On a recommendation, I downloaded a few episodes of Ergo Proxy and finally got a chance to watch the first episode. One episode into a series is rarely a good point at which to make sweeping statements about it, especially when so many people have already seen up to episode 9 now, but here’s my two cents anyway.

One of the first things that struck me about this series before I gave it a shot was the alarming amount of eye makeup on this prominent character, presumably the main protagonist of the show. Her name is Lil, she’s a citizen of the dark-future megalopolis the story takes place in, she’s handy with a gun, and affects the kind of painfully-disinterested ennui that I generally associate with Vampire: The Masquerade enthusiasts and people that own too many Morrisey albums (frequently the same people). Shallow person that I am, this was enough to delay my acquisition of this title.

It turns out that yes, this is a series that is clearly intended to appeal to dark-future cyberpunk enthusiasts. Themes of artificial intelligence androids subservient to people, immigrants subservient to citizens, and citizens subservient to some shadowy elite group are clearly central to the premise and future development of the plotline. It appears that the shadowy elite group has been playing God in some form or another, and has created or discovered a superhuman… something that they are performing experiments on. It breaks out, and people start dying.

Lil, the previously-mentioned lady with too much eyeshadow, is investigating the deaths independently of the police. The murders have thus far been attributed to androids (called “autoreivs” in a few snippets of text in the show, “autoraves” by the translators) that have somehow gained independence through the “cogito virus.” Lil isn’t buying that line, though. The murders look more like the work of a depraved lunatic than malfunctioning companion-bots; the cogito virus is a red herring.

Meanwhile, the evil oligarchy has deployed an effete long-haired girly-boy to use whatever resources he must to capture the rogue experiment. As he is to capture it alive, at any costs, we are to understand that the value of this psycho-killer is greater in their eyes than the dozens of victims and police that will almost certainly die in the coming episodes.

This is a show that could seriously head either way, quality-wise. The production values are excellent, with character designs and attention to detail that remind me of The Last Exile, a potentially intellectually-challenging premise, and fansubbers with outstanding taste in font-faces (Optima == classy):

Ergo Proxy runs a serious risk, however, of degenerating into a masturbatory mire of self-loathing and existential angst. The themes of class and privilege are classic, but when combined with superhuman experimental monsters, I foresee a fair amount of “what does it mean to be human” polemics that I just don’t need. Pop-culture psychology is tiresome. Pop-culture philosophy is positively dreadful.