Baccano! Season 1

What BollyAI Thinks

Baccano! aired on WOWOW in summer 2007 and was immediately identified as an outlier: 16 episodes structured across three interweaving timelines - 1711, 1930, and 1931 - with a cast of roughly 30 characters and no central protagonist. Brain's Base adapted Ryohgo Narita's light novel with an almost adversarial confidence, refusing to orient the viewer with linear chronology and trusting that the pieces would assemble into a coherent whole. The Flying Pussyfoot train massacre, which runs through the 1931 timeline, provides the narrative spine; the 1930 Martillo family story provides the comedy; the 1711 prologue provides the mythology. Critical and audience reception has been consistently high, with the MAL score of 8.34 from nearly 400,000 users reflecting a show whose reputation has only grown through word of mouth. Comparisons to Tarantino in structure are common and broadly accurate.

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The Room

Standout Episodes

The hours worth arguing about - premieres, finales, and the turning points. BollyAI reads the room episode by episode.

1. E1The Vice President Doesn't Say Anything About the Scenario He Wrote7.8

   A clever, crowded premiere turns chronology into a weapon, though its briefing-room density sometimes outruns its emotional grip.

   The moment: The two informants' opening argument about protagonists, which is the show's thesis delivered as comedy: there is no center, there are only people.

   Full review of E1 →
2. E13The Train Comes, The Train Goes9.0

   The broadcast finale converges the major timelines and reveals how the Flying Pussyfoot massacre, the Martillo family's elixir, and the 1711 alchemists' bargain are structurally the same story told at different scales. The three DVD-exclusive episodes continue past this point, but the broadcast ending stands as a satisfying resolution.

   The moment: The convergence of Isaac and Miria's cheerful obliviousness with the darkest events on the train - the show's argument that chaos produces grace as readily as violence.