Midnight Occult Civil Servants (Mayonaka no Occult Koumuin)

Have you ever come across one of those shows that's just pleasant to watch? It's not always clear why that is the case, and it's easier to point out the flaws then the good, but still, the show manages to be enjoyable from beginning to end. For me, that is this show.

We follow around an agency who watches the activities of Anothers, the name given to all the spiritual creatures only certain people are able to see. There is a new employee named Arata, who seems to possess an ability called 'The ears of Sand'. Essentially the agencies of the world cannot communicate with Anothers, despite being able to see them. Arata seems to have the same aura of a man named Seimei who could also speak to these creatures, and many of the Anothers seem to recognize him as this person.

The most interesting thing about this show is that while there are a lot of high stakes situations, it's clear humans can't fight against these spirits on any kind of even footing and their job is just to minimize the damage and catalog what happens. No matter the situation, the characters are forced to be more creative to solve what's going on without fighting. At times things can be fairly interesting, especially seeing how similar the Anothers are to humans, something people don't really realize as they can't communicate, but they still feel like something distinctly not human.

Where things get a bit odd though is that even not taking into account that Arata is the only one who understands their words, it's kind of obvious these creatures exhibit of human behavior. And somehow no one has ever realized this. It does a lot to call into question how these groups have managed to operate for so long without falling apart, as Arata's Ears of Sand seems like the only thing they have at their disposal that consistently accomplishes anything.

I will expand on this and say, to be entirely honest, even he doesn't sort out most cases. In the end, they kind of all just... resolve themselves, at least the most important one. To spoil a little bit, part of the show is dropping hints one person joined the team in hopes of finding his sister who disappeared. When that case finally comes up, their actions had no impact on the outcome, the same thing would have happened if they weren't there at all. At the end of it all, his sister comes back, meaning his actions to rescue his sister had nothing to do with getting her back, it was always going to happen that way.

I understand part of the reason for this is to showcase the differences between Anothers and people, but rather than show that it just starts to show they are incompetent since, as I mentioned, much of their behavior is pretty human despite being different creatures entirely just makes these people seem utterly useless. Throw in how often situations resolve themselves without their interference, or how often cases that were actually resolved only did so because of 'The Ears of Sand' it's kind of fascinating how more people aren't aware that Anothers exist.

What does carry the show is the characters are all pretty likable, though not very deep. Each episode you do learn a bit more about the characters, and you get a feel for how they all think and their motivations. They have a lot of great an interesting interactions, for example, Theo looks really effeminate, so one of his coworkers uses Theo's photo to tell other girls who hit's on him that he already has a lovely girlfriend. Theo is not thrilled by this.

It's also funny to see Arata regularly interact with a god of disaster and chaos he calls Kohaku, who strangely spends most of his time annoying people. He has ended civilizations and caused mild irritation to a guy who just wants to wake up and go to work. That is kind of a good representation of what to expect from any of the Anothers honestly, just a bunch of really silly folk.

There isn't' really an overarching story to the series, just a bunch of short tales about dealing with individual instances of Another's, which occasionally connect in some way. There isn't really much depth, and many people come out looking a bit stupid, but at the same time, it's a pleasant enough watch. If there aren't any other shows catching your interest right now, or you just want something slightly different from the other offerings coming out, it's a decent watch.