Folks, I’d say it’s well past time we settle down for another episode of Girls’ Last Tour. This production has been a charming and profoundly atmospheric show from episode one, with the sound design, use of color and space, and general pacing consistently elevating the show’s world from a narrative conceit to an immediate, tangible reality. From the start, the show has embraced the unique emotional appeal of the apocalyptic travelogue, contrasting a global situation that seems completely hopeless against a friendship that at least provides a light in the dark.

Last episode, the thematic subtext which tends to always underline this subgenre rose up into the actual text. The introduction of Kanazawa, an actual human in the wasteland, led the show to frame its thoughts on purpose and hope in the starkest of terms. While Chi and Yuu at least have each other, Kanazawa’s source of meaning was the map he was creating – in a world gone to ruin, he found hope through his dream of cataloging the fading city. But when his map blew away in the wind, Kanazawa was forced to ask himself why he really keeps moving, and what purpose he can actually serve in this world. Ultimately, Kanazawa was consoled by the unexpectedly profound words of Yuu: “you don’t need a reason. Good things happen sometimes.”

Yuu might not understand the gravity of those words, but “you don’t need a reason. Good things happen sometimes” is one of my favorite thematic arguments. Life is messy and unsatisfying, and we often won’t get the clean endings or earned payoffs we feel we deserve. Life is like people in that way, and just as I love shows about messy people, I love shows about messy lives, stories where our heroes just have each other, and ultimately discover that maybe that’s enough. In the realm of apocalyptic travelogue, “good things will happen sometimes” stands alongside “at least we have each other” as the defiant counterpoint to society’s wholesale collapse.

In shows like Sound of the Sky or Planetarian or even Kemono Friends, the world as we knew it isn’t coming back – the time for gallant heroes who set things right has passed, and all such heroes are dead and gone. But people live on past society’s end, and though we don’t need society, we do need hope. Yuu helped Kanazawa rediscover that hope, demonstrating the grounding kindness and common-sense, one-foot-in-front-of-the-other attitude that has likely kept Chi standing as well. It was a terrific episode, and though I suspect we’ll probably be heading back to more scattered vignettes this time, I’m eager to see what wonders this city still holds. Let’s dive into another episode of Girls’ Last Tour!

Episode 4

We open with several shots of their car unoccupied, ending on a shot of it visible through imposing black wires, before quickly jumping to the girls trying to take a photograph. Girls’ Last Tour loves to pull this trick – using menacing imagery or layouts to imply something terrible has or is about to happen, before immediately subverting that expectation. Here, starting with the empty car implies something has happened to the girls, as we so rarely see the car without them beside it. It’s a choice that I assume is mostly intended to maintain a sense of unease and danger within the city – it’d be easy for the apocalyptic setting to be overwhelmed by the mundane slice of life activities, but Girls’ Last Tour wants to maintain an active balance

What is with these weird pillars with Chi’s face on them

Chi knowing you’re supposed to say “cheese” for a photo, but neither of them knowing what cheese actually is, is a quintessential genre moment. Characters making their own meanings in the wreckage of meanings forgot

They even made a CG model of the weird face pillar for Yuu to spin around. Perspective shots are a good way to enhance the audience’s sense of closeness within a situation, but they draw attention to themselves, and are difficult regardless due to the constraints of animation – here, a perspective shot is only possible because the focus object is CG and the background is a steady blue

Oh wow, beautiful shots as they putter through the city. I’m reminded a bit of Ico, which also told much of its story through the humbling architecture of its city

Nice song, too. “Somewhere between a religious hymn and Enya” fits this show very well

The grainy filter for this flashback makes it feel like Kanazawa is already infinitely far away from them. This is a lonely world

Yuu actually points out that the statues look like Chi’s face. I’m sorry Chi, you have a kinda weird face

Oh dear lord, they knock over one of the Chi statues. They have angered the Chilords

Chi knows that there is no way to successfully make Yuu learn from this experience, and so she just smacks her upside the head

Why do these statues have faces? Their designs do a great job of creating a sense of unease tone-wise, but I actually do want to know what they are

Yuu’s expressions reveal she’s a lot more sensitive than her carefree manner of speaking would indicate. She shows great satisfaction when Chi accepts her peace offering of a rations bar, and is consistently worried about Chi actually staying mad at her

They’ve stopped in a very picturesque spot. I like how the streetlights wander up the ramps in front of them to essentially bleed into the night stars

“We have food for thirty days for the two of us. But I could eat it all by myself in seven days!” I absolutely believe that Yuu by herself would run out of rations far sooner than these two girls together, and probably feel pretty proud of herself doing it

The food today is cheese-flavored, but they still have no context for what that means

“When the town falls apart and even those statues break down, those pictures might still be there.” Another way of approaching this genre’s thematic heart – perhaps the way to find meaning in a world that has ended is to create something that will outlast you

And in immediate response to this, Chi decides to use the delayed timer to take a picture of the two of them. A very endearing gesture

Their small gestures of mutual concern are all so nice. Chi fussing with Yuu’s hair before the photo, Yuu smiling as she recognizes Chi caring for her

This show is very good at finding beauty within harshly limited color palettes. The consistent grey of the city means it has to get creative about using the quality of sunlight and consistently dynamic architecture to keep the show from looking too homogeneous, and it succeeds wonderfully. I really like the burnt orange look of their late afternoon journey

In spite of chastising Yuu for taking too many photos of the weird statues, Chi has started doing it too

The inside of the bright structure they’ve been seeking is a dark corridor with those creepy statues looming over them like a line of pillars on both sides. They will have their revenge

The show is using the limitations of these girls’ lantern to smart effect, creating intimate spaces and intriguing geometric patterns out of how the light shines off the edges of surfaces

“Maybe this place was a temple.” “A temple?” “A place where a god lives. Maybe these statues are like gods.” “What’s a god? Can you eat it?” Chi and Yuu treat the concept of gods with exactly the same idle curiosity as they treat the concept of cheese. In a genre that’s so fixated on creating meaning where the world offers none, reflecting on the end of gods seems very natural

They discover some old markings – the temple was built over four hundred years ago, in reverence to three gods

Chi tries to discern more of the rituals, but can’t really pull them together, while Yuu is mostly bored. The meaning of ritual is the meaning we bring to it – the meaning we collectively afford it, through our own human passion. These are old rituals for old times; for Yuu and Chi, the only meaningful ritual is caring for each other

And then the light goes out

The meaning Yuu finds in life is illustrated in stark terms as the light goes out, and Chi disappears with it. Yuu is left calling for her friend in a blank void. “Is this what the afterlife is like? No warmth, so dark you can’t see, with no one else… If I lost Chi, what would I do?”

The light returns just after Yuu stumbles over Chi, and the metaphor is made explicit by the reveal of the central statue – a goddess that looks even more like Chi than the other pillars

There’s a whole fake pond around the statues, with fake lily pads and even fake fish. The meaning these choices once had are lost on these new visitors; to Yuu, all that matters is she can’t eat the fish

And just like this temple, that photo of Chi and Yuu may last a long time, but will eventually have no context or meaning for anyone. We create objects meant to outlast us, but meaning is more difficult to preserve – the only meaning we can be certain of is the meaning we hold for ourselves

“I’m so disappointed in this god. It’s just a stone statue”

“Eating rations while looking at the afterlife is pretty weird”

“Even this nice god is just a fake, right? What’s the point of making a big disappointment like this? Nobody knows what life’s like after death, anyway.” “Remember what you said earlier in the dark, Yuu? That the afterlife is a dark world. Maybe they didn’t want to think that, so they made those statues and all the lights. To feel more at ease.” “I felt way more at ease after I found you, though.” That’s the point, Yuu!

“Maybe Chi is a god!” Damnit Yuu, you got it backwards. Or well, sideways? Either way, the only thing special about Chi is that she’s special to you, and that’s basically every god

And Done

Well shit, this episode solved theology. I really expected we’d be returning back to the largely atmosphere-focused material of the show’s first two episodes, but instead, this episode once again struck at the heart of this show’s themes with curiosity and precision. The introduction of the camera facilitated early discussions on “the things we can preserve” which segued naturally into the second half’s discussions on gods and temples, as Yuu and Chi explored an enduring artifact while lacking any of the context to understand its intended meaning.

Instead, they illustrated through their conversations that they don’t need this temple’s meaning – our great works will all ultimately decay, but every new generation will find things that are precious to them, things that inspire hope. For Yuu and Chi, that hope comes from the company of their closest friend; even as this episode bluntly acknowledged that all things will pass, it simultaneously argued that the bond between these two is as meaningful as any god could ever be. Another knockout episode for this beautiful show!

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