First Impression: Listeners

Well.

Umm.

Huh.

The first episode of Listeners was…trippy? Yeah, let’s go with that. I mean, it’s a music-themed, post-apocalyptic, giant robot adventure, so what do you expect?

At a concert, a young boy sees a giant robot? The concert gets blasted by the Death Star or something. The boy, now older, is scavenging in a post-apocalyptic junkyard. His name is Echo, and there’s a grouchy overseer and an old dude who speaks in unintelligible grunts. While trying to grab a random shiny object, the boy accidentally discovers an unconscious girl buried in the junkyard; naturally, she has amnesia. She also has a jack installed in her back, which makes her a “Player” capable of piloting giant robots to battle the “Earless.” The grumpy overseer, who’s also the mayor, says Players caused the disaster we saw back in the opening, ten years ago. The Earless attack; they are basically the smoke monster from LOST? Echo falls in a pit that appears out of nowhere. The girl dives after him, plugs the boombox he’s carrying into her back, rock music starts playing, and a giant robot appears to punch out the smoke monsters. Echo names the girl Mu (why?), the mayor gives a speech, some major structural collapse occurs, and Echo and Mu catch the first train out of town (going where?). The stinger / preview for the next episode makes…just as much sense.

I can’t honestly say this first episode is “good.” However, it was rather entertaining. It’s hard to say much more than that when I still don’t really understand what’s going on. Will the show continue to be hilariously weird? Or maybe everything will make sense eventually? While it’s cliche and confusing, I found little in the way of objectionable content; the biggest issue was a couple scenes Echo says stuff that gets mistaken for innuendo, and even that was fairly mild, as anime goes. I think I will at least watch another episode or two before making a decision on Listeners. I wouldn’t recommend the show, per se, but it is quirky and amusing, so you might want to try it.

Listeners can be streamed on Funimation.

Latest posts by jeskaiangel (see all)

Leave a Reply