Don't go to pieces! Land of the Lustrous simulwatch (completed)

[CommanderZx2]

I believe Dia used her missing right forearm to make her particular sword as her new style? but correct me if I'm wrong.

I think her new fighting style was the act of catching and flicking the enemies arrows back at them using her sword, and perhaps the impacts with her sword was too great and caused the break in arm? I think that's why she ended up dropping her sword after several rounds of doing that, as she lost control of that hand due to the break.

 

[Lordhippos]

I like to post my own episode analysis before I read any others, but I've come back to read some of the other ones and add some comments

Another little bit of visual language I picked up in was that their home/temple/palace (whatever it is) is riddled with cracks in the stone work. It looks so perfect from afar but up close its riddled with imperfections and seems a little fragile much like the gems themselves. Just how easy would it be to bring them and their way of life down? Well Phos finds out its pretty easy if you encounter a giant acid snail!

I get the impression the gemstones are used to being broken and put back together again a lot.

There is a theory that if you break a glass or something by knocking it onto the floor, theoretically you could put it back together 100% the same, but it would be insanely hard to do, so I think they settle for "close enough" when it comes to reconstruction.

This is to say that their entire structural system has cracks in it, and those cracks are their norms.

Episode 2
My favourite part of the episode is actually Diamond asking Phos to come up with a word for this dichotomy. Creating new words in order to better communicate an idea is a powerful tool. To illustrate, while Diamond managed to put it in words quite well already, it would be hard for Diamond to describe changes over time. If the balance of the two feelings or the nature of either of them changes (e.g. becoming literal hatred towards Bort), the new word can be used as reference point. There are some studies that even suggest having additional words can even improve the capability of humans to classify and specify things. In some cases even "improving" ones senses. Now this is all a bit debatable, but I think there's some truth to it. For example, if I would ask you guys what the distinction between cute, moe and kawaii is, I'm sure there will be plenty of answers. While there might not be a single definition that everyone agrees on, each community likely has some "average" for each of these terms. We can thus use them to convey slightly different things. Before learning these words it was difficult, if not impossible, to express these subtle differences (not that we needed to, probably ).

One of the defining points of humanities ability to excel in things like science and tech is our ability to store information, it seems in the gem society they place little emphasis on record keeping. Since computers have come along, we have been able to advance tech in leaps and bounds because our records are being stored and can be searched/reviewed.

The gem people place very little importance on the role of record keeping, but in human society storing information is vitally important for future generations.

Interesting episode.
Both the OP and ED are quite good. Sticking on the soundtrack, I quite like the soundtrack... It's quite minimalist. It sort of reminds me of Breath of the Wild's soundtrack in some places, with the long violin notes and piano accompaniment. The CG animation is growing on me, I do sort of like how the facial expressions look, especially their fluidity. It's not really something you see in many other places.

As for what actually happened in the episode, It was interesting that it showed Diamond was not as strong as their their name implied. The old person that that would not awaken (whose mind has just escaped me) definitely seems a bit weird.. They've got a strange aura, that's for sure. I didn't see that ending coming, that's for sure. It'll be interesting to see where this story leads..

Definitely enjoying it so far


(Also good to hear that the Spanish Dub is good, maybe one to put on for a re-watch )

I said last episode I don't trust him, the subs call him Master Adamantum, but he seems to be having his own agenda to me!

I believe Dia used her missing right forearm to make her particular sword as her new style? but correct me if I'm wrong.

I might be wrong but I thought that the arm broke as the sword was being battered, and she was hiding it under the glove, which is why the sword flew off due to the lower arm chipping off.

 

[Geriatric hedgehog]

I think her new fighting style was the act of catching and flicking the enemies arrows back at them using her sword, and perhaps the impacts with her sword was too great and caused the break in arm?

I might be wrong but I thought that the arm broke as the sword was being battered, and she was hiding it under the glove, which is why the sword flew off due to the lower arm chipping off.

Ah I stand corrected, I clearly missed that! There I was thinking she'd gone to new heights to achieve her goal.

 

[Robin91]

Better late than never

So I just finished Episode 2 and I found this one to be more eventful than the first episode.

I liked the fact that even though Diamond is thought of being the most prized gem even she has someone to look up to in Bort.
It really highlights the fact that they struggle with the same type of feelings as humans, like being envious to someone who we think is superior to ourselves.

But it's also about trying to conquer our fears and shortcomings, as Diamond for example tries her best to be the one fighting on her terms instead of being saved by Bort all the time.

Something else that I forgot to say yesterday was that this anime gives me some major Final Fantasy XIII vibes, especially from the area called "the plains". Some of the action scenes really reminds me of that game and how much I enjoyed it back in the days.

About the ending of the episode I have a feeling that Phos is about to find out what her strength is and maybe she will be the hero of the day.

 

[Birdie Num Num]

Episode 2 - Diamonds are a girl's best friend (but Bort is better)

I remembered a bit of information I read about this series the first time I watched, while using 3D animation, it does use 2D animation as well, like for the close up on facial expressions and some F/X animation (like the water splashing in this episode). After the series is done, I would recommend reading the production notes on Sakuga Blog or watching The Canipa Effect's video breaking down the animation. Just ask if you need links, I'll post them on the next episode post.

 

[Professor Irony]

Episode 2

Not sure I have a massive amount to add with this one. As much as it focuses on Diamond, I was quite struck by Bort's warlike demeanour though. While they're not obviously sympathetic in the way Diamond is, it does seem as, by bearing the responsibility of being their strongest fighter, Bort is alienated from the other gems in a similar way to Cinnibar, and perhaps lashes out at Phos because of some unspoken desire for their own destruction as an escape from that.

I was half expecting a "mean girl" take [from Diamond]

I thought that as well, I'm sure one of the exchanges between Phos and Diamond in the previous episode seemed a bit catty.

 

[Dai]

Episode 3 - That Time I was Reincarnated as a Snail...?
What's interesting about this episode is that it hinges around a case of mistaken identity. When Phos is absorbed, Diamond goes into denial and refuses to believe that she's dead. So when she sees that the snail has what seems to be a sentient personality, she assumes that's Phos and interprets its squeaks and gestures to mean whatever she wants them to mean. Everyone else accepts Diamond's interpretation that this is Phos, and if they hadn't found out otherwise they probably would have spent the rest of the snail's life treating it that way.

Diamond can't help but project her own feelings onto the snail, and goes so far as to envy 'Phos' for not having to "put on airs" anymore. We normally think of social hierarchies as being about differences, but Diamond seems to perceive them as being more about similarities. To her, only a gem girl needs to worry about their social standing against others because of their common points of reference: hardness and durability. Rather than acting like being a snail has reduced Phos's social standing, Diamond thinks it's freed her from it. Bizarrely, the other gems decide that the metamorphosis has increased Phos's social standing, since they think she's now cuter and less annoying.

All of this comes back to a very human trait: forcing our own perceptions onto things we don't understand.

Also, Bort starts to dere.

Thoughts for the day:
Was Diamond blinded by grief or would she have made the same assumptions anyway?
If Bort is a tsundere, why doesn't she have twin-tails?

 

[João Gomes]

Episode 2
Jimcarreyohboyherewegoagain.gif

There you guys go again, saying literally everything there is to say about the ep before I even get a chance to watch it lol

Am I the only dad around here?!

Seriously though, mess with cosmic snails at your own peril is my takeaway from this episode.

This series reminds me of Casshern Sins in the way it portrays violence against non-humans. I don't know if they go that far precisely because it's non-humans, or if it's just the way I see it, but both in Casshern and this, robots and stones suffer atrocities that I can't help but project onto myself and what it would do to a human. Wires resembling guts getting ripped off, arms falling off, legs getting cut.

Phos getting dissolved inside the snail made me shiver, it's really extreme just seeing her fade away and her eyeballs float around in space acid. I know we're led to believe it doesn't hurt them ( from Phos' reaction to being completely broken by the master in the first ep "eh?" to a few other moments) and it's even used for comedy, but it kinda makes me go "ouch". Then again, I don't like gore a whole lot.

Still, loving this. It's a very elegant show, even in regards to the fights. They are well animated, no-nonsense, elegant and fast. The music is simply stunning.

We're still in the intro phase, so I'm most interested to get to know all characters and how they'll relate to each other and what Phos can learn from them and their misadventures. Also, Master's nap being seemingly impossible to wake up from is definitely weird.

Take these rocks to space, please. I wanna see the moon.

The mvp in the thread is, of course, @WMD for watching this with the Spanish dub and sticking with it

"cuidado Phos los budas están llegando, acércate de ahí!" it makes me snort just imagining it, I'll give it a try when we're don

Oh god, Dai is already talking about ep3 I die inside

 

[WMD]

Episode 3

This ep was a bit harder to follow in Spanish than the last one due to there being so many half conversations with the snail but I managed to muddle my way through.

Identity is clearly a major theme in this series and it's interesting that they look at identity erasure so early on in the series. It's also interesting that this is done from the perspective of others rather than the victim. Its interesting how little most of them care that the Phos they knew might be gone but then all come together to help once a viable solution to the problem is found.

My only issue is that solution is very obvious- maybe it's because I've seen the show before but collect the Phos coloured bits of stone from the shell is hardly genius level critical thinking. Maybe that's the point, even with their ludicrously long lifespans they never really have to think outside the box. Would also explain why they though Diamond coming up with new fighting techniques was odd.

A few touches I picked up on I enjoyed were Diamond sitting there unmoving for a seemingly long while watching the Phos-snail sleep. Gives a sense of how they perceive time differently. Also the whole Cinnabar Diamond interaction was really good. The 2 gems who've had the most meaningful interactions with Phos being the ones who save her is just good writing. And finally the rebirth scene was a feast for the eyes, kind of like a fantasy version of the Ghost in the Shell opening. At first it seemd a little odd to make it so fluid but I think it represents all the microorganisms reconnecting and bring life and identity back to Phos in a pretty great way.

 

[Neil.T]

@Dai has covered episode 3's core idea so well that all I can add is just to point out that scene where Dia runs back home in the moonlight. It's just stunning, isn't it? Beautifully animated and scored so atmospherically. It really stood out at the time, and I think that'll stick in the memory.

This series reminds me of Casshern Sins in the way it portrays violence against non-humans.

I can totally see that too, now you mention it. Yeah.

I can see how they're similar also in how we're offered these little self-contained studies of different aspects of human nature.

Perhaps Casshern Sins or even the similarly thought-provoking Haibane Renmei would make for good simulwatches some day. And on the subject of provoking thought...

the creators have taken common anime charcter tropes

I'll freely admit at this moment that, because of the very thing that Vincentdante points out there, and at least on this first viewing, I haven't felt myself anywhere near as moved to contemplate the deeper meaning of what I've been seeing when compared to those latter two series or one of my personal favourites Serial Experiments Lain (already simulwatched). I've been waiting for Lustrous to really click with me so far, but I hope that episode 3 might just have provided that moment.

 

[RadFemHedonist]

I'll be honest: I enjoyed episode 2 but the only thing that I can really think to comment on is how gosh-darned adorable Diamond is. Looking forward to episode three, I've seen this show before but I forgot what happened to Phos in ep 2! It's nice that they care so much about Cinnabar I do agree with what Vincentdante said about the point of the encyclopedia assignment being different than the usual work=fulfillment trope I'm currently rewatching Howl's Moving Castle after recently buying the Blu-ray but I'll try to watch episode 3 and maybe post something more substantial later today

 

[Vincentdante]

Episode 3 - Revenge of the Snail

Have I ever told you about the tragedy of Phos the wise? It's not a story the gems would tell you.

Honestly this episode just made me feel bad for Phos. It's like she get's a lot of undue hate from the other gems just because she is naturaly soft which they interpret as useless and annoying. Anyway following on from the last time Phos is eaten by a giant snail and dissolved. Diamond tries to save her and kicks the shell off the snail and mistakes the little creature left over as a transformed Phos.

The whole episode is through the perspective of Diamond as she talks to the other gems, and seeing their reactions to the possibility that Phos has turned into a snail. A lot of them turn their noses up at her and don't even want to help, while at least Cinnabar kind of softens up and ends up offering the solution by explaining about snail metabolism.

One part that stuck out was when Diamond questions whether Phos would be happier as a snail and comes to realise how she has such a hard time as a gem. I think this is why the snail has taken a liking to Diamond as I will explain in my next paragraph.

Eventually they figure out that Phos's body was used to repair the snails shell so they fish it out and put her back together. While it was sweet that they ended up saving Phos, she also had some kind of bond with the snail at the end. My theory is, because she literally became a part of the snail this is why she can communicate. And the same is for the snail, not just because it can communicate with Phos. But because all through out the episode the snail has been seemingly sticking up for Phos as well. When the gems were bad mouthing Phos and the snail was lashing out at them, at the time might have been intepreted as Phos lashing out as a snail.

That was my take away. I will now read the other posts for more insightful thoughts than mine.

 

[Neil.T]

That was my take away. I will now read the other posts for more insightful thoughts than mine.

I thought that was pretty insightful myself; I'm still waiting to get on the right wavelength for dissection.

like a fantasy version of the Ghost in the Shell opening

Yes! Indeed. I feel like I should have clocked that during the episode.

This is one of the reasons why I like simulwatches.

 

[RadFemHedonist]

"Do you know? That's the most you've spoken in a hundred years."

Poor Phos-snail-chan ;-; Also so so cute! I like that this episode is focused on Phos and Diamond. I feel like for all that the gems are "genderless" some of the ones with more archetypally masculine traits are nasty to some of the ones with more archetypally feminine traits. Though tbf some of them are also mean in more archetypally feminine ways. But the personality and treatment of Diamond is fascinating from this perspective. I suspect that Phos has been treated as an outsider from the start? No-one really believes in Phos, for the most part ;-;

 

[João Gomes]

I can totally see that too, now you mention it. Yeah.

I can see how they're similar also in how we're offered these little self-contained studies of different aspects of human nature.

Perhaps Casshern Sins or even the similarly thought-provoking Haibane Renmei would make for good simulwatches some day.

Casshern Sins is one of my all time favorites, so I just need an excuse much like Lagann. We're building ourselves a nice simulwatch list if I do say so myself! Never watched Haibane Renmei, but always wanted to, I just don't have it.

About the comparison, it's true that Lustrous does the same, I just didn't think about it that way because in Casshern, the setting and characters change all the time, making it feel more thematic than personal, whereas here it feels more personal so far. But it'll be interesting to see the effects it will have on Phos throughout the series.

I'm refraining from reading the rest of the comments as I won't be able to watch ep 3 until the evening, but I'll be back!

 

[Professor Irony]

Phos getting dissolved inside the snail made me shiver, it's really extreme just seeing her fade away and her eyeballs float around in space acid.

I was quite struck by that too, it's a very eerie sight, seeing Pho's eyeballs linger after the rest of their form has been absorbed. Perhaps the eyes are the hardest part of the gems? It also kind of made me think of the old myth that the image of the last thing a person sees before their death can be seen in their eyes, but I don't know if that's a purely western idea.

Episode 3

Between the title and the plot of this one, it seems very much to be alluding to The Metamorphosis by Kafka, in which a young man is inexplicably transformed into a giant cockroach. It's a surprising contrast to that story, however, that most of the characters seem to think this situation is an improvement and Phos is better suited to being a snail.

When Phos is absorbed, Diamond goes into denial and refuses to believe that she's dead. So when she sees that the snail has what seems to be a sentient personality, she assumes that's Phos and interprets its squeaks and gestures to mean whatever she wants them to mean.

I must admit to having taken the whole thing at face value. While the episode does hint at Phos not being the snail early on when it shows the elements of her stone in the empty shell, Diamond seems so utterly convinced that the snail is Phos, it never occurred to me that might not be the case until the end.

 

[Neil.T]

About the comparison, it's true that Lustrous does the same, I just didn't think about it that way because in Casshern, the setting and characters change all the time, making it feel more thematic than personal, whereas here it feels more personal so far.

Hmmm, that's a very interesting distinction.
This is a real learning experience for me. Great stuff.

 

[Lordhippos]

First time viewer! Episode 3!

Some more clues unearthed about the world the gem people inhabit throughout the episode.

First episode with no Lunarians attacking, guess we need to break and get the Phos situation sorted.

It seems that Phos was initially thought to be the snail, and the original Phos has been lost, but right at the end we learn that Phos was in fact just part of the shell. I somehow knew that Cinnabar would play a part in restoring Phos, but didn't guess that the knowledge of the local wildlife would be the key that solved the mystery.

I mentioned on my episode 2 post that I thought Phos would come back but be somehow different, I wasn't sure how exactly, but I must admit gaining the ability to talk to the snail was not what I would have predicted.

This revelation opens up some interesting ideas going forwards;

• Can the snail communicate with Phos about what the moon people are like?
• What other knowledge can the snail share with Phos?
• If Phos can learn to talk to the snail, maybe Phos can also talk to other creatures? Possibly even the Lunarians.
• Is part of Phos in the snail which is why they can communicate? even a small fragment might be enough.
• They don't seem to have a concept of pets, or any that I've seen, maybe Phos will keep the snail as a pet and get it a new shell

I can't help but draw certain parallels with how the snail consumption of material works to form their shells, and how the gem people are created by minerals being consumed to form their gem bodies.

We also learnt that the gems can operate at night they just seem to prefer not to. Dia really went out of her way to help Phos when the others didn't initially seem that interested in doing so, but in the end I was happy to see them all pulling together.

 

[Lordhippos]

Episode 3

My only issue is that solution is very obvious- maybe it's because I've seen the show before but collect the Phos coloured bits of stone from the shell is hardly genius level critical thinking. Maybe that's the point, even with their ludicrously long lifespans they never really have to think outside the box. Would also explain why they though Diamond coming up with new fighting techniques was odd.

I was kind of working on the assumption that Phos wasn't gone materially, but my biggest worry was that she was melted into fine essence and sitting in that body of water where the snail/shell fell. If you grind a gem person into dust can they still be recovered? fragments seem to be recoverable.

@Dai has covered episode 3's core idea so well that all I can add is just to point out that scene where Dia runs back home in the moonlight. It's just stunning, isn't it? Beautifully animated and scored so atmospherically. It really stood out at the time, and I think that'll stick in the memory.

Totally agree that bit was really nicely done, reminded me of something Ori leaping through the forest in the games.

"Do you know? That's the most you've spoken in a hundred years."

Poor Phos-snail-chan ;-; Also so so cute! I like that this episode is focused on Phos and Diamond. I feel like for all that the gems are "genderless" some of the ones with more archetypally masculine traits are nasty to some of the ones with more archetypally feminine traits. Though tbf some of them are also mean in more archetypally feminine ways. But the personality and treatment of Diamond is fascinating from this perspective. I suspect that Phos has been treated as an outsider from the start? No-one really believes in Phos, for the most part ;-;

I guess gender isn't important to them, but I feel like Bort is more masculine and Dia is more feminine despite them both being diamonds, more in the emotions and the way they act rather than just in looks.

Dia was accusing Bort of confessing if I remember it right, so they must have some concept of relationships/romance, but I haven't really seen any evidence to support that, the gem people all seem fairly lonesome to me.

 

[HWR]

Episode 3: Metamorphos

Some great commentary for this episode in the thread! Diamond trying their best to save Phos was nice and the resolution was also an interesting one.