Recommended: Kino’s Journey

Kino’s Journey takes place in an oftentimes mystical alternate world and tells the story of a traveler who moves from town to town on a talking motorcycle named Hermes. Kino stays at each stop for three days and two nights – no more, no less – and at the end of each sojourn, simply packs up and moves along to the next destination having experienced as much as possible during the brief visit.

This kind of plot could have been handled in any number of predictable ways – a quirky comedy where the protagonist meets amusing villagers and develops a growing cadre of sidekicks with each passing day or a shounen-style action quest where each town means new villains to conquer.

Instead, Kino’s Journey takes a quieter road that, though superficially might seem quite simple, is thoroughly complex and engrossing.

The main theme that weaves its way through each and every episode is “the world is not beautiful, therefore it is.” It sounds a bit like the contents of a really irritating fortune cookie, but the anime’s execution is so deft and affecting that I give the wording a pass. That brief phrase really does encompass everything behind Kino’s Journey far better than any verbose essay I could come up with.

Bad things happen. Good things happen. It’s only when we see both pressed up against one another that we really understand the depth of either. When brutal dictators rule without reason, the “goodness” of the rebels risking their lives to oppose him becomes far more profound. That’s, of course, a simplification, but you get the idea.

Kino’s rules, which are designed to lead to a certain level of emotional detachment, add even more layers to the show. The distance that staying so briefly in each location builds makes Kino a documentarian of sorts, designed only to witness events for the most part. So when Kino chooses to get involved in situations, it feels almost as if we’re being dragged along, too.

This is an episodic show that explores what it means to simply exist within the world the characters inhabit. It never shies away from the tragic moments revealed in some of the destinations, but it’s never mired down by an excess of “emo.” Instead it leaves you feeling a bizarrely pleasant pang within your chest, as though you’ve gone through some sort of fulfilling experience.

Who might like Kino’s Journey?

While my first instinct is to insist that everyone will like it, I can draw more concrete parallels between the kind of storytelling and pacing you’ll find within it and anime like Mushi-shi and Haibane Renmei, though the latter is significantly less episodic in nature. You also might like Kino if you enjoyed the directing style of Serial Experiments Lain and Ghost Hound, as all three are Ryutaro Nakamura’s projects.