Now and Then, Here and There Vol 1

Cruel, bleak and depressing are three words that can describe Now and Then, Here and There (NTHT) and that's exactly the type of anime I like best! Horribly underrated and yet so much better than most anime, I have decided to give this a much needed publicity boost!

Age Rating: 16+
Company: Central Media Park/US Manga Corps
Genre: Sci-Fi, War, Epic Drama
Running Time: Approx 125 mins
Region: 1



I didn't know what to expect when watching Now and Then, Here and There, as all I knew was written on the blurb from the back of the box. I was pleasantly surprised how engrossing the story became after the first episode! It starts off like a fairly typical anime, Shu (the main hero) is having another ordinary day at school and tries to impress a girl he likes with his Kendo skills. Needless to say, he loses completely and embarasses himself. The girl befriends the other snobby boy instead and leaves Shu oblivious to the situation. So he walks home but notices someone sitting ontop of a very high smokestack and then eventually climbs up on another one - without think how far apart they actually are! :o There, he gets his destined meeting with a strange girl with blue hair and sparkly neckalce. But after some one-sided exchange of words - of course something happens! Evil badguys from another dimension are trying to kidnap the poor girl and Shu tries to fight them off with a stick - but somehow he gets transported to this other dimension along with them!



And this is where the normality ends as Shu is thrown into a world where children like himself, have to fight in the 'Holy War' and kill each other in order to survive. He is shown no mercy, as he gets beaten up and tortured over the girl he tried to save named Lala-Ru. She had an uber-1337 necklace that somehow Shu lost while trying to defend himself. King Hamdo, is an unstable leader who declares that this necklace must be found, whatever the cost and lets his commander - a ruthless female called Abelia do whatever she wants to Shu. She decides to give him a few more beatings and strings him up to hang for a while.
Meanwhile King Hamdo tries to 'talk' with Lala-Ru but ends up with nothing as she pushes away his advances. The all ever important water-giving necklace is lost for good it seems! Shu then wakes up in a prison like area and meets a very scared girl originating from America. They accidently mistook her for Lala-Ru and now she is trying desperately to escape the barren place. She introduces herself as Sara and almost imediately rests all her hope on Shu, who in return tells her never to give up (probably some hidden message there).
Sara is then reluctantly taken out of the prison and thrown into one of the soldiers rooms to get raped. Abelia tells Hamdo that they are low on soldiers as most of them got killed on the previous fight. Aha! I think I can put two and two together, although it's not the quickest or nicest way to 'produce' a soldier.
Wondering where Lala-Ru is and how to save her, Shu is conscripted into the local forces without his consent. Nabuca (whom Shu saves earlier) gives him the basics but he realises eventually there is no turning back, as Nabuca coldly kills a 'terriorst' attacker when he was trying to save his life. There is no point after all, when the children's lives are worthless. All they have to live for is to protect a maniac King who would gladly send them off to get killed in a 'Holy War' he has invented himself. And for Sara, the future is bleak. She looks forward to the thinly veiled hope that she may get saved one day, from the endless brutal rapes she endures.



This is not an anime for the feint of heart: Child cruelty, implied rapes, torture - the overall atmosphere is just depressing! The closest anime it resembles - from what I've seen - is Key The Metal Idol, which although had different themes, has the same atomosphere of no hope and cut throat cruelty. NTHT is a harrowing and touching experience, I can't wait to see more! It has that strange hook, that makes you want to see it all through to the very end. Hopefully the rest is just as good!

Overall: 8.5/10

I would have given this a 9 had it not been for the first slow paced episode. Otherwise, I highly recommend it!