FIF#124-Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo

In a future far from the one we know, young Albert travels to the moon based city of Luna to find something amazing, beyond his families wealth and title.  Here, in the midst of a grand festival, Albert meets The Count of Monte Cristo: a well spoken man of tremendous presence.  Little does Albert know that the closer he gets to the Count, the deeper he is drawn into a game that has been building for a very long time.  Who is the man with the power to reshape the world and what role will Albert play in this dramatic tale of vengeance?

Many of us probably had to read The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas at some point in high school.  It’s a fantastic and epic read: the tale of a man wrongfully imprisoned who plays a very, very long game to get his revenge on the people who wronged him.  It’s been adapted several times including a pretty fun action flick back in 2002.  Considering its core subject matter, you’d think it would have been adapted into an Anime well before it was.  Still, I don’t think anyone was expecting anything quite like Gankutsuou and the first episode is, in a single word, astounding.

There are few Anime I can call operatic but Gankutsuou is definitely one of them.  This is high class scifi opera at its finest, complete a performance of “Lucia di Lammermoor” (for those with clever ears, it’s the same piece used in The Diva Dance sequence in The Fifth Element).  Those first thirty minutes made me think I was watching a dramatic stage play unfold across a long and elaborate painting.  Which reminds me, though this is apparently a work by Studio Gonzo (Hellsing, Basilisk, Vandread), Gankutsuou reminds me a lot of the works of Studio Shaft (Madoka Magica, Bakemonogatari).  There’s just so much going on in every single frame of the episode its hard to keep track of it all.  Heck, the outfits worn by Albert and his friend Franz seemed to have moving designs themselves.  This show is beyond gorgeous and a testament to the power and skill of the Anime medium.

The first episode does raise some questions as to how this version of the classic Dumas tale will play out…you know besides putting a heavy scifi spin on things.  We’ve jumped far past the Counts origins and skipped right to his fateful meeting with Albert.  So I guess we’ll get the backstory of the man behind the title later on?  Is Albert going to be the central focus of this version rather than the Count himself?   Neither is a bad approach to take, especially if you’ve got a 24 episode run time to work with.  Heck will 24 episodes be enough?  Given how long and how dense the original novel is, I’m surprised Gankutsuou isn’t clocking in at 50 episodes at least. 

It’s been a long time since I read the original Dumas novel or seen any of the film adaptations.  No I wont go back and try to reread or rewatch either cause that would be going overboard.  So going in with minimalistic knowledge (the extreme basics) might be a good way to approach Gankutsuou if I opted to continue it.  The visuals alone should be enough reason to give it a try and, again, I am a fan of the source material.  This is certainly one inviting Anime I wouldn’t want to turn away so easily.