A mix of sci-fi and Danganropa-style detective work is the recipe for GNOSIA, set in space. It’s an interesting premise, and I am a sucker for a good “Who done it?” story, so I decided to give this one a try. The thing about mysteries is that the deeper and more well-hidden they are, the more entertainment you get out of them. Does GNOSIA have the depth needed to create something special and unforgettable?
Let’s go!
First Episode Synopsis
A boy named Yuri wakes up after being sealed inside an instant knowledge chamber. Apparently, Yuri has amnesia. He quickly learns that there is a space parasite that goes around infecting people. Those who are infected become known as Gnosia. This infection is so severe that the protocol to cure the infection is to self-destruct the spaceship that’s carrying the infected passenger; however, a compromise was made to determine who is the Gnosia and put them into a cryogenic state known as a Cold Sleep. To do this, our cast will gather evidence and vote on who they think is the Gnosia. Once put into a Cold Sleep, the ship’s lights will either turn green to signify the Gnosia presence is contained, or they will remain red.
We are then introduced to our cast of characters: Setsu, SQ, Gina, and Racio. Setsu seems to be hiding something from Yuri, primarily when Yuri asks if they met before in the past. Racio is super suspicious of Yuri since he was just picked up and rehabilitated on the ship after becoming wounded in a conflict, SQ is just your typical brash and tomboyish girl, and Gina is the quiet, yet soft-spoken one of the bunch.
Here, we see them take their first vote, suspecting Racio, so she’s put to sleep. Then, they decide to do a warp jump because a Gnosia won’t fall unconscious during a warp, while normal humans will. After the jump, Gina is missing, meaning she was attacked by the Gnosia. They vote again and suspect Setsu, so they put her to sleep, but before she is, she talks to Yuri alone, giving him some sort of cube, stating that knowledge will set them free. After Setsu is put to sleep, SQ is the only one left, and she reveals herself to be the Gnosia as the episode comes to an end.
Worth Watching?
MAYBE – This show is confusing… and by confusing, I don’t mean that it’s hard to follow, nor do I mean that you can’t comprehend the events happening. What’s confusing is how shoddy writing like this gets green-lit and published and/or adapted.
So, the first vote we get is just based on a bunch of lip service. It’s nothing more than a he said / she said ordeal except… no one truly says anything. It’s all a gut feeling they are basing their votes on. Very little to no investigation was carried out, which kind of defeats the purpose of this being a mystery series. Typically, SOME sort of detective work would be done, but we don’t get any of that here. It’s all just feelings, and that is not a good way to carry out justice.
Second, if the Gnosia can walk around during a warp, why not just do that straight out of the gate? Once the warp happens, we’re just told that Gina was attacked, but we never see her being attacked; we don’t know what happens to her. Is she presumed dead? Was she just hidden somewhere? Was she infected, and now she’s a Gnosia, too? There were zero answers or explanations concerning that. We just get “She was attacked,” and that’s it.
Next, If the ship is this advanced AI that can detect a Gnosia on board, can pull up planets on a big screen, hold voting, and provide information, you’re telling me it can do all that, but not a biometric scan to determine who is infected? For an advanced AI, it seems pretty useless in these situations.
Lastly, they mention that the ship has other passengers and a crew, but we don’t meet any of them. Why is it just the main cast of characters who could be the Gnosia? Why couldn’t it have been one of the crew members? To just narrow it down to the five of them without any explanation or reasoning is kind of weird.
I’m giving this the MAYBE tag because, despite the pile of plot holes in the first episode, the synopsis mentions there is a time-traveling aspect to this show, so this episode COULD be at a moment where all of the above concerns were already addressed. We could very well be opening with an aftermath situation, and future episodes could fill in the blanks. That’s what I’m hoping for here. So far, the show does have potential, but the time travel aspect wasn’t revealed out of the gate. I only know that from reading the synopsis. Had I not known that, this would have gotten a NO from me.
I guess you could say that the synopsis provided enough copium to pass the mustard… for now. Now, the show needs to prove to me that it can be way better written than this, because the logic (or lack thereof) in this first episode was laughable at best.
