Character Spotlight: Anzu

In a season chock-full of sequels to popular, already established series, Hinamatsuri, a standalone series, does a fantastic job of holding its own. Hinamatsuri is an entertaining and unexpectedly moving show about a yakuza grunt who ends up taking in a bizarre young girl named Hina, who possesses telekinetic powers. Anzu, another strange girl with telekinetic powers, is sent to track down and defeat Hina before returning to their world, however, she soon finds herself stranded in our world with just the clothes on her back. Fortunately though, she is soon taken in by a community of homeless men who took pity on her and teach her how to survive.

One reason why Anzu is so great is that she undergoes more character development in two or three episodes than some characters do in an entire series, despite the fact that she is not the titular character. She starts her life as a homeless girl by routinely robbing stores of their food. However, instead of feeling remorse over this, Anzu, who lacks the morals instilled into most of us human beings, sees this as a necessary means to an end. And when Yassan takes her under his wing and shows her how to exchange cans for money and find small change she constantly complains, about how much walking they have to do and how little they earn for their hard work. But Anzu soon begins to see that there’s value in actually earning money and in working hard to put food into your belly. This transforms her from a shameless, sticky fingered, and somewhat entitled brat into somebody who could actually take pride in themselves. These are hard lessons that I didn’t learn until I was in my late teens, so it was nice seeing Anzu learn them while she was still so young. These are lessons that, were she a real person, would put her in good stead for the rest of her life.

Another great thing about Anzu is that even though a lot of her problems could be fixed by using her powers – at the very least they would reduce the amount of effort she would have to put into her tasks – she never takes this shortcut, but continues to survive using just effort and hard work. Even when given the opportunity to take a load off when shown an easier method of collecting cans or when taken in by the Hiyashi’s, Anzu continues to actively seek ways in which to help herself and those around her. The phrase ‘work smart not hard’ is often bandied about these days, which, in my opinion, encourages people to avoid hard work, cut corners, and take shortcuts whenever possible. So it was awesome to see a character eschew that approach in favour of putting in the legwork.

Anzu not only elicited my admiration, but also moved me. During the show she shows no embarrassment or shame when her friends come to hang out with her in her little homeless village, and why should she? Anzu hasn’t been conditioned to avoid or ignore the homeless, as so many of us have. She sees them as people and expresses a desire to fight for them and their home when it comes under threat. This moved, not only me, but the other people of the community, who have long since stopped feeling valued as people, let alone people worth fighting for. And upon moving into the Hiyashi residence Anzu expresses gratitude towards simple things, like a warm bed, home cooked food, and hot water, which also moves those around her. She sees the value in people and in things that many of us undervalue or take for granted. And that’s the best thing about Anzu, she reminds you just how much you have to be thankful for!