Ergo Proxy

Ergo Proxy

For all those of you who watch anime, I recently came across this fantastic series which I highly recommened. Ergo Proxy is a dark, futuristic, science fiction based anime. The visuals are stunningly rendered using digital cell animation and 3D computer modelling.

The story is based in a futuristic city known as Romdeau. The city itself is a typical Asimovian domed city, with it's human inhabitants existing along with their robot servants (called as autoraves). The plot centers around the sudden appearence of mysterious creatures, called Proxies, and the spread of the Cogito virus. The virus (probably named after the phrase by Descartes) infects the autoraves and enables them to "think", with the consequence being that the robot obtain "free will". (You can pretty much guess what this leads to!)

The plot is sophisticated and takes many twists, and although slightly confusing at times, has many subtle (sometimes obscure) philosophical and historical themes. There are references to various individuals from diverse fields such as Alan Turing, the French poet Joë Bousquet, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the post-strucuralist philosopher Julia Kristeva, and even John Millais and his painting Ophelia, on which an entire episode is based. The influence of Greek and Aztec mythology in some of the episodes is also evident.

If you have time to kill and want to watch something interesting, I think you should give Ergo Proxy a try. It's very enjoyable and refreshing to watch.


External links:
Review of Ergo Proxy - Some spoilers