through the ceiling and lands right behind her.
It looms over her, growling. Tears leak out of its eyes, and hers as well. Then, it starts to push one of its fingers into her mouth in a fairly rapey manner.
Suddenly, something else drops down through the hole in the ceiling and knocks the beast away. It's...okay, misidentification! The thing that just attacked her has similar hair and facelessness to the Proxy, but is much bulkier and more organic looking. The ACTUAL Proxy, with the collar still around its neck and everything, drops down next and knocks the other monster away from her. The battle moves outside through a confusingly large bathroom window that the two break open, and Re-I loses consciousness. End episode.
Okay, so. My repeated confusion with which monster was onscreen at any given moment (while understandable, I think, going by the fast movements and horror movie-like cinematography that often keeps you from getting a good look) is sort of appropriate, because I misidentified the show. This is NOT the series I saw the first few episodes of some years ago. I was thinking of a different dark cyberpunk anime with similar aesthetics and another Greco-Latin title. And, while I don't remember many plot details of that show, I remember it doing a much better job of explaining itself to the audience than this.
I'm not sure how much I can even say about this show, because it just...failed to communicate much of its contents in a way I was able to follow. I don't know if that's mostly my fault or mostly its fault. But either way, aside from "some nice music here and there" and "I liked the big construction robot fights," I just don't have much that I can meaningfully comment on.
There are two more episodes of this commissioned. Hopefully it'll start making more sense and I'll be able to analyze the show in more depth. Or, like. At all.
