Recommended
THIS IS A HIGH AND TALL ORDER PSA: Aside that this will be a VERY HEAVILY NON-SPOILERY review, go figure out things yourself if you truly want to enjoy Odd Taxi to the fullest. And I highly swear by my guarantee: the rewarding payoff is much better that way. This is a criminally underrated, underwatched/overlooked hidden diamond gem of an intrically made complex and gobsmacking show YOU DO NOT WANT TO MISS OUT ON! In my very honest-to-marvellous-greatness, this show a.k.a Odd Taxi has been far in the way, the most frustratingly challenging review of all time for me to pen down a non-spoilery review ina very long time (that gives me headaches of the absurdly mind-boggling kind), simply because:
- It not just joins in the fray of 2021's setting of "ridiculously, notoriously high standard" bars of original anime of the likes of Wonder Egg Priority or even Vivy: Fluorite Eye's Song;
- Not just because it's gonna be a modern-day cult classic of a masterpiece through and through;
- Heck, not even its subverting setting and themes which encapsulates everything about an ARG-like film noir;
BUT BECAUSE IT'S HEAVILY SLEPT UPON by the anime community which gives no two flying Fs about anthropomorphic "furry" shows that Odd Taxi is one, but not at the same time. It's a devastating shame that only those of us (like me) whom have watched this show can appreciate that Odd Taxi is NO DOUBT THE BEST ANIME of the Spring 2021 season that no one is watching, BAR NONE! And it's massively thanks to the production staff at P.I.C.S (for the most part with director Baki Kinoshita and scriptwriter-cum-series composer Kazuya Konomoto) and OLM's Team Yoshioka for giving us such a tightly compact, outstanding, pièce de résistance masterpiece of a brillantly thought-out mystery thriller of a show that's unlike anything ever seen in anime before (lest if you count Durarara!, Baccano, or even "Sayonara, Zetsubou Sensei" in that sense).
You know me: If you're reading this review, you know that like many others outside of MAL in Reddit or even in a specialized Discord group have been discussing and sharing potential theories for the last 3 months when this show was airing, I might not be the first to jump into that gun. But not just in the very elaborate episodic discussions (that I felt like I was the Sensei dishing out those answers to everyone who are lazy in being detective sleuths, which I say: "Why the hell are you lazy-bums?"), the real joy of enjoying Odd Taxi to the fullest is to be like Sherlock Holmes, going in-depth with people who are like-minded and try to figure out the 5W1Hs of how everything came to be from the very beginning. It's very low-key in wanting to accomplish its "Inception" like thematics, and both Baki Kinoshita and Kazuya Konomoto really did use all of the mixed media mediums to corporate all of the "occult"-style hidden juxtapositions that is meant for the audience to truly be Odd Taxi's version of Holmes, both in and out of the anime. The film noir we didn't know we needed, and it was a total blast from start to finish.
Just for context, let me give you the preface of what Odd Taxi is about:
"41-year-old Hiroshi Odokawa is is an eccentric, reticent talking walrus of a taxi driver, who has no relatives and does not have much to do with others. He does have conversations with his customers, including a college student who wants to go viral, a nurse hiding a secret, an unsuccessful comedian, a street rough, and an up-and-coming idol. These conversations lead him to a girl who has disappeared." If you're thinking that this premise does sound "Odd", given its very aptly named title, that's because it purposefully meant to be a subtle and covert message that everything that happens within this show, NOTHING happens out of coincidence: everything is intertwined together, one way or another, even in the smallest of ways that brings the setting and characters together for such "idiosyncratic" events like this. Don't blink, or you might miss a beat and rewind 10 seconds to see the untold messages. So strap in your seat belts, folks! We're going where the night is right, the city lights are bright, and the conversations are tight in this very strange and peculiar world named Odd Taxi.
Before that, I would also like to preface what is the company P.I.C.S all about from the debut director Baki Kinoshita himself (most of which was taken from the ANN interview and changed for nuance, so plagiarism issue solved);
P.I.C.S is a production company that handles all kinds of visual works, including advertisements, music videos, live footage, dramas, and films. Serving the role of a character designer and animation director, Kinoshita's impetus for working on TV shows is his desire to create an entertainment work with dramatic elements that depict character growth, which sadly can't be gotten out of a commercial or a oneshot comedy (his inspiration being influenced by Studio Ghibli and Satoshi Kon's works, which it all finally clicks). Working together in the amazingly tightly-packed script for Odd Taxi with writer Kazuya Konomoto (his other work being a hidden gem of a manga: Setoutsumi), I'll just slot a PR for this: Go and read Setoutsumi (which I did before penning this review down), the story itself is conventional to the tropes and clichés of the modern age, but what the hell that Konomoto did was to flip it entirely on its head, giving a whole new rhyme and feeling to his creative inventiveness that "nothing and everything made sense". After watching Odd Taxi and reflecting back on Setoutsumi, it is very clear on its succinct approach to creative storytelling that will blow the minds of people.
Back to Odd Taxi, Kinoshita is the character designer, and Konomoto is the scriptwriter and series composer. He had the loose idea for things like an individual taxi driver, but Konomoto was the one who fleshed out the characters and plot beats, as is the story with juxtapositioning ironic and enjoyable comedy elements with the darkness of society with the tight refines with the sense of balance is very tonely refined (which I can firmly say that I've really been taken aback each and every episode). The narrative structure, the meticulous foreshadowing, the characterization…every element is superb in his view, as is the script for the show (AND YOU'RE GODDAMN RIGHT IT WAS!). The key to Odd Taxi's eccentricness was the decision to go anthropomorphic with animals instead of humans, a realistic story about the human condition with cute animal visuals. If a heavy story has a cute-looking surface, it mitigates the feeling of gloominess and expands the scope of the story. Both him and Konomoto had confidence that the dissonance brought out by the contrast would be compelling, and that's not just to say about the foreshadowing weaved throughout the entire story. There will be mysteries right to the very end, so the elements are quite strongly pronounced. At the point when the mysteries are being solved, you can see the backbone of the characters, then feel the drama...it's an anime that juggles both its mystery and its human drama elements to an equal (but insane perfection of a) degree.
Another key element of Odd Taxi, was getting the voice actors that are a complete un-hoax of an unorthodox (aside from the famous ones), that along with the entire mystery of Odd Taxi, brings another compelling reason why this show is SO doggone perfect. Casting Natsuki Hanae as the cynical 41-year-old Walrus, you've heard his voice go around a lot recently thanks to his massively successful role as Kimetsu no Yaiba's lead MC Tanjirou Kamado. So for Kinoshita to cast him (which does not sound like Natsuki-san's voice at all), it was an interesting choice nonetheless to potray the kind of character who became an adult while dragging along his childlike heart. To be frank, Kinoshita didn't want to make him the typical middle-aged guy with a gruff and austere attitude, but wanted to express his internal youth and purity of his heart. Odokawa may have a cold side, but he makes witty retorts and his conversations bring out his youth as not just an older guy who has given up on various aspects of his life. And as such, Natsuki Hanae's portrait of Odokawa as the middle-aged guy, while also bringing out his cool and collected side, has energy and vigor in the depths of his voice, and is a perfect suit for Odokawa. Also, the comedic conversations and verbal exchanges are a very important part, so Kinoshita wanted to get professional comedians involved for those (the comedic duo of the Homosapiens: rhino Shibakagi and horse Baba, voiced by entertainers from the Yoshimoto Kogyo talent agency: Yuusuke and Atsuhiro Tsuda respectively). In order to bring out the feeling of reality when it comes to the gaps in conversations and the warmth, the pre-score voices are recorded ahead of time and afterwards made the images match them. This unorthodox approach follows up to the cast for some examples (who are complete unknowns): the Daimon brothers with Kousei and Asei, Taichi Kabasawa with Takashi, heck even rapper METEOR got in the fun being the "Handshake" porcupine-rapping Yano. These so-called pseudonym-but-real VAs are not what you typically expect of the anime industry, so to see Kinoshita going far as to recruit actual real-life prominent figures makes the icing on the cake much sweeter.
If you wanna understand how much Odd Taxi is playing hooky with the audience, let me direct you to these references (again, NON-SPOILERY):
- First and foremost, is the YouTube MV for the OP of Odd Taxi. Sure, as is every full-length song that you could find on Spotify that you can hear if it's your favourite songs of the season, even with the cool anime OP visuals, Baki Kinoshita goes one step further into integrating the anime scenes with the MV, making it look like a sneaky, non-canon of a foreshadowing sequence of events. There are a lot of scenes to take in, because as you constantly watch the anime and go back to the MV, that is where the sublime mystery all clicks up. Even to the point of getting famous rappers such as OMSB, METEOR and VaVa, as is comedians Yuusuke and Atsuhiro Tsuda, along with typical anime VAs Riho Iida and Saori Terai, all of them are a teaser to what the anime has going for its progression. Other than that, Odd Taxi's OP by Wataru Sawabe (Skirt) and PUNPEE is a total blast of a catchy, laid-back, low-fi, city pop of a juggernaut song that gives the whole anime a peace vibe of a mood. Honestly though, the Spring season has a lot of good (and few amazing like Vivy, 86, Megalo Box 2: Nomad) OSTs, but Odd Taxi knows how to hit with full cylinders pumping, and as such, it's the No. 1 spot of OPs for me this season, NO QUESTION. I just love this song to bits, and only Odd Taxi watchers can follow up with that vibe. The ED with Suzuko Mimori and the insert songs with its pseudonymly named "Mystery Kiss" group, it can take a while to get used to the various idol songs, but it's all good as well.
- Secondly, it's the official YouTube channel, which also has a non-canon hidden story about normal objects, which is intricately placed in the anime in full hidden view, and used as devices to snively record normal day-to-day conversations that would have been otherwise classified as an "Extras" of sorts. Hey y'all, these are MORE than just your typical "Extras", they are also integral to piecing the smaller puzzle pieces with the main plot. By the time this review is up, most (if not all) of the audio drama would've been fully translated and posted on YouTube or even the compact Fandom page (which I DO NOT recommend to go in the early stages because of heavy spoilers lest you searched for something else, only go there once you're 3 episodes deep into it).
- Thirdly, is the official character cast graph. I'd highly doubt that most of you would've made the effort to scour the official Japanese website when the anime started airing for the character cast (and some that actually caught on), but a few wittingly apt people have already made the translations to the big picture of the character connections, so the information is readily available at the places you will expect. Again, please DO NOT spoil yourself by referring to it early on, you're doing a major disservice to yourself (unless you're watching it and need some help).
- Last but not least, it's a rando Twitter account that is also non-canon to the story, AND YES, you're hearing it correctly. I've already hidden that link in the discussion forum (you should be able to identify as much from my shared topic), so please check that out also. You should already get the gist that it's also a small integral part to the Odd Taxi story.
I understand why you'll want to get a studio such as OLM, popular for the Pokémon series, to create such a kiddy feel of a show that doesn't detract the visuals amidst a film noir-like mystery thriller masterpiece show in the making. OLM's Team Yoshioka having only done a few shows and films made for kids, and Odd Taxi lends that abstractness to the team's unique calibre. It's definitely an unique piece of media, made by a unique production team, crafted by well thought-out people, that only the people who watch Odd Taxi (like yours truly), will find this to be a modern day triumph of a sensational showpiece figure of a cult classic for the 2020s.
If Quentin Tarantino had a side job that he would've like to produce an anime for, Odd Taxi would be one to fit within his brilliantly crafted mindset that will always aim to play mindgames with the audience, and you'll be seeing twice or more with the "Inception" like feel that will never get old. Nevertheless, I BEG ON MY KNEES (even with a Dogeza) to ask you to watch Odd Taxi, this is THE one show where nobody gives a crap about "furry" shows. But laying deep within the rabbit hole, is a thriller story beyond anything you could ever imagine to come out of the anime spectrum. An abnormally peculiar rare show that you won't find anywhere else (that I'll ever swear until my time has come), and a tremendously ironic, yet surrealistic monumental classic for the ages.
That said, GO WATCH ODD TAXI! STOP SLEEPING ON IT! This is unanimously easily my absolute favourite AOTS, even down to being an undisputed AOTY with a double-confirm plus chop with so many big hits registered in 2021 alone.
