[DreamSword]

Well I finally did it. I finally watched my first "proper" Ultra show with Ultraman Nexus. (Spoilers below!)

And I now kinda get why some of you warned me about it being my intro into the franchise way back when I asked about it.

Even as someone not super well versed in all things Ultra, I could tell that Nexus was a rather unique beast of a show, and one that I could easily see as one that'd potentially alienate alot of fans of the franchise.

That being said... I still rather liked it for the most part! It's by no means perfect, but I came out of the experience liking it more than disliking it. It's a show I feel that, while it doesn't execute alot of its ideas in the best way, always swung for the fences and was made with passion by alot of the people involved.

I also went ahead and read into the production history of the show, and while its troubles do help to explain the reason as to why certain aspects were handled the way that they were, there are alot of decisions the show still made that I felt weren't for the best. The biggest example being the very clear divide between the first and second half of the show as a whole.

Apparently it was always planned for Nexus to have a big swing a new direction once the second half of it hit, and I really gotta question why, as the result was that alot of stuff from the first half just kinda gets jettisoned away without much of a care. I still liked the second half for what it was, and in some ways it was better than the first half when it came to handling certain things, but I wasn't too keen on losing alot of what made me really like the first half.

For example, the first half's' overarching theme about how memories make people who they are and shape the reality in which people live, which in turn also influences other people's' perception of reality and how that affects the concept we know as the truth made for some rather fascinating stuff, and combined with some killer directing lead to some of my favorite episodes. The result was a toku combined with a psychological thriller and I was absolutely all for that. Then the second half just kinda... gets rid of it, without much fanfare.

The cutting down of the show did still hurt though. The Director's Cut of 29 is vastly superior to the TV cut, and Episode EX I feel is absolutely mandatory viewing, as otherwise Shiori never gets an arc(like alot of characters in Nexus, more on that in a sec), and it serves as one of the better arcs in the show, I felt. Heck, that's another thing that Nexus fell short with; It wanted to do these big dramatic swings with alot of its characters, yet never really gives the audience time to breathe and warm up to the idea of these characters. Nexus is very much a show where if you're not digging the leads, you don't have much else to cling onto.

Nexus is also a show that's a rather slow burn; You don't get many answers on much of anything until late into the show, and I could easily see people losing patience with it, especially if they're not especially loving its mystery aspect. Heck, you don't get any answers on certain things regardless. For example, why did Yu order the Night Raiders to shoot Ultraman at the start of the show, despite it being framed as though it were part of some grand plan? Never explained. It's at one point hinted that he's an alien who can see the future, but that plot point goes nowhere in favor of the Prometheus' Children plot.

I also felt that the big plot twist at the end, with Ishibori being the Unknown Hand was also handled pretty weakly. It's not that it comes completely out of nowhere or anything, it's more that the show waits until its last stretch of episodes to even try and make Ishibori a character. Dude pretty much doesn't even exist up until that point. If he had any sort of screen presence at all before that point, it would've worked alot better. Heck, had alot of the ways the second half handles its characters been intermixed with the first half, I think Nexus in general would've been a fantastic story. Rather than two distinct halves, making it one long show that alternates or mixes the two. Then you could have the character development of the second half with the plot of the first.

If at this point it sounds like I've just been hating on Nexus, don't worry, because again, I found alot of it to be made of stuff I rather like! The biggest and possibly most obvious one for those who know my tastes is that I really dug Nexus' heavy and mysterious atmosphere that it kept going through the entire show. Even the second half, while lighter on it than the first, never fully gave that atmosphere up and I really appreciated that. I also really dug our lead characters in Komon, Himeya, and Ren. All three of them are very distinct and very likable protagonists who very much carried the show for me. And to bring up the show being cut down again, it wasn't all bad. One of the arcs that got cut, apparently involving time travel, is one that I felt would've seriously clashed with the show's' overall style and tone.

In addition to that, I felt that, given the circumstances, the ending was probably the best one that Nexus could've ever asked for. Does it answer and resolve absolutely everything? No, but it does have a big emotionally payoff for pretty much every character involved, especially Komon, who absolutely earned his spot as the lead. Even on the surface level though, Nexus never disappointed. The kaiju designs were all very creative, the fight scenes were entertaining(some fights going into straight up DBZ territory), and the musical score is some of the best I remember hearing in tokusatsu as a whole. I think where the show most shined in all of its positive aspects was the Faust arc, which I felt perfectly blended character arc, drama, atmosphere, and psychological thriller/horror into an intense and cohesive package that I hope to not soon forget. The Mephisto stuff was almost a disappointment in comparison.

I don't know if I'll end up making an Ultra playlist like I've been doing for Rider, but for Nexus, the perfect song came to my mind almost immediately. That being "Everything You Feel" by YULA, which I think sums up the first half especially perfectly. In the end, Ultraman Nexus is a show that even if I ended up not liking it, I still think I'd have alot of respect for it, as it was clear alot of passion and care was going into it. It's not a show I'd call one of my all time favorite toku, and it's not only I especially loved, but it's one that I felt made for a good experience watching and one I ultimately ended up liking a good amount. And this was all despite the very lackluster sub quality. I actually compared both the CrunchyRoll and TV-N subs, and both are pretty mediocre overall. Really wish a different sub group would come along and do a proper scrub so the show can get some more positive attention. But now I'm just rambling. In the end, I give Ultraman Nexus a 4/6. Good, but not incredible.