Hello and welcome to Project Nitsuj. Anime incorporates a number of music genres in its shows. Whether it be rock, jazz, country, or future funk it’s a buffet for the ears. However, one genre of music that always gets the red flag in anime is rap. It’s been well-documented that the two are like water and oil, they just don’t mix and any attempts at putting them together have been awful. The only exception to this statement has been Samurai Champloo which showed us that when put in the right hands rap and anime can in fact work together. Another anime that tries to be an exception is today’s anime Hypnosis Mic. Okay, here’s the exposition on this series. Hypnosis Mic was a music project created by King Records in 2017. It had the same idea as Idolm@ster. Get a bunch of voice actors to play characters and have rap battles with each other while representing a different prefecture in Japan. It was a crazy concept that paid off big time. Since its inception, the project would go on to release hit songs that mainstream the music charts, manga adaptions, stage plays, concerts, a mobile game, and yes, an anime. Released in 2020 by the notorious A-1 Pictures (SAO) this series tries to be the first anime centered around rap music that works. Did it succeed? Let’s do a mic check and find out. This is Hypnosis Mic.
Opening and Ending Theme
The anime’s opening is”Hypnosis Mic -Rhyme Anima-” by Division All Stars. A good song that introduces you to all the major characters in the anime and gives them all a chance to shine. After just hearing them once you quickly get an idea of who they are, what they’re like, and what they contribute to their respective team.
For the ending we have “Kizuna” by each group. This was one of my favorite endings from 2020. The song carries a deep meaning about the bonds the groups share with each other and I like how each version is different from each other. My favorite being Mad Trigger Crew’s version. Their voices are just perfect together.
Episodes 1-4
The anime starts with a public service announcement from the government (hopefully it’s Sonic speaking) which is now falling under the control of the Party of Words an all-female political group. Otome, the head of the group, announces that violence, guns, and weapons of mass destruction are all to be destroyed immediately and the government will now be run by females (feminism on full display here). Instead, all battles will now be done through rap battles (this is what I imagine everyone’s reaction being to this announcement: https://youtu.be/H6M1OF_E0IA) using these new tools they call the hypnosis mics which will cause listeners to suffer various misfortunes when words pass through it (that seems more dangerous. Especially since everyone will have access to it). These new changes fall under the new H Law that will abolish violence and bring peace to the world. 3 years soon passed, and everyone conformed to this change surprisingly well (shocking, I expected there would have been a lot more resistance. Especially given the choice of music genre). We focus on two guys named Jiro voiced by Haruki Ishiya and Saburo voiced by Kōhei Amasaki (Taichi from Isekai Cheat Magician) who are members of a group called the Buster Bros. trailing this guy to a warehouse. They fall into an ambush and become surrounded where the guy and his gang plan to crush them in a rap battle. The leader of the Buster Bros., Ichiro voiced by Subaru Kimura (Aoi from Jujutsu Kaisen), arrives to battle with Jiro and Saburo and we get our first rap battle (where I’m not gonna lie, it is pretty cringeworthy. However, the beat of the song is actually very good). The Buster Bros. win convincingly, and we see this battle caught the eye of Otome who reveals that Ichiro used to be a member of group called Dirty Dawgs. It was a 4-man group that dominated until the government forced them to split up in order to make the territory wars more interesting. For the rest of the episodes we get introduced to the other characters. We have Jyuto voiced by Wataru Komada, Rio voiced by Shinichiro Kamio, and Samatoki voiced by Shintarō Asanuma (Crow from Yu-Gi-Oh 5Ds) who make up the Mad Trigger Crew (aka MTC) which works as a law enforcement group who have clashing personalities, but form a cool team (Jyuto is the cool detective, Samatoki is the badass yakuza, and Rio is the hardcore military man). These guys have a better song than the Buster Bros. along with a better beat, I just wish they had better lyrics. The guy voicing Samatoki is the best of the group. You can tell the actors of Jyuto and Rio aren’t used to voice acting and trying to find their footing while Shintarō knows what he’s doing and is very comfortable with his rapping. Their rapping also takes inspiration from East Coast rappers. There’s a heavy bass in their song and more complex wordplay that you associate with East Coast rappers. But hey, if cool gangster guys aren’t your thing, we have the Fling Posse to fill your moe need (somewhat). There’s Ramuda (the cute one) voiced by Yusuke Shirai, Gentaro (the charming one) voiced by Soma Saito (Hermes from DanMachi), and Dice (the down on his luck guy) voiced by Yukihiro Nozuyama. I have to admit out of all the groups so far these are the three who seem to have the best chemistry, flow, and song in the episode. We see Ramuda is popular with the ladies, Dice is a gambling addict, and Gentaro is the voice of reason among the group while also being a writer. This group seems to take inspiration from West Coast rappers as well (they even do the Snoop Dogg dance). There’s more funk in their song and seems to be more laidback as opposed to MTC’s song. The final group is Matenro which represents old-school rap (their raps are simple but effective). The members are Jakurai (a doctor) voiced by Shou Hayami, Hifumi (a host afraid of women) voiced by Ryuichi Kijima, and Doppo (a stressed-out white-collar worker. Do I detect a male version of Retsuko only with rap instead of heavy metal?) voiced by Kent Itō. Next to Fling Posse these are the VAs who seem to have the best chemistry with each other.
Episode 2 starts off with Ichiro getting a solo rap as he runs to meet up with Jiro and Saburo (where I’m not gonna lie, this song was way better than the first episode. The flow, the lyrics, the energy. This is what I wanted to see in the episode with this character. Scene here: https://youtu.be/x6s4OdhyQco). We also learn that the Buster Bros. are in fact real brothers (in the anime, not in real life). Later on, Ichiro gets held hostage with a bunch of other people in a café by a criminal who’s carrying illegal mics (*chuckles* they did it. They’ve found a way to make mics a dangerous weapon. This is both silly and stupid at the same time. I have to tip Baron’s hat to them. I don’t have my own hat). Ichiro stands up to the criminal but without his mic he’s pretty much helpless (and has to endure listening to the weak rhymes of the criminal). Thankfully, Jiro and Saburo get Ichiro his mic and he takes the criminal down with ease along with his bros (again, the song is way better than the first episode. This also shows some good chemistry and flow between the three).
In episode 3 we focus on Matenro who operate out of Shinjuku. We see that Jakurai and Hifumi are pretty famous in the area but Doppo seems to be the forgotten member (I can see why. One’s a cool doctor, the other’s a first-class host and the last one is a white-collar worker who gets used by everyone at work. Who would you remember?). When Doppo comes home from a long day at work, he finds a dead body in his apartment (oh come on, give the guy a break). Naturally, Doppo freaks out and it doesn’t help that the tie used to strangle the dead body was his tie (well your case just keeps getting better and better). Hifumi arrives to see the body (taking it surprisingly well) and ditches the apartment with Doppo where they get picked up by Jakurai who tell him what’s going on and he makes a call to Samatoki for help. Jakurai and the others find a potential suspect named Uwabami, a former host who hung out with the wrong crowd and go to confront him. They go around searching for him taking out a bunch of wanted criminals in the process until they finally come across Uwabami and his “girl” Mimimi who is dating Uwabami but is madly in love with Hifumi (in fact, she’s a borderline Yuno as she has keys to just about everything he owns). It turns out the man in Doppo and Hifumi’s apartment was Mimimi’s husband who she killed at the request of Uwabami to frame Hifumi who Uwabami could never stand. However, Mimimi flipped the script and instead tried to pin the murder on Doppo to get him away from Hifumi and have him all to herself (whatever you say, crazy bitch). Doppo finally hears enough and we get our rap battle where once again the song was better and the flow between the group was great (scene here: https://youtu.be/2jXtmrE3ceI). In the end, Uwabami and Mimimi are arrested, Mimimi’s husband shockingly didn’t die and Doppo is cleared of all charges.
Episode 4 focuses on MTC. In the episode, Jyuto discovers a drug deal about to go down in Samatoki’s territory from a rival clan. They infiltrate the rival clan’s casino (now if this was Kiryu, he would have just walked in, punched anyone who got in his way and headbutted the guy in charge. Because the Dragon of Dojima knows how to get it done). They follow the drug dealers only to realize they were set up and learn from Rio that they were members of his old unit. In the past, he and his unit did a lot of illegal stuff in order to maintain peace and were supposed to be arrested. However, their commander took the fall for them and was thrown in prison. Rio along with the members of his unit want to free their commander (however, Rio tries to do this the right way while the others try to use illegal means to free their commander). Jyuto discovers that Rentai a member of Samatoki’s clan is a rat who tipped off the drug dealers in order to save his sister who was kidnapped by them. MTC raid the HQ of the rival clan (why they didn’t do this in the first place is beyond me. The teachings of Kiryu should be followed by all yakuza). We get our rap battle where MTC win (scene here: https://youtu.be/Xwr19uUsY-Y, I’m not gonna lie they have the best effects for their raps), the drug dealers and rival clan members are arrested and Rentai gets expelled from the clan in order to keep his sister and himself safe.
Episodes 5-8
It’s Fling Posse’s turn in episode 5. Now these guys probably have the weakest story of the groups as it doesn’t do a good job exploring the group or expanding on them. In the episode, the group sees a special about ghosts in Shibuya. Ramuda is obviously scared of ghosts but won’t admit it and winds up making a bet with Dice to see if ghosts are real or not (and if they are, we know who to call). This leads to a tour of Shibuya where Gentaro and Dice tease him a little bit until they arrive at a music club ran by this creepy manager who can’t get anybody to come (have you looked in the mirror? That could be one of the reasons why nobody comes). He begs Fling Posse to perform at his club and they agree to do it (I’m sure most of the audience will be female since Ramuda will be there). Fling Posse get the word out about their performance, but nobody shows up because apparently the club is haunted by ghosts as everyone who performed at the club swears they saw them. This caused everyone to stop coming and according to the manager this problem has been happening all over Shibuya except for one club, Club Colony. Ramuda calls up Ichiro to look into it and sure enough they’re a shady group of people. Apparently, they’re ex-rappers who belonged to another group that fell apart and have been using their hypnosis mics to create scary illusions in other clubs to scare everyone away. Fling Posse confronts the group where we get our rap which actually is a good one (I especially like the visuals they use for this song. It matches up perfectly with the theme of the episode). Fling Posse wins, Club Colony gets shut down, and we end with a ghost possibly being caught on camera at the concert (good times).
Nothing much really happens in episode 6. With the character episodes done the division qualifiers have been announced. Sure enough our 4 groups are the favorites to win and they’re each in a different bracket (ya gots to make the people want it more). We get a few hints into how and why the Dirty Dawgs broke up. There was an issue between Ichiro and Samatoki (that makes sense. They do have clashing personalities) and it’s also hinted that Ramuda may have also played a part in the breakup as well. In the Buster Bros. neck of the woods, some monk rappers try to sabotage the division qualifiers with a bomb but the Buster Bros. take them down and dispose of the bomb with the help of this photographer named Tom and his assistants.
We continue with the division qualifiers in episode 7 where our 4 main groups seem to be dominating the competition (either they’re just that good or everyone else has bars that make Vanilla Ice look like Eminem). We get a side story involving Doppo who makes a friend at work named Kazuha who is a fan of his. During Matenro’s qualifying matches, a series of burglaries have been happening and police are stumped into who’s behind this. Matenro manages to find the culprits by piecing together that the tools they used to commit crimes were items from Doppo’s company and the only person who has access to this stuff is Kazuha. Sure enough, Kazuha is behind the crimes and gets taken down by Matenro (who gives us a pretty sad rap this episode which conveys Doppo’s feelings. He doesn’t have a lot of friends, so I imagine he was ecstatic to befriend Kazuha only for him to turn his back on him. Scene here: https://youtu.be/T0Ie2FDDx8w).
In episode 8 we get two stories. In the first half of the episode we focus on MTC. We see Jyuto has been swamped with work in the investigation of a robber and if it keeps up, he might miss the division qualifiers. Even with the help of Samatoki and Rio, he has no luck cracking this case until one of Tom’s assistants appears to help them. It turns out two corrupted senior cops who are jealous of Jyuto’s success (don’t be jealous just because he’s better looking) are behind these series of robberies. They have a third guy rob the houses while they keep him safe and hide him in a safe house where nobody can find him. However, they plan to cut ties with him by dropping him into the Yokohama Bay. MTC catch onto their plan and confront the corrupted cops where we get a rap battle (which is honestly the best rap I’ve seen from MTC so far). The corrupted cops lose and instead of turning them in, Jyuto decides to make them his personal slaves who will only help further his career (you’re now his bitches). In the second half of the episode, we focus on Fling Posse. Their story isn’t really all that great or interesting as Dice once again gets into gambling debt (you know, the usual). However, this time he was set up. The dealers are cheating and Gentaro exposes their folly, a rap battle commences (and yeah, this might be the weakest rap from Fling Posse so far). We end the episode with the final four teams being announced: Buster Bros., MTC, Matenro and Fling Posse (did you really expect anybody else?). In the semifinals, we’ll be seeing Buster Bros. vs MTC and Matenro vs Fling Posse.
Episodes 9-13
We start episode 9 with our 4 teams meeting each other and seeing no love lost between our 4 captains (it’s like a high school reunion where the first person you see is that guy you didn’t get along with). Before they fight each other, they get stopped by the women of Chuohku who warn them to behave or they’ll be disqualified. They all go inside the stadium where we see the audience is all female as apparently the whole point of this competition is just to entertain them (rap monkeys rap). The first match will be Buster Bros. vs MTC where we learn more about the hate between Ichiro and Samatoki. It turns out that in the past Samatoki tried to kill Jiro and Saburo (what the hell Samatoki?). Jiro and Saburo got abducted by Chuohku for some reason (did they need snu-snu?) and Samatoki was going to push a button that would have killed them (I think we need a little more context). Samatoki also carries a grudge against Ichiro as apparently he told Nemu, the sister of Samatoki what he was going to do and she left him disgusted by his actions. The time for the rap battle comes and I love it. We finally get a chance to see evenly matched teams face off against each other. The visuals, the music and rapping is really on point here as everyone takes their best shots at each other only to get back up and fight. The battle comes to a head when it’s down to Ichiro and Samatoki as they hit each other with their best shots (or bars), but Samatoki is the one left standing and wins the round for MTC (yesssss~).
For episode 10 it’s Fling Posse vs Matenro. Before the battle, we see Ramuda get called to meet the vice-chairman of the Party of Words. Throughout the season we’ve seen that Ramuda has been their puppet and was the main reason the Dirty Dawgs split up in the first place (cute boy is TOTH). Why? Because the Party of Words was scared of Dirty Dawgs. They were afraid that their combined powers would disrupt the society that they created (why would they think that? And for that matter, why would Dirty Dawgs want to disrupt society? From what I can tell they all seem to like the new government just fine. Hell, I’ll take rap battles over people killing each other with guns any day of the week. I say the Party of Words is being paranoid for no reason whatsoever. Just like the real government). Anyway, Ramuda receives a true hypnosis mic which will allow him to hypnotize anyone he wants. However, the output it generates takes a hefty price on the person using it. They want Ramuda to use it in his battle against Jakurai so that they can take control of his special power which is what they’ve been aiming for this whole time (Ramuda was just the appetizer before the main meal). As Ramuda gets depressed after finding out he’s a sacrificial pawn, he decides that if he’s going to go down, he’s taking Jakurai with him (Jakurai is the only who sees through his happy cute boy act). The battle begins where Fling Posse dominate early on (geez they’re making Matenro look weak here). When Ramuda is about to use the true hypnosis mic, Dice and Gentaro stop him (did they know about the mic? Maybe) and remind him who he truly is (a wolf in sheep’s clothing). Hearing his posse mates, Ramuda decides not to use the mic and battle Jakurai head-on. Just when Fling Posse has Matenro on the ropes, Jakurai uses his special ability which is healing his allies and re-energizing them (well he is a doctor, so it matches his character). However, even that’s not enough to withstand the bars of Fling Posse as Jakurai and Hifumi go down and Doppo got stage freight. Just when it looks like it’s over, Doppo rises back up and just blasts Fling Posse (it’s a dammmmnnnnn~ moment) to take all three of them down and give Matenro the win (scene here: https://youtu.be/Nts2H1LKQJM).
It’s the finals in episode 11 as it’s MTC vs Matenro. In the first half of the episode nothing really happens. We see Samatoki and Jakurai have a sit down with each other where they both show faith and trust in their teammates. In the second half, we get the rap battle where MTC notices something about Matenro I didn’t notice before, they don’t diss their opponents. Usually in a rap battle, you diss your opponent to make them look weak and foolish (sort of like those commercials you see during an election time), but Matenro doesn’t do that (once again following the rules of old-school rap). Hifumi and Doppo get taken down by Jyuto and Rio where not even Jakurai’s healing ability is enough to get them back up so he’s on his own (again, why are we making Matenro look so weak here?). Hifumi and Doppo do get back up and the battle continues where Matnero takes down Jyuto and Rio with their combined effort, but Samatoki takes down Hifumi and Doppo. It finally comes down to Jakurai and Samatoki where Jakurai delivers his best bars and manages to beat Samatoki and give his team the win (okay no offence to Matenro but MTC should have won).
In episode 12 the Prime Minister Otome gives her second in command Ichijiku permission to capture all four teams. Thanks to the tournament, all 4 teams are now stars, so the Party of Words plans to capture them and brainwash them to be their puppets (again, you guys are really being evil here for no major reason). The Buster Bros., MTC, and Matenro catch on to their plan and make a run for it together with the help of Tom and his assistants. These three have been keeping an eye on all four teams throughout the anime and have even helped them out a few times. Ramuda and Fling Posse snuck out before the final battle but Gentaro and Dice know something is up and force Ramuda to tell them what’s going on. Back with the others, they get led to Ichijiku where Tom and his associates reveal that they’re working for the Party of Words (I see your reporter spirit is full of shit). We find out that Tom and his associates are a group called Secret Aliens who work as secret agents of the government and take out those who are a threat to freedom. While Tom acknowledges that our 4 groups aren’t threats to the country’s freedom they’re too wild and dangerous to be left on their own. They’re not a threat now but who’s to say they won’t become one down the line and lead their own revolution that destroys the Party of Words and returns the country back to its previous form (um, how about the fact that they have nothing against the government nor have they shown any disdain for the government until you guys decided to be idiots and tried to screw them over for no reason other than to sate your own paranoia and fear of the unknown? Dumbasses)? We get a short rap battle between Secret Aliens and the others where they’re pretty good (and I like the fact that we have a female rapper this time). Before Buster Bros. MTC, and Matenro can retaliate with an attack of their own, Ichijiku disables their mics making this an unfair match and angering Secret Aliens who wanted to test their skills against the best (then why the hell did you decide to be dicks and screw them over?). Luckily, everyone gets saved by Fling Posse who came back and created a diversion for the group to escape. However, Fling Posse gets caught themselves (and something tells me Ichijiku is going to use those heels of hers to crush Ramuda’s manhood for screwing her over).
In the final episode, Fling Posse is used as bait to lure out the other groups. Since Ichiro, Samatoki and Jakurai are the only ones still able to move, they go to face Secret Aliens in a straight-up rap battle with no interference from anyone (and the Dirty Dawgs Reunion Tour has begun). The teams battle on the bridge (oh sure, hold up traffic like assholes just to have your little rap battle. I’m sure everyone will understand) where Fling Posse gets released and Ramuda joins Dirty Dawgs. It’s an evenly fought match until Tom begins to rap and turns the tide in Secret Aliens’s favor with holographic images of the group so now it’s 12 on 4 (sounds like the title of a sex tape). Of course the other members show up and we get an all-star rap battle between our 4 teams and Secret Aliens where Secret Aliens lose but they admit they had a lot of fun. Ichijiku shows up prepared to capture everyone, but she receives a call from the prime minister telling her to back off for now saying that they’re going to form a new plan (one that involves Samatoki’s sister. All female group please). So everyone lives to fight another day and before going their separate ways they decide to have another rap battle with each other to end the anime.
Final Thoughts
In all honesty Hypnosis Mic isn’t the greatest anime. It could have done better in terms of characterization, plot points, exploring the lore more and having their rap battles be more interesting and competitive, especially near the end when all four teams faced off against each other. Seriously, why did they make Matenro look so weak here? Also, the whole government corruption angle just feels forced. Like they needed to have a villain for this series and just weren’t sure how to work them in, so they just threw in government corruption and hoped that people would buy it. Personally, I don’t think a series like this needs a villain. It can be about these individuals taking on challenges and living their normal lives while facing off against each other. However, despite the problems of this anime I still enjoyed it. The concept is good, I did like the characters, the songs, and for an anime being the first to center around this kind of music genre I give it a pass and give them credit for having the guts to take this concept and turn it into an anime. I can only imagine the amount of pushback they got when trying to get this anime approved let alone the project. The animation is very nice and I did like how each character has a different mic transformation and animation that reflects their personality and character. The songs are overall good and worth checking out on Youtube to see other songs from the group if you enjoyed the ones you heard in the anime. Like I said before the rap battles could have been more competitive between the four groups and they could have done a better job explaining the various hidden powers each rapper has.
Final Score
The final score for Hypnosis Mic is 5/10. There’s a lot of mistakes but the anime is decent overall and worth checking out if you’re a fan of rap music or looking to get into Japanese rap. With a second season on the way I think this has the potential to be a good series and I’m sure the team behind it will see their mistakes and learn from them. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time on Project Nitsuj.