Back

Carole & Tuesday / キャロル&チューズデイ

Readers of my gemlog may have guessed that I quite like music-themed anime. This can be anime about school idols, DJs, rock bands, or indeed almost any other type of music - which, incidentally, reminds me that I still should write a post about K-ON one of these days.

So, Carole & Tuesday should have everything to please me. It's a tale of two 17 something girls who try to make their way in the rock scene of Alba City on a terraformed Mars. Alba city is the New York of Mars, with a vibrant, but brutal music scene with cutthroat competition between up-and-coming artists.

Enter the two main characters of the stay, Tuesday and Carole. Tuesday comes from a rich and influential family, but feels unfulfilled with her life of ease and wealth. She's become enamoured by her Gibson acoustic guitar and dreams to hit it off in Alba's music scene to become a famous star. One day, she grabs a suitcase and her guitar, sneaks out of her sheltered home and makes a run for it.

Almost needless to say, he pampered childhood has left her utterly unprepared for reality. Almost immediately on arrival her suitcase is stolen and only her guitar remains. At that moment she runs into Carole, a streetwise orphan who feeds herself with small jobs left and right, but aspires to become a keyboarder of renown. In spite of coming from the polar opposites of the social spectrum, the two hit it off instantly - and the story starts to go downhill.

At this point a little caveat - what I'm reviewing hee is the manga, not the anime, of which I've so for just seen the trailer. Maybe, if I can muster the courage, I'll still give episode 1 a try... "Courage", because the manga at least has certainly not got me hooked. It all starts out with the orphan taking in the rich daughter, whom she had never met before, into her room and life - just like this, on the strength of a chance encounter and few shared musical preferences. Almost immediately the two start jamming together, even though Tuesday has by her own admission only limited skills on her beloved guitar and neither has experience in playing together

Having both girls creating an Instagram(!) account on future Mars is just one more indication of the story's shoddy plot (later we'll learn that also wikipedia and obviously YouTube have survived into the distant future - speak of dystopia...). More current technology survives - Tuesday actually uses a debit card, but her family obviously never even thinks of blocking it...

Worse, however, is the start of the duo's career, without training or anything,

just on the strength of a public jam session on a hijacked piano... As if music - and indeed any art - needed only talent without the hard work it takes to hone it.

Maybe the manga improves later on - if so, I'll gladly listen to advise. Otherwise, I don't plan on getting volume 2.

Website of the manga (in Japanese)

Official website of the anime

P. S.: One day I hope to add a comment system to the log. Until then, please feel free to share your comments on Mastodon, where you can reach me under @temperedTea@mk.absturztau.be