A boy who cannot pilot and a girl with a reputation for killing her partners. That is the engine of Darling in the Franxx, and it does not stall.
Trailer, via Crunchyroll Dubs.
Plantation 13 and the Birdcage
The series is set in a dystopian 22nd century where humanity has left the ruined surface for mobile fortress-cities called Plantations. Adults are immortal, and procreation has become obsolete. Children are artificially created, called parasites, and raised in isolation in quarters nicknamed birdcages. Their only mission is the fight.
The enemies are klaxosaurs, giant organisms split into at least four size categories: Conrad, Mohorovičić, Gutenberg, and (Super) Lehmann. The children pilot robots called Franxx in boy-girl pairs, a male stamen and a female pistil. Parasites have short lifespans.
Hiro and Zero Two
Hiro, Code 016, was once a prodigy. He can no longer synchronize with his partner. While skipping his squad’s graduation ceremony, he meets Zero Two, Code 002, an elite pilot with klaxosaur blood and red horns. She is known as the Partner Killer.
I’ve found you, my Darling.
A klaxosaur attacks the ceremony. Zero Two’s partner is killed in action. Left without a partner, she lets Hiro ride with her. He becomes her darling, and later her partner.
A-1 Pictures and Trigger
The 24-episode series premiered on Tokyo MX on January 13, 2018 and ended July 6. It was co-produced by A-1 Pictures and Trigger, animated by Trigger and CloverWorks, and announced at Trigger’s Anime Expo 2017 panel. A manga by Kentaro Yabuki and a four-panel strip began in January 2018.
Yuto Uemura voices Hiro and Haruka Tomatsu voices Zero Two. The cast includes Kana Ichinose, Yuuichirou Umehara, Nanami Yamashita, Saori Hayami, Marina Inoue, Shizuka Ishigami, Mutsumi Tamura and Aoi Ichikawa.
What the Series Gets Right
The world-building is the strongest thing here. APE, the magma energy, the cult around Papa, the immortals who gave up reproduction to live forever: that is a machine built to say something about what people trade for comfort.
The pairing mechanic is the smartest part. A boy-girl pilot system drawn from flower anatomy could have been decoration. Instead it carries the question the series keeps asking about what these children are for and who decided.
What holds it back is the middle stretch, where the squad’s ten pilots crowd the story and Hiro and Zero Two drift to the edges of their own show. The ending reaches for scale it has not earned.
Still, when it works, Darling in the Franxx is a romance wearing a mecha suit, and the fit is better than it has any right to be.
Key facts
- Score: 8.5/10
- TMDB audience score: 8.5/10, 1937 votes
- Episodes: 24, one season
- First aired: January 13, 2018
- Last aired: July 6, 2018
- Network: Tokyo MX
8.5 of 10.
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