Music in Carole and Tuesday

One of my favorite directors is Shinichirō Watanabe. He is a director for a few successful anime series such as Cowboy Bebop, Samurai Champloo, and Space Dandy. With that in mind, I recently decided to watch his most recent anime, Carole & Tuesday.

Carole and Tuesday is an anime revolving around two girls, Carole and Tuesday, hence the name. The story in summary is about how a runaway rich girl, Tuesday Simmons, meets a street orphan, Carole, and decides to become the best musicians on Mars. One of the most particular features of this show is the setting. The world they are set in is far into the future on a  terraformed Mars.

The anime, Carole and Tuesday, is something akin to a musical theater. Music is something that is pretty much in almost every anime as well as normal movies too. TV shows are no exception either since music is a part of the show since it adds a sense of atmosphere to a certain scene. Music is used to draw out and reveal a certain emotion or message to its audience. For example, there is a character called Erutegun who is a loud DJ who produces loud music. His character’s personality and appearance can be said to be the personification of ‘loud’ itself. The two protagonists are sincere girls who are new to the music business so the music they produce is something akin to an early Taylor Swift.

As stated, the two protagonists decide to join together to create their own band. In fact, the entire anime revolves around the music industry which seems to be dominating the rest of the industries from the perspective of the audience. Naturally, there is lots of songs and dance involved since concerts and music competitions are an aspect of the show. But it does have a purpose in the time and place it is set in.

One character whose songs and appearance that I consider to be very notable is a side character, Amer Souleyman, who goes by Ezekiel as his rapper name. He is a rebel rapper who takes a more political stance which causes him to get arrested and deported. He is also the long time friend of Carole who he once lived in the same refugee camp with. His intro soundtrack gives his first appearance a vibe that is something like a thug or a gangster. Both of his songs even show his stance and message.

Around season 2 episode 20, the anime took on a more political stance in its plot line. In the end, he was arrested and deported back to Earth as well as having a ten year expired visa and illegal immigration being the stance. But it was his songs that revealed the background of Earthlings immigrating from Earth as well as the government’s evils that caused his arrest.

In the setting of the anime, Carole and Tuesday, the main plot line occurs on a terraformed Mars in the distant future. While the colonization of Mars has been successful, the planet Earth exists but only after it has been severely ravaged by humans to the point where much of the population wishes to immigrate off the plant occurs. Naturally, there are the political views of immigration between Martians who were born there as well as Martians who were originally Earthlings through immigration. Around that time period, the term ‘Earthling’ is the new synonym for ‘savage’ or ‘terrorist’. From beginning to end of his screen time, his music and soundtrack played a big part in the development of the plot.

Music is likely the biggest feature of the show. It comes from the variety and unique qualities of characters. However, the music in Carole and Tuesday is used for more than just adding a sense of atmosphere or emotion to a certain scene. Beginning from the character’s songs, their theme and aspects are unique to them.