Uma Musume’s Beginning of a New Era movie is the fiercest, most aggressively expressive sports film in a while. Beneath that bombastic animation horsepower, you’ll find an ingenious director’s uplifting story about possibilities that is worth exploring.
Prisms are a universal symbol for potential, an array of possibilities. The way a ray of white light is refracted and dispersed into an entire rainbow spectrum is, as far as physical phenomena go, a straightforward visualization of the idea that one event can lead to many different outcomes. In a conversation with the core staff of Uma Musume: Pretty Derby – Beginning of a New Era for its bluray booklet, writer Kiyoko Yoshimura mentioned that this concept—most directly exemplified through protagonist Jungle Pocket’s necklace—wasn’t part of her script. And yet, it’s an ever-present one in the film, which gets away with such a dominant motif through thematic relevance, crafty direction, and the sheer pizzazz of its delivery.
It was none other than director Ken “Leaf” Yamamoto, charismatic friend of the site, who came up with that concept. He first alluded to his train of thought in an interview for the July 2024 issue of Animage, and has since then expanded upon it in outlets like that same bluray booklet. Surprising as it may seem, the genesis wasn’t in the film’s original protagonist, but rather in the popular rival they would be incorporating from the game: Agnes Tachyon. With a name alluding to a hypothetical particle faster than light, accompanying a crazy scientist whose true strength is yet to be known, the bridges with the movie’s motifs should appear clear the moment you stop to think about it.
Beyond these general concepts, some details about Tachyon’s design caught the director’s eye; to be precise, it was the horsegirl’s own pupils. The unusual stripes in her eyes are said to be a reference to the double-slit experiment, which demonstrates the duality of particle and wave behaviors of light. Due to its loose relationship with quantum mechanics, Leaf noticed that fans had used that information to theorize about the existence of parallel worlds in the Uma Musume universe. Although he wouldn’t canonize those theories, their adjacency with all the ideas he was brewing—after all, what are parallel worlds but possibilities—encouraged him to pursue that direction.
The incorporation of those themes took many shapes and forms, not following one path but rather branching out into the constellation that connects all the dots in the series. Within the game, Tachyon is often accompanied by the mysterious Manhattan Café, whom they made sure to place in the same room as her for this film. Café is said to always be accompanied by a mysterious “friend”, alluding to the existence of ghosts in this universe. And thus, the team decided to turn that shared room and its windows into the plate of the double-slit experiment; in this case, demonstrating instead a duality between material and supernatural behaviors. As a more scientific counterpart, they also doubled down on this relationship with light and rainbows, turning them into a beautiful visualization of the optimistic worldview the director wanted to imbue the movie with.
Since the beginning, that vision resonated with Cygames personnel like scenario director and story composition chief Tetsuya Kobari. In those same interviews, Kobari dug into an aspect that we’ve discussed previously: Uma Musume’s relationship with real history. Unsettling as it is, its relationship with horseracing events has always put it in a unique position among sports anime; not just because they include those historical facts, but due to the willingness to build around them rather than stick to more easily digestible conventions.
This was particularly true of the second season of the TV show, which oftentimes felt closer to a dramatization of sports history than a fictional sports narrative. That much was noticeable in the deployment of events like completely arbitrary, ruthless injuries. While in stories those tend to be used with clinical precision to make a point, reality cares not about telling a traditionally structured narrative, and an injured body can quickly spiral into seemingly inescapable cycles of pain. To maintain that authenticity while still telling its ultimately uplifting stories, Uma Musume tended to pick and choose specific individuals and events that could eventually lead in the direction they desired. The interpretation and subtle alterations of history became an important aspect of the franchise.
While those what-ifs were part of the experience, though, they were never the focus. And what a better opportunity to shake things up than your first true film? The stars aligned for it: a daring director, a screenwriter who shared that fondness for uncompromising juvenile positivity, franchise representatives willing to take that next step, and an amalgamation of ideas that pointed towards a rainbow of possibilities. In and of itself, this film was also posed to be a beginning of a new era.
Before we cross that door to the future, however, we should do our usual homework and establish how this production came to be. In the theatrical pamphlet for the film, Cygames contents director Akitsu Takuma noted that they had wanted to release an Uma Musume movie ever since the game finally (and very successfully) came out in February 2021. That idea began crystalizing into proposals on that same year, as part of a project that didn’t only include this film but the impressive Road to the Top web series that preceded it.
Speaking to Animedia for their July 2024 issue, Leaf noted that he first heard about this project during the production of his Cygames 10th anniversary short film Follow Your Fantasy; thanks to the fact that he’s a real Uma Musume fanatic, we can place this event exactly in mid to late August, since he recalled it coinciding with the implementation of a new character in the game. It’s worth noting—especially if you want to understand how it came to have a very troublesome schedule—that they didn’t immediately proceed to make the film. Leaf only accepted after getting over his feelings that he should decline it. In that movie pamphlet, he refers to it as a tangible job after having worked on RTTT, which explains why he was still very active in other works across 2022 and only reduced his output came 2023. For as much as the participants loved working on it, there certainly was friction between its ambition and the deadlines.
That unassuming 2021 promotional video is worth looking back on, as it shares a surprisingly high number of staff members with the film; not by accident, as Leaf was pleased with their work and happy to reunite with them for a film production. This includes Deho Gallery art director Yusuke Watanabe, compositing director Akane Fushihara (whose distinctly hazy, cold look was balanced by Yuki Kawashita in the film), 3D director Yoshinori Nakano, and of course his partner at the studio: animation producer Kan Mizoguchi. When talking about the impressive way that studio Cygames Pictures has been able to hit the ground running, not just in regards to Uma Musume but other titles like Priconne, we’ve highlighted a strategy to absorb experienced producers and nets of relationships from other studios. This reliable backbone then allowed their own personnel to grow as well. Mizoguchi quickly stood out among them for his keen eye and empathetic, encouraging approach to animators—a reason why he’s been celebrated by his peers and even ourselves for years.
Another continuing relationship that is worth emphasizing is the one Leaf maintains with character designer and chief animation director Jun Yamazaki; who, coincidentally, drew horsegirls for the first time in that promotional video. Leaf perceives himself—correctly so—as an artist who focuses so wholeheartedly on conveying emotions that he can help but shrug off the superficial norms of character art; a spirit that shatters the restrictive, lifeless tendencies of modern anime, as we’ve been writing about for many years. Liberating as that is, disruptions are by nature not welcome, and radical approaches sometimes need a bit of counterbalance to stabilize themselves.
And thus, enter Yamazaki, whose preoccupations are kind of the opposite. As an artist who gained notoriety among the lively animators of Dogakobo’s golden age, and has then followed them into high-profile Shouta Umehara projects more recently, he feels self-conscious over drawings that he perceives to be too stiff. What his peers see as reliable solidity, he fears may be mediocre in comparison to the more outlandish output of his companions—a self-deprecating spirit that you can catch a glimpse of in a Kisekoi interview we translated. Regardless of how he feels, Leaf has enthusiastically praised his work, finding it indispensable to ground his madness without compromising the emotional storytelling.
In that regard, it’s worth noting that this collaboration didn’t lead to them taking the less flavorful centrist road. Beginning of a new Era is, despite being attached to a bishoujo property, one of the most aggressive forms of character expression in commercial animation. The girls’ faces distort into maddening grins, quick to turn cute roundness into steel sharpness and brutal brush, jaws completely off their hinges as they aim for victory. While Yamazaki’s presence tethers the movie to more conventional styles during the quieter downtime, every contributing artist is dyed in Leaf’s ferocious color; unsurprisingly so, considering the combination of his sheer charisma and the fact that he personally corrected so many layouts. That much is true of Yamazaki himself, who worked alongside him in RTTT as well. As its character designer, he pondered how far he could take that expressivity, so Leaf stuck with him as an uncredited episode director in the first episode—an extra job added to his opening storyboard—to regulate its sharp edge. And for this film, the two of them took it to the next level.
In addition to those returning faces, Leaf and Mizoguchi made a point to reach out to interesting new members. The film’s usage of color is one of its greatest strengths, and much of that is owed to designer Yoh Iwaida. Beginning of a New Era draws a clear line between the palette of its rabid races and everything in between; both of them filtered through the psyche of its lead character, yet with clearly separate modes. Iwaida was chosen precisely for her aptitude to illustrate those daily life moments, as the director had a been a big fan of her color design in the stunning Kase-san and Morning Glories anime.
The director’s personal taste kept on coming through while rounding up the team. Another key aspect of the production was its sound, and Leaf has been very explicit about entrusting it to the veteran Yota Tsuruoka because he’s a big fan of his work alongside Kyoto Animation. It was also Tsuruoka who introduced him to composer Masaru Yokoyama, with whom he’d been working at the time through the sequels to Tsurune—tying things back to the studio again.
That fondness for KyoAni’s works wound up being more relevant than many would assume. Otherwise, a lot of the influences that went into Beginning of a New Era are easily identifiable. It’s clear that its protagonist Pokke draws from a history of yankee manga, and that there’s a lot of classic sports series DNA in it; Ashita no Joe in particular cast a big shadow over the movie, influencing character dynamics, line and accent delivery, and even specific details like Trainer Tanabe turning from a woman to a fairly direct reference to Danpei Tange—down to having a similar training hut. Since each race was granted a specific stylistic register, Leaf was able to tap into old favorites of his, like Bakusou Kyoudai Let’s & Go for the Japan Derby. While many attributed the general intensity to the works of Gainax and Trigger, however, the director said he wasn’t conscious of them at all. Instead, he pointed to KyoAni’s works and Liz and the Blue Bird as what he’d envisioned while conceiving the film to the surprise of the attendees to its Animestyle event.
While Leaf wasn’t conscious of the Gainax/Trigger lineage, Toshiyuki Sato pointing out the similarities to Imaishi’s work of certain finished sequences did make him realize that there was something to it too.
Though Leaf tends to be a bit tongue in cheek, there is always a lot of truth in his words. When he shouts out The Iceblade Sorcerer Shall Rule the World and its director Masahiro Takata (as he had already done in our awards), people tend to treat it merely as jest. Mind you, Leaf does enjoy that, but having recently seen Takata’s Grieving Soul adaptation I can attest that he’s a very crafty, efficient director. Despite being an exceedingly bombastic artist himself, and being personally close to many young creators whose high-profile contributions to action hits become viral, Leaf is quite critical of modern anime that foregoes directorial vision under the assumption that flashy animation will fill the gaps. From that position, it’s no surprise that he’d take notice of directors who work in unglamorous productions with little to no resources, but have the ingenuity to make it work. And just as he can be sakuga heavyweight while appreciating smart economy of animation, he can make the most intense sports anime while chasing the interiority and delicacy of Liz. Successfully so, too!
To coalesce those sometimes disparate aspects into a cohesive film, many materials were prepared during the pre-production process. In the bluray booklet, Mizoguchi revealed that he was behind one of the more unusual ones. Since he had recently worked with a director who drew manga strips to get across their vision, he pitched that idea to Leaf as well; and given his willingness to provide specific references for everything he’d envisioned, it’s unsurprising that he took him up on the idea.
Screenwriter Yoshimura was moved by the energy in those strips, which channeled the same emotions that had resonated with her while binging the TV shows in preparation. She’s quite fond of loud feelings, and found the director’s drawings to match the high emotional volume of her own interpretation of Uma Musume. Though we opened this piece by saying that the most important motif in the movie wasn’t in her scripts at all, don’t take this to mean that her input wasn’t important—Leaf himself added that her writing helped him further solidify all those ideas.
It’s worth noting that Leaf has a strong affinity for using text to give form and concretion to his vision, in a field where the greatest storytellers tend to come from an almost exclusively visual angle. Perhaps because of that, he’s very thankful for Yoshimura for having provided lines like “everything about horsegirls is revealed in their running”, which unlocked his path forward when he was feeling somewhat stuck. A big reason why he was so careful with the nuances of the writing in an otherwise explosive movie was to avoid misrepresenting the nature of the horsegirls as he perceives it. For the director, the fierce competition between the most psychotic-looking anime women you’ve ever seen can’t shake a fundamental truth: that the girls clash fairly without wanting to trample on the dreams of their peers, even if accomplishing theirs may necessarily extinguish someone else’s chances. This idealistic, noble stance is one he wouldn’t compromise on, hard as it is to balance.
With a better understanding of the project and the creators behind it, we can finally delve into the film itself. Beginning of a new Era’s introductory speech alludes to the setting of the story—never drawing too much attention to how ridiculous it is, which is one of the charming points of the series. It points out that despite their destiny to run, no one knows what the future of the horsegirls holds; making it clear since the very first scene that possibilities are at the core of this tale. What stands out even more than this message is the way it is conveyed, most notoriously through the unmistakable animation of Kou Yoshinari. The elder of perhaps the greatest sakuga siblings had already worked alongside Mizoguchi, and the producer has never been shy about sharing how much of a fan he is.
It’s not uncommon for artists that revered to receive special treatment, hence why Aninari was allowed to open up the film by ignoring its original storyboard as he pleased. Mind you, going rogue doesn’t mean that he forgot to consider how his work would fit in the whole; if anything, he’s characterized for being an obsessive storyteller. It was his choice, for example, to show the age progression of the characters as the narrator brings up the theme of the future. By ending on the girls morphing into a rainbow, the main visual motif is gestured at even before the film has had time to establish it. Even the articulated silhouettes at the beginning are a fitting choice—that sequence is a nod to The Horse in Motion, one of the most famous applications of chronophotography by motion pictures pioneer Eadweard Muybridge.
Following that preface, we get to meet our lively protagonist Pokke. This glimpse of a recent past shows her first meeting with competitive, regulated racing—which she had been rather skeptical of—by the hand of the director himself, who likely contributed to the animation given how idiosyncratic her hands and clothing folds are. The intense reality she witnesses blows away all her prejudices, altering her entire life the second that she crosses paths with Fuji Kiseki. The crescendo in the music and emphatic sound effects (even the deployment of typography makes a satisfying noise!) already serve as a solid example of how important this movie’s sound is, but don’t let its loud triumphs distract you from how smart its visuals are as well.
It’s not by coincidence that rather than shine in a solid color as it usually would, the lens flare when she comes face to face with this new reality goes through the entire rainbow, as does her pendant by the end of the same cut. The intense white light that was Pokke’s life hits its first major prism, dispersing into differently-colored rays. The ones we’ll follow—the ones her eyes are focused on when she’s stunned after the race—will take her to perhaps become one of the greatest competitors in this field, which as her friends’ casual comments underline, isn’t the only option even for horsegirls who follow their destiny to run. Had they not attended this race, maybe we’d be follow another trajectory for Pokke, with its own set of possibilities. But that’s not the beginning of a new era that we’ll experience.
The prologue is completed with an amusing opening sequence that abbreviates Pokke’s arrival to the school, her meeting with the person that inspired her to take this path, and the training that allows her to successfully debut as a professional. As we approach her first real challenge, we’re met with the always recognizable style of Kerorira and a very Bocchi-like sequence. Although Leaf himself provided a ridiculous amount of corrections across the film, as long as they conveyed the emotion he’d envisioned, neither him nor Yamazaki were particularly worried about hiding the artstyle of every contributor.
Rather than that, what you can feel here is the director’s intended emphasis on spacious, wide layouts, which immediately allows him to start playing with symmetry (and lack of thereof) with the introduction of Tachyon as Pokke’s rival. A lot is said through the construction of the shots alone; the two stand in similar positions yet Pokke is left behind and trapped by the surroundings, Tachyon’s shamelessness allows her to trespass the physical boundary of each lane, and her invasive presence gets uncomfortably close even to the camera itself. Mizoguchi explained that he chose Leaf for this project because he believed in his ability to craft images that felt theatrical in nature, and the director immediately proves him right. And as if to make a point that such a thing doesn’t come at the cost of funny animation, we get the first taste of Toshiyuki Sato’s cartoony deformations as well.
This first race is but a tease of what’s to come. The effortlessness the production conveys mirrors how casual Tachyon is in securing this victory; simply strolling ahead of Pokke with unbothered drawings, in contrast to the protagonist’s bombastic step that ultimately amounts to nothing. Through Isuta Meister’s animation, we stare at an unbothered Tachyon basking in the sun, while Pokke begrudgingly swallows the pill of defeat in the shadow. Although they made this choice to hold back on the amazing frenzy that characterizes every other race, some other production choices already rear their head at this point.
Early on, the team decided to introduce first-person shots to the races, which hadn’t been a factor in previous Uma Musume entries. While those are troublesome to animate, a theatrical project was the place to try it out; not only due to the increased production muscle, but also because they felt like the cinemascope aspect ratio they had chosen would be a natural fit for that type of immersive, wild field of view. Even on a broader level, one recurring idea was that they were adapting Pokke’s world rather than representing an objective, detached view of the reality. In the same way that they didn’t hesitate to dye the scenes with very artificial colors if those fit her emotional state, physically placing the viewer in her shoes was an effective approach.
As a surprisingly cute Pokke processes that defeat, both the audience and her are exposed to the tremendous intensity of Uma Musume. In a televised race that also involves its protagonist Narita Top Road, RTTT’s main rival TM Opera erupts into the scene again. This link between the movie and the previous web series precedes Leaf’s own arrival to the project; while Pokke didn’t exist yet by the time he formally joined, they’d already established that the most powerful horsegirls seen in RTTT would be placed in a position of non-malicious final bosses. Although the intent was to connect the two in a way that would be exciting to returning viewers and might pique the curiosity of newcomers, that relationship extended to the production and the staff dynamics.
Back in RTTT, the nuclear, climactic sprint to the goal had been animated by Takeshi Maenami. Alongside his contribution to the opening, that combination of loose form but very accentuated, rough pencil traces had come to embody the intensity of the races at their greatest. By placing him in the first real showcase for Beginning of a New Era, involving the same characters he’d already drawn, Maenami was immediately established as the bar to clear. Across all these interviews we’ve referred to, the staff have openly talked about how that sparked a friendly challenge among the team, with every animator trying to live up to Maenami’s bombastic work if not outright surpass it. Quite the fitting attitude for a film about mental horsegirls trying to outrun everyone.
As Pokke could tell by getting slightly too close to her screen, Maenami saw the director’s willingness to turn everything up a notch and added layers of his characteristic effects animation to the already aggressive style he exhibited in RTTT. While the need to vaguely adhere to running forms limits the extents to which you can manipulate the posing, he still finds way to add that extra dynamism—even when it comes to the celebration of her victory. In line with the rest of the movie, the expressions manage to grow even more distorted and fierce, which sets the stage for other animators to follow. Incidentally, if you enjoyed that sequence, we’re publishing this around a day before the release of the Yaiba remake where he’ll be acting as the assistant character designer and main animator. A very fitting platform for one of the most notable modern embodiments of the Kanada school of animation, given that its older source material appeals to his sensibilities and he’ll be working under the like-minded Yoshimichi Kameda.
Rather than growing depressed at yet another seemingly insurmountable wall appearing before her, Pokke becomes excited at the prospect of kicking it down to pieces. Her amusing honorable yankee attitude brings her to directly challenge Tachyon, in yet another stunning piece of animation—though one with a very different flavor. Ayaka Minoshima is a tremendous character artist, and the sheer range of expression in this scene should tell you why. Much of the credit goes, of course, to her interpretation of Leaf’s excellent storyboards and his own corrections here and there. The sequence is brilliantly laid out so that Tachyon doesn’t have to face straight, using elements of the environment like the old CRT to reflect characters who aren’t in full view and give amusing visual continuity to the funny poses in the process.
Up to that point, Tachyon had no reason to pay real attention to a newbie like Pokke, hence the sparing of mere side glances. That is, obviously, unacceptable to a hotblooded protagonist who wants a clear victory over her rival. In an impulsive move that temporarily hides her own face, Pokke launches a direct challenge that Tachyon can’t help but receive. The mad scientist, who had already caught a glimpse of the rainbow of possibilities in her eyes, accepts it by showing her most neurotypical face. There’s a funny asymmetry to the rivalry that is established there—Pokke wants to run as equals yet is treated sort of like a guinea pig—that hides the beginning of Tachyon’s biggest mistake: detaching herself from her dream. In her obsessive research to break the limits of a horsegirl, she has been using others as tools to grow closer to that goal, without thinking that what she truly seeks is the satisfaction of doing so with her own legs.
Since it’s too early for her to be forced to reckon with that, though, the movie continues to underline how overwhelmingly fast she is, granting her another unique stylization that taps into the idea of the prism but also incorporates visual concepts that represent her character’s relationship with science, the future, and parallel worlds. And yet, this immense power also showcases her fragility, her fear, and the solidification of that mistaken belief that she’ll be fine even if her dream is accomplished through someone else. Her even more overwhelming victory at the Satsuki Sho takes those stylistic traits to the next level, adding even more thematic motifs in the process. Leaf thought to accompany her running with audiovisual cues related to man-made, artificial vehicles—like planes in this instance—as a harsh reminder of what she becomes after this race: someone who has given up on running on her own. In a press conference after the race, Agnes Tachyon announces her indefinite hiatus.
Tachyon quitting dyes the whole world red. Leaf is a thoughtful, detail-oriented director, but Mizoguchi praises him as someone capable of being both smart and gleefully dumb. Apart from being a funny jab at his friend, the animation producer explained that unlike genius directors who overthink and get lost in the sauce, Leaf ultimately has the ability to be very blunt and deliver straight pitches. As a result, his work is very readable and not afraid to keep up this overwhelming tint even as Tachyon is confronted about her sudden hiatus.
After being handed a brutal defeat and then denied the possibility to close the gap, even being mocked by a Tachyon who definitely isn’t compensating for the pain she’s causing to herself, Pokke marches forward recklessly. Leaf’s direction shines through its atmospheric qualities at this stage; this sequence animated by ump is particularly claustrophobic, not only due to its staging but also because of the choice to animate two cuts as involving full-cel shots. It’s only when her trainer opens up to share his experiences alongside Fuji Kiseki that she opens up again—conveyed by the storyboard through her gradually removing the hand on her face, representing how she was blocking the outside world.
Somewhat recovered, Pokke joins the Japan Derby. Toshiyuki Sato’s animation ignites the protagonist—and an astonishing relay of artists that includes Odashi, Takahito Sakazume, Shun Enokido, Shuhei Fuchimoto, TOMATO, and Hikaru Miyazaki—as she channels all those bottled up feelings into a race where she finally can start seeing beyond the prism of possibilities. Her glorious victory leads to a cathartic roar animated by Hirofumi Okita; an integration of a famous incident involving her real life horse equivalent, which the staff had wanted to include since the start of the project.
In a way, though, Pokke isn’t the actual protagonist of this race. For all this movie, she’s had an unassuming girl by her side. Dantsu Flame is a nice girl who’s nowhere as much of a punk as her old gang, nor as much of a gal as another group we’ve seen interact with them. She is always looking for Pokke, but never really standing out on her own. Leaf confirmed that he wanted to strengthen this feeling by avoiding placing her at the center of the screen as much as possible; something that’s noticeable even in the montage shot that introduces her… and yet still places her in a group, sorta to the side.
However, the incident with Tachyon truly hurt her. Part of it is, of course, being aware of how hard that might hit Pokke—but that’s clearly not all of it. Dantsu also wants to compete with the very best and beat them, so the strongest competitor quitting in a seemingly selfish way (as Tachyon’s injury concerns are something she hasn’t bothered disclosing) also set her off. Her training grows noticeably more intense, and for the first time, she physically competes with Pokke for the position of honor in the screen. Although she loses in the end, she proves that she can compete on the same level. Her noble tears of frustration at the end contrast with Tachyon’s reaction; one of them lost, but proved that she belongs here and that she can keep competing, while the other’s superficial happiness over someone else inching closer to her dream begins to crumble. Would she really rejoice about Pokke achieving it?
The brief respite that follows marks the switch to the only other storyboarder in the film: Toshimasa Ishii, another favorite of this site and of Leaf himself. Despite knowing that he was busy and would likely be forced to deliver those boards late, the director has long since believed that Ishii is one of the most brilliant directors in the industry—and I would be inclined to agree, as would many of the people who followed him across the 86 anime.
Ishii has an uncanny ability to thread together immersive, seamless film, and then subvert that in favor of snappy turns you can physically feel. His training camp feels breezy until the feeling of emptiness and self-doubt that has crept up to Pokke manifests in Ishii’s viscerally (in)satisfactory fashion; Ayaka Tsuji’s organic animation certainly helps a great deal in that regard. And talk about literalizing the concept of bottled-up feelings too! Tachyon could learn something about that metaphor, since her repressed desire to run is instead conveyed by her annoying twitching legs. While Ishii’s storyboards only last up to that preceding loss against Café, it’s easy to see why Leaf holds him in such high esteem.
At this point, Pokke is at her lowest. Tormented not just by losses but by her own wins too; after all, did she even win at the Derby, considering her most formidable rival wasn’t even there? Doesn’t that, if anything, prove her lack of strength? The person who rescues her from that abyss is the same one who’d thrust her into this path. Fuji Kiseki was a tremendous athlete, but her career was cut tragically short by injuries. The film has tackled the idea of possibilities from an inspirational angle, but she offers the experience of someone who was haunted by a worse what-if than Pokke’s self-doubt—the chance that she’d never suffered such injuries. For as bitter as that is, it’s also the reason why she’s the perfect person to nudge Pokke in the right direction.
The next morning, Fuji Kiseki surprisingly challenges Pokke to a race. As it turns out, that competitive fire is reciprocal; just like how seeing her senior for the first time made the protagonist want to race professionally, Pokke’s running has made Fuji Kiseki want to run again. She knows better than anyone that she can’t take over the world of horsegirls like she might have been able to before her injuries, but she’ll still try to dash forward. And dash she does, because she beats Pokke and manages to shine by proving that this is not the place to give up; if even she can do it, there’s no doubt that Pokke can run.
As everyone reaches out for their catharsis, Pokke visits Tachyon one last time with the intent to invite her to the Japan Cup. They look hopelessly, irredeemably separated, but Pokke doesn’t hesitate to reach out. She’s aware that the Tachyon she’s chasing may be an unattainable phantom, that the competitors this time will be stronger than ever, but still wants to run. She faces straight to the lights refracted by the prism of possibilities. But Tachyon, still lying to herself about her desires, has her back to them. She closes the curtain after brushing Pokke off, still unwilling to accept it.
For this movie’s camera, which has always empathized with Pokke, the final race is positively breathtaking. Even in the face of the strongest horsegirls of the moment, afraid that she could very well lose and still haunted by self-doubt, she explodes into the rainbow blaze that seizes the greatest win. Like many other highlights in the film, this scene was key animated by Shuu Sugita—a returning face to the team, who was happy to pick up the glove that Maenami had throw in the preceding series and at the start of this film. They’re all just as competitive as the horsegirls, I swear.
This climax is satisfying for nearly everyone, with one deliberate, obvious exception. Right before her final dash, Pokke had dedicated one glance at the audience, as well as the words “I’ll be going ahead”. The recipient was Tachyon. Up until this point, the mad scientist hadn’t really blinked for the entire film. While they admitted that most viewers likely wouldn’t notice that, the staff still issued a Tachyon blinking ban, hoping that this would have a subconscious effect on the audience.
The reason behind this is rather straightforward: blinking in animation is an easy tool for humanization, granting characters a relatable trait that can also boost expressivity. By denying it, she comes off as an unsettling, inhuman figure—exactly what she was pretending to be, fooling herself in the process. She is an objective scientist, a godlike figure above human passion. Achieving a goal is all that matters. That has been the mantra she repeated until Pokke’s actions manage to shatter it. And so, Agnes Tachyon blinks. And she runs, immediately, without needing to witness the rest of the race. And she screams, with the passion she pretended she didn’t have. Anges Tachyon is human. Or, well, she’s horsegirl. But you get me.
In Uma Musume tradition, the epilogue is delivered in the form of a live performance—directed and storyboarded by Naoya Nakayama, quite the specialist in viral dancing. This trait of the franchise feels particularly amusing after such a hotblooded movie, but maybe being an idol is simply another one of the possibilities refracted by the prism; and really, who is going to be discontent about the banger that is Umapyoi Densetsu playing over the credits. In that initial Animedia interview, Mizoguchi explained that he interpreted the movie as a beautiful, encouraging message for creators to keep following their paths. While Leaf replied that he didn’t have such a specific reading in mind, that uplifting spirit was very much what he wanted to convey with this film. The future holds countless outcomes, and Beginning of a New Era invites you to chase the most dazzling ones.
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