It’s never a pretty business when American production houses take a fondness for a manga or an anime. Whitewashing, lost cultural contexts, deviation from the original work run rampant among examples of these adaptations, so it's very normal for anime fans to be wary of western adaptations.
Netflix, however, is the clear winner when it comes to non-Asian companies working in the manga/anime genre, and the latest contender to grip its viewers was Alice In Borderland.
Released on Netflix on December 10th, Alice In Borderland is a Japanese thriller-drama series based on the manga by Haro Aso of the same name.
The show centers around a young man named Arisu, who thus far has found his life pretty dull. No job, no zeal for new experiences...the only thing that makes him want to keep going was video games.
But one day, Arisu finds himself in an abandoned version of Tokyo, where he must complete dangerous and violent tasks to survive - just like one of his video games. Arisu and his friends, Chota and Karube, need to keep up to keep living, and suffer extreme physical and emotional torment while playing through the "game" and trying to figure out the meaning of life.
Critics are saying that director Shinsuke Sato has done an amazing job in visualizing the manga panels onto the storyboard and in a frame. The dark, suspenseful themes are just as strong as in the original works.
As it turns out, the science fiction series is an absolute treat for all the manga and anime lovers out there as well, and they couldn’t contain their love when they took to Twitter.
Twitter's love for Alice In Borderland also praised the show for its good suspense, science fiction, and drama content, with many saying that this successful live action adaptation was what live action version of Death Note should have been. which was a cult classic anime that apparently did not translate as well when done in live action.
It helps that it was easy to compare the storyline of Alice in Borderland with the psychological twists in Death Note, which was also known for its mind-bending, thrilling, suspenseful aspects.
This adaptation going well is a big moment for anime fans. Other past live action adaptations, like Attack On Titan and Fullmetal Alchemist were universally panned by fans and critics alike. Even the live action version of Avatar: The Last Airbender, which was an American anime to begin with, left fans cold and disappointed. This Netflix interpretation being as good as it is bodes very well for the future of anime.
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