Alexis Kerib, The Cruelest Villain Of 2018

The words that keep coming back to me when I think of Alexis Kerib, the shadow perpetually looming behind SSSS Gridman’s troubled Akane Shinjou, are “quietly grotesque.” He doesn’t look like much when we first meet him, mind. Oh he looks big and strong and like a perfectly worthwhile Tokusatsu fightman villain. His big Darth Vader-esque mask, flaming mane, and immense black cloak are worthy of any good comic book villain, and his regal, somewhat poncy accent and dignified, unshakeably polite manner as he chats animatedly with the young and impressionable Akane from her computer monitor help establish him as an immediately charismatic figure. And certainly it’s immediately clear that he’s a dangerous influence in a practical sense, as he transforms the toy Kaiju Akane sculpts in her trash-filled room into true, massive monsters with a ceremonial shout of “Instance…Abreaction!!” But it takes until slightly past the show’s midway mark, when the show starts letting the audience into Akane’s head to discover what a deeply lonely place it is, and when Alexis slowly begins to become more active and more insidious in his ‘partnership’ with Akane that the show’s metaphor truly begins to crystalize and we see Alexis for what he truly is. Alexis is not merely a big, costumed Tokusatsu villain who fights with lasers and swords and dark sorcery. No, Alexis Kerib is a careful, insidious, and deeply cruel child predator. As the show proceeds onwards it becomes inescapably obvious that Alexis has sought out a depressed and isolated teenager, carefully nurtured that sense of isolation and the accompanying resentment, deliberately cut her away from any sort of positive context that might have helped her to grow, and weaponized the hatred he himself has fostered in her as a tool to his own petty ends, all with every intention of casting her aside entirely once he can no longer wring any value from her.

By the time SSSS Gridman’s first episode begins, Akane Shinjou has already created (or at least been placed within) an artificial world in which all inhabitants are, supposedly, programmed to love her unconditionally. But it’s clear after even a casual observation of Akane’s hobbies and passions that, in another world, Akane would probably struggle to make friends. Akane is an odd child, by most standards. She enjoys taking walks around empty graveyards in late summer. She has a deep passion for Tokusatsu shows – already a niche interest – but rather than rooting for the Tokusatsu heroes she cheers heartily for the villainous and destructive Kaiju and their masters. She’s short tempered and rather petty, easily upset by the lightest slights. Unwanted/unexpected physical contact in particular seems almost like a trigger for her – she visibly struggles to maintain basic coherency both when her teacher carelessly bumps into her in the school hallway and when one of the boys on a group date she reluctantly attended brushes against her shoulder to look at her cellphone. And, of course, she lives alone (aside from internet and occasionally physical contact from Alexis himself) and amidst mountains of garbage she can’t summon the motivation to throw out properly. None of this is sinful on her part, of course, but they are traits that don’t generally play well with other people unless carefully observed and managed. While we can reasonably assume that having Alexis as her sole ‘caretaker’ has exacerbated these personality issues, there’s every reason to assume that this is reasonably true to who Akane was before she met Alexis and before the show’s run began. And, while the show’s final episode has yet to air as of this writing and could, perhaps, make me look rather silly, I would bet a great deal that Akane was, indeed, extremely lonely before whatever transpired to place her in charge of an entire digital plane of existence alongside Alexis.

Enter Alexis Kerib. Alexis meets this odd, lonely, frustrated, depressed girl in need of nothing more desperately than affection and validation, and what does he offer her? Something only she can do. Akane alone can make true Kaiju, Alexis tells her. She’s “brimming with talent”, capable of “magnificent” creations, “so much better” than she even realizes. All Akane has to do is sculpt toy Kaiju, and then Alexis can give them form, animating them with her hatred. It’s art, Alexis assures Akane. It’s her unique talent, something that makes her special, something that only Alexis truly appreciates – and something he’d just like her to use to help him deal with these guys Alexis doesn’t like. It’s the most dangerous thing Alexis could possibly have said – and he knows it. Though she would, of course, describe herself as the boss going forwards, from that moment on Akane is in the metallic palm of Alexis’ hand. She is helplessly addicted to the false sense of agency and control and worth that he provides, even as her partnership with him cuts her off from the sort of social contact that could provide Akane with the actual affection and validation she craves more than she is capable of understanding.

And make no mistake, Alexis has no genuine interest whatsoever in validating Akane or doing anything other than giving her aimless hatred form and directing it wherever is most convenient for him at the time – typically towards his own enemies. He lies to her routinely – when he tells her that she alone can create Kaiju, for instance, even though one of Akane’s own creations conjures a Kaiju of his own with Alexis’ help. When Akane falls asleep during a depressed slump late in the show’s run, she wakes up to find Alexis looming over her, calmly telling her that ‘true humans’ don’t sleep and ‘politely’, firmly, single-mindedly insisting that she resume work on her next Kaiju. We also know that, despite what Akane believes, the inhabitants of the virtual world are indeed capable of acting in ways that she can’t predict and even actively defy her on multiple occasions – they appear to have all the agency of full people, despite Akane’s belief to the contrary.  It’s not entirely clear as of this writing, but I would bet a great deal that Akane only believes that the people around her aren’t actually people largely because of Alexis. It’s chilling to see how casually he isolates Akane from anything and anyone besides himself, how he insists that only he can help her understand the world, how he alone is her link to self-actualization and self-worth. It’s evocative of the worst stories I’ve heard of abusive or controlling families – especially parents -, sex offenders, or the most insidious recruiters amongst internet nazis and the alt-right. But it’s not until the most recent, penultimate episode of SSSS Gridman that the cruelty of Alexis Kerib is fully laid bare.

Akane has run away from her empty house after her latest Kaiju’s defeat at the hands of Gridman and his new ally Gridknight, and with the world seemingly beginning to fall apart with the deaths of the minor Kaiju who quietly kept the simulation running in an orderly fashion and Akane’s own motivation shattered by both relentless defeat and personal rejection, she quietly informs Alexis that she can’t make Kaiju any longer. Confronted with her brokenness, Alexis has nothing to offer her but an irritated sigh. He walks away, choosing instead to resurrect all of Akane’s old Kaiju at once in an attempt to smash his foes through sheer numbers, but when this fails he returns to Akane with one last desperate measure in mind – or perhaps this is what he planned from the beginning, the fulfillment of months or years of careful and callous manipulation. Akane has been confronted by Rikka, a kind girl who was once friends with Akane long ago, and remains the closest thing that poor, broken, suicidal Akane has to a friend. Even after all the people Akane’s desperate flailing has hurt, even after the condescension and spite Akane has directed towards Rikka and her friends, Rikka is willing to reach out to her. To be the friend Akane wants, needs, more than she could possibly understand. For just a second, Akane wants to turn back towards Rikka…

Alexis casually interrupts and dismisses this ‘pointless’ conversation, right at the moment Akane was finally, finally finding the courage to reach out to another person, to see them as a person. He makes one more demand of her – not to make another Kaiju for him, of course, he understands Akane’s burnout. No, Alexis is far more practical and far crueler than that. He calmly informs Akane that he doesn’t particularly mind the idea of seeing her become a Kaiju, lets out the iconic cry that accompanied every previous Kaiju summoning – “Instance…Abreaction!!” – and the episode ends in a flash of red and a shot of Akane writhing amidst a terrible crimson glow, all the hatred that Alexis had fostered within her and left to fester at last ready to burst out and leave her empty. Only the finale remains to determine whether Alexis has succeeded in fully consuming this bitter, angry, depressed girl he’s so callously weaponized.

Alexis Kerib is the voice in a lonely, angry teenager’s computer that tells them that other people aren’t real (They’re NPCs! Nobody cares if you hurt an NPC!), that lashing out will make them happy, that only the voice can help them understand and master their own fear – even though that voice can ultimately only deepen that fear. He isolates emotionally vulnerable prey, turns them into weaponized assets of his own, milks them for all they’re worth, and then ultimately (if not stopped) consumes and discards them altogether the way one might toss aside a crumpled and empty beer can. By the end of the show he has come far beyond the cartoonish Lord Of Monsters archetype I had assumed would be typical of a Tokusatsu show and become a chilling avatar of online predation and the targeted radicalization of alienated youth. He’s polite, charismatic, marvelously voice-acted in both English and Japanese, he’s got a great costume, and he’s utterly, profoundly grotesque. He’s a magnificient and vile, incredible and despicable achievement in villainy, and far and away the most profoundly compelling villain I’ve seen in anime (and probably period) in 2018.