The world is dead, but two girls are still living, making their way through the ruins of a civilization they don’t understand out of an almost childish will to keep going. It’s the slow, introspective, and yet somehow cute Girls’ Last Tour.
It’s not strictly rare, but it is notable when a show comes out and just introduces itself as clearly and absolutely as Girls’ Last Tour does: we start in a dark, industrial space, and then focus on a vehicle moving through it with two girls. The girls are done in a very squishy art style, skewing cute above all. The environment… is anything but. And they talk about their trip through this industrial hellscape, where the sun hasn’t been seen for days, as a matter of mild inconvenience at worst. Like a couple of friends on a road trip. That’s the show. That’s Girls’ Last Tour
We start out very much with vignettes in the “Slice of Life” or “Cute Girls Doing Cute Things” band, as our two girls – quirky idiot Yuu and practical nerd Chi – make their way through the desolation, across snowy ruined battlefields, through blizzards, and into an eerily empty city.
One thing that a sharp-eyed viewer could notice early, which is made explicit pretty quickly, is that this world isn’t… normal. The first episode might trick you: the vehicle the girls have looks very period, as does Yuu’s bolt action rifle. When they scavenge the battleground, the tanks and planes all seem like they could have come out of World War II or the like, giving the impression that this might be an alternate history where 20th Century style warfare went a lot worse. However, as we see more, we come to understand both that the artifice and desolation are more absolute than simply ruins in winter, and that they’re far more advanced.
The first clear sign of this is noticing the “levels” of the city – giant pillar towers hold up huge plates, with more city on top. They don’t cover everything, letting us get some really nice looking sky views even from the lowest level we experience, but it’s clear that one past civilization had serious science fiction construction capabilities, creating this terrestrial megastructure. This is guessed to be an older civilization than the one that built the modern-style high-rises on the first level, or presumably the 20th century tanks and planes.
After discovering a dead fish washed down by snow melt, the girls decide they want to make their way up, hoping that more tasty fish (and possibly more life and civilization) will exist higher up. On ascending one of the towers (with the help of the first other human we’ve seen in the show, albeit not somebody who sticks around) they find that on the upper level, power is still running enough for the street lights to ignite, and they set their course for a spot on the horizon that seems unusually bright.
The trek continues, through somewhat more surreal cityscapes as they pass the lit building (some kind of temple) and make their way onward. There is a strong theme of cute girls doing cute things all the way, but… there’s more to it
Behind the squishy designs, a lot of what they talk about ends up being as bleak as the environment. There are always, or at least usually, spots of light that are more dwelled on, but there is a lot of introspection about life, death, hopelessness, futility, and of course the desolate situation the girls find themselves in.
As they work their way up, they encounter another woman (who is trying to build a plane to go anywhere but here) and, further up, begin to find more “live” evidence of the advanced technology. This even includes a robot they’re able to talk to. After it, they come across a little white blob creature they identify as a “cat” (clearly never having seen a real cat before) which can speak through radio waves and which seems to be related to certain statues seen throughout the city.
Eventually, with the little creature, they make their way to an incongruously beached nuclear submarine up in these upper levels of city. There, the ship’s computer is able to sync with the camera and display photos and videos taken by its past owners, back to before the fall of civilization. Some show the lives of survivors like the man who gave them the camera. Others show daily lives that would be more familiar to us. And still others chronicle the downfall of mankind.
Girls’ Last Tour, you’re better than this. There was no need to copy Nausicaa’s homework. Well, it’s as good an answer as any.
There, they also meet (through a frightening first encounter where it seems as though Yuu has been devoured) large versions of the little creature. The big ones reveal their true form as mushroom-like entities that subsist by consuming substances with great chemical and nuclear energy, scouring away the weapons of the past. They also say that, on all but the highest levels that their kind have not surveyed, Chi and Yuu are the last living humans, and that the time of life on earth will soon be over. The little one goes with them, and they leave the sub behind, having polished off its reactor and warheads.
Thus, with what supplies they can glean and down to just the two again, the girls continue their journey, heading for that uppermost level with surprisingly high spirits.
And… I’m kind of glad that’s where the anime decides to end. I don’t know if this is the final ending in the manga or not (the source material is six volumes, so an awkward number that might or might not be covered in one season) but this is fine to me – their adventure continues, and even if we as the audience can kind of suspect we might know where it will lead, there’s enough ambiguity for a speck of hope.
On the whole, when you hear about a Cute Girls Doing Cute Things anime and see the potatoy visages of our main characters, even with a rather solemn premise you’re expecting the show that results to be… well, like other Cute Girls Doing Cute Things outings. Lively, chipper, bright, harmless – maybe not all of those, but at least some.
Instead, Girls’ Last Tour is melancholy, slow, gray, and existential. It’s heavy as lead and consistently sour, a dead world where wishes aren’t granted… and the interplay of Chi and Yuu, that does the Cute Girls Doing Cute Things loop, is all that really keeps it merely melancholy rather than making it a quick trip to depression town.
And it’s not just because of the usually cute, silly, harmless antics. Chi in particular can be kind of a downer, and often acts as the vehicle for sad ideas to be really explored in this piece, and while Yuu has some goofball energy to her, it’s still very muted. Instead it’s because the girls, as old or young as they may be (it’s never made clear), approach their world with something of childlike wonder. Chi is smarter and more aware of the sadness that surrounds them, but she still has immense curiosity while Yuu is more than willing to stumble forward, oblivious to whatever might get a more mentally adult character down.
Because of this, we get a lot of scenes that use the overall quiet of the show to be more peaceful than oppressive. There’s one great sequence, for instance, where the girls are taking shelter from rain, and note the sound of water drips, and ultimately use their helmets and various bits of debris to turn that into music – something they only knew about and had never properly experienced. This discovery is just one of many. Objectively, it isn’t much, just a little thing that might slightly lift morale, but it feels amazing in the context of the story that makes little things like that seem big and big things like the end of the world seem small by comparison.
Girls’ Last Tour brings to mind two works that I’ve talked about: Haibane Renmei and Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind. The setting and philosophy are more Nausicaa, the tone and pacing are more Haibane. And if you haven’t heard me talk about either of those before, they are both masterpieces, Haibane Renmei standing as one of the best anime you could hope to find if we’re going to try to measure objective “quality” and Nausicaa as one of the most powerful manga entries.
Girls’ Last Tour doesn’t quite manage to get on that level. The excuse plot of the upward drive, which keeps the girls on the move rather than trying to build where they can find resources, is a little thin and the slow pace can drag a bit more than Haibane Renmei. Haibane Renmei had some very heavy intensity to break the calm quiet when it needed to. Girls’ Last Tour… really doesn’t have that. I found it fascinating, but I could see some viewers getting bored here in a way they wouldn’t over in Haibane Renmei. And while I’ve mentioned consistently that the edge is blunted, this is a rather oppressive and lonely piece. There are, in the entire show, only six or seven voiced roles, and of those only Chi and Yuu are really there for more than an episode, so you know the vast majority of this thing isn’t going to have a lot to distract you from the isolation.
However, Girls’ Last Tour does get surprisingly close to the greats. I honestly considered giving it an A+ as well, since you don’t have to beat the best of the best to receive the maximum grade… but in the end, I think I’m more comfortable with an A since I’m not sure how willing I’d be to rewatch this show or go back to its world in the form of the source manga. In any case, it’s worth checking out, and I would strongly recommend giving Girls’ Last Tour a watch when you get the chance.