English Dub Review: Alice & Zoroku “The Red Queen Escapes”

What does a magical girl have to do with an old man with yakuza connections? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

Spoilers Below

A strange girl in a medical gown runs through the forest in the pouring rain. A bubble of psychic power shields her from the worst of the wet but doesn’t protect her from being watched by Big Brother. Though she seems to also have the ability to teleport, she’s very limited in it. The commander of her pursuers notes that this is the reason why he limited her calorie intake at dinner. She only has one jump left in her. In comes “Little C” a woman in a traditional kimono, who summons a giant arm and demands that this girl (the Red Queen, they call her) return with her to “Wonderland”. The Red Queen doesn’t have the power to fight back, but she doesn’t have to either. Another woman appears with a sword and shield, summoning weapons and dropping orange marmalade for the Red Queen to eat. Not jam, of course. Jam tomorrow and jam yesterday, but never ever jam today. The mystery defender gives her instructions on how to spend her new calories: Teleport to the nearest large town and raise as big a scene as she can. Well, if that isn’t “in medias res”, I don’t know what is. We’re left with more questions than answers and…

Zoroku is an old man in the office of some very Yakuza-style businessmen. They pay him for some services and offer him much more if he will just come back to work for them. He refuses, taking only his fee for whatever he delivered, and continues on his way. Heading back to wherever he works, Zoroku makes a stop off at a convenience store. The clerk is concerned about a little girl hiding in one of the aisles, she looks like she’s going to shoplift the food from the cooler. Zoroku goes over to talk her out of it. Oh, hey. It’s the Red Queen. She proceeds to use her powers to read his mind quoting off his name, age, and the exact location of his granddaughter. She declares that in exchange for his assistance, she will grant him any wish. He doesn’t quite understand, and that angers her. She teleports out, leaving the adults mystified.

Zoroku returns to his car, and the Red Queen is waiting for him inside. She makes her offer again, but there’s no time for the confusion! A wrecking ball is hurtling straight for them. She goes all ET and levitates the car out of the way. That was no accident though, two other girls are after them, and they have powers of their own. Arrows, wrecking balls, anchors, flying bicycles, all come flying at the unlikely pair of old man and magical girl as they flee in his tiny car. The mayhem spreads across town, with the car under the Red Queen’s telekinetic control.

An arrow punctures the rear tire of the car, and it swerves out of control into a railing. Red Queen parlays with Tweedledee and Tweedledum while Zoroku bleeds into his airbag. They beg the little blonde to return to the research facility with them, but she refuses. It is her determination that they all go free. The two draw their weapons, preparing to end their Red Queen. Zoroku jumps in, grabbing them by the head and noogie-ing all three into submission. He lectures them on the destructive consequences of their actions and holds them until the police arrive.

The police hold everyone for questioning, but they aren’t getting much. The Tweedles aren’t talking, and the Red Queen is too hungry to give anything. The detective probes Zoroku on his previous meeting with the Yakuza. He was just delivering an order, but the detective isn’t buying it. Another officer barges in The Red Queen as vanished! Shortly after they fed her, she gave the names of the Tweedles (Asahi and Yonoga Hinagiri, if you care) and poofs into thin air. Apparently, the Hinagiri twins were just collected by a government agent, along with orders to drop this case. Zoroku is free to go, and the damage to his car is completely gone. In fact, all evidence of the battle, even videos from cell phones, has been wiped out. Still, with all this weirdness, the old man just can’t look at the car the same way again. He sells it off and wanders over to a hole-in-the-wall restaurant. Red Queen appears to him again.

Okay, exposition time: She’s what is called a Dream of Alice, someone with magic-like psychic powers that are very personal in their expression. She normally could do just about anything she could imagine, but she hasn’t had a real meal in three days. He orders a buffet for her, and she gobbles it up. They had all been living out of a research facility, and the subjects of some intense and unpleasant testing procedures. She tells him that she wants to free them, but needs his help to do so. She’s in no position to fight the organization. He tells her to come with him, there’s a couple stops he has to make.

He takes her to a popular shrine and continues their conversation after making an offering. It’s time for real introductions. She already knows his name, but he doesn’t know hers. Truth is, she doesn’t even know her name, she goes by Sana, a name given her by the Hanagiris. He tells her he will take her in and feed her on one condition: She can’t use her powers. Not only do they put innocent people at risk, she doesn’t really have enough discernment to use them well. In their first meeting, She read his mind, talked about his loved ones, then made a demand. Though she didn’t intend it that way, it felt like blackmail, like she was threatening his granddaughter. If she really wants to help her friends, she should work on blending into the world and learning to act like a normal person.

Next stop, to his shop. He had left it in the care of his hired help while he was gone and needs to check on a few things. Inside, the shop is full to the brim with flowers! This is what he had delivered to the Yakuza! Not a head or someone’s fingers, but flowers! The Yakuza boss heads up to see his girlfriend with the arrangement and proposes to her. This was the last of his errands, and he carries the little girl to his home. She passes out on the futon just as soon as it is unfurled. Zoroku watches her as she sleeps, reminded of his own granddaughter and daughter when they were her age. She, on the other hand, dreams of cream puffs… and him.

I am very pleased by this show. It shows a real depth in its writing that makes it difficult to define as any one genre. It feels like a kid-friendly version of Elven Lied, and the dynamic between the two main characters has a lot of heart. The art of its traditional animation is great. Different characters are styled in their own ways, making them each feel like individuals. There is a good amount of hidden details, like a scene with a projector where you can actually see the dust floating in the light. My only criticism is that all vehicles (and most of the stuff summoned by the Hanagiris) are CG, and really obvious CG at that. It really doesn’t look all that good, when put next to the traditional art. The sound mixing is amazing, though, and most of the SFX are realistic. The cast of voice actors for the English Dub are real pros. “Zoroku” is voiced by John Swazey, who has been doing anime voice overs since Golden Boy. “Sana” is Sarah Wiedenheft, who we saw just recently as “Tohru” in Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid. So we’ve got a real all-star cast who know what they’re doing. I really look forward to the next episode. I give this one eight jars of marmalade out of ten.