The Scarlet Moon shines upon the hymnodists.
Visual Prison (ヴィジュアルプリズン, Vijuarupurizun) is an original Japanese anime series directed by Tomoya Tanaka at A-1 Pictures. Since the anime’s release in 2021, the series has had a comic, a stage play and a live concert.
Vampires have existed for centuries and live under the rule of the Scarlet Moon. Once a year, "Visual Prison" occurs, a visual kei competition where the vampire who sings the most beautiful song is bestowed with great power by the Scarlet Moon. At the forefront of the competition are ECLIPSE—the reigning champions who stand for an established order, and LOST EDEN—a group that believes the strongest should rule.
Ange Yuki is a lonely young boy who is unable to fit in with his surroundings and has no confidence in his singing ability. He leaves his hometown to visit Harajuku in search of a musician he idolizes, but during his quest, he gets entangled in one of the many live performance clashes between the visual-kei unit "ECLIPSE" and "LOS†EDEN". While being overwhelmed by their fascinating stages, Ange is suddenly hit by a severe pain and soon collapses, overcome by bloodlust. Regaining consciousness, Ange finds himself under the care of Guiltia "Guil" Brion, the musician he admires, and learns that he is a dhampir.
While Ange now has the privilege of participating in the upcoming Visual Prison, Guil explains that he will not join him in this endeavor. Meanwhile, Ange encounters Robin Laffite, a foreigner from England enamored by his astonishing singing voice. With the day of the competition slowly creeping up, Ange has to put together a capable unit in an exciting race against time.
Tropes:
- The Ace: ECLIPSE, as the reigning champions of Visual Prison.
- Affectionate Nickname: ECLIPSE refers to their fans as "lambs" to play with their Messianic Archetype image. They also call Ange "puppy".
- Always Identical Twins: Subverted with ECLIPSE. Their Vampire form is pretty much identical, they’re of the same age and call themselves each other’s "brother", but there’s no blood relation between them. They are actually vampiric brothers - those turned into vampires by the same person.
- Bad Moon Rising: The Visual Prison is driven fowards by the Scarlet Moon and the power it promises to those it finds worthy.
- Battle of the Bands: The Visual Prison is an annual ritualistic contest between vampire musicians in order to offer the Scarlet Moon the most beautiful song, and in return, it will reward the champion with the Blood Tear. Once someone owns ten Blood Tears, they can make one wish for anything they want, even if it rewrites the world.
- The Beautiful Elite: ECLIPSE are world-class celebrities and high-ranking vampires with the wealth and looks to match.
- Big Entrance: ECLIPSE makes a huge scene and gets a helicopter involved every time they perform under their stage persona.
- Blue Is Heroic: The main unit, O★Z, is defined by the color blue.
- Cast Full of Pretty Boys: Though Saga and Dimitri are more in the Hunk category.
- The Chosen One: When a vampire’s singing reaches the Scarlet Moon, it will bestow upon them a personalized Power Tattoo and a name for their band, marking them as eligible to lead a band for Visual Prison.
- Chromosome Casting: As only males can be turned into vampires (not considering those born a vampire), all the units engaging in Visual Prison are male, even if some’s appearance is a little misleading.
- Color Motifs: Every main characters has their Image Color listed in their bio in the official site, combined with a word that hints at an aspect of their personality.
- Ange: Fatal Orange.
- Guiltia: Guilty Blue.
- Robin: Innocent Yellow.
- Eve: Dual Violet.
- Saga: Ruby Rouge.
- Mist: Obedience Cyan.
- Jack: Envy Green.
- Elizabeth: Exotic Pink.
- Dimitri: Invincible Gray.
- Hyde: Superior White.
- Connected All Along: Guiltia’s late friend, Yutaka Nagase, is Ange’s father who died shortly before he was born. And after past events are unravel, it turns out Guiltia was the one who made Ange a dhampir.
- Designated Parents: Guiltia and Eve for O★Z because the other two are Naive Newcomers to the vampire scene. Saga and Mist also play this role for LOS†EDEN despite not being the oldest, while the actual oldest member Elizabeth often acts like a Bratty Teenage Daughter.
- Didn't Think This Through: ECLIPSE established the rule that forbids vampires from attacking humans, which is well-intentioned and in the interest of the weaker race, but it doesn’t take every circumstance into consideration. As a result, Guiltia was still judged guilty by the Scarlet Moon for biting a human despite his purpose being saving her life, leading to his demise.
- Eyepatch of Power: For unknown reasons, ECLIPSE wear eyepatchs in their uniform.
- Fairytale Motifs: O★Z’s given name is pointed out by Robin to be a reference to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. The situation of the book’s protagonist Dorothy indeed draws some parallels to Ange’s: he also unintentionally wandered into a world of fantastical creatures but chooses to stay, has three companions, and defeats two rivals in his journey just like how Dorothy destroyed two wicked witches.
- Feather Motif: Ange’s name is "angel" in French, and one of O★Z’s Image Songs is named ANGELIST. ECLIPSE also evokes this with their white color palette and feathered wings.
- Family of Choice: The bands all have a familial relationship despite being strangers before.
- Foil: O★Z and LOS†EDEN are both four-member bands with familial dynamic, but their aesthetics are polar opposite of each other.
- Friendly Rival: They may not look it, but all the bands have quite a friendly relationship despite opposing each other and being initially hostile.
- A God Am I: ECLIPSE has this attitude and evokes angelic imagery when they perform. Their image color’s name also suggests that they’re "invincible" and "superior".
- Guyliner: The vampires wear heavy makeup not only because it is required for Visual Kei fashion, but also to hide their vampirism. Since every performance is an offering to the Scarlet Moon, the makeup functions as a ritualistic face paint as well.
- Ham and Deadpan Duo: Although they’re both hammy in one way or another, Dimitri is much more dramatic and grandiose while Hyde serves as the designated Deadpan Snarker.
- Idol Genre: Even with all the Visual Kei aesthetic and vampires, Visual Prison at its core is still an idol anime with groups of musicians competing at a grand music event the idol style, and are treated as celebrities.
- Image Song: Each unit has its own trademark song(s). The characters also have theirs which are listed in the character page.
- O★Z: Zankoku Shangri-La (Shangri-La of Cruelty), Angelist
- LOS†EDEN: BLOODY KISS, SACRIFICE
- ECLIPSE: Gyokuza no GEMINI, ROYAL CROWN
- Light Is Good: Contrary to their arrogance, ECLIPSE is actually more than willing to have a friendly relationship with the current contenders in this year’s Visual Prison.
- Long-Haired Pretty Boy: Eve and Mist, fitting for the Team Mom of the groups. All members of the first-generation ECLIPSE also kept their hair long when they were active as a team.
- Lucky Charms Title: O★Z has a star in their name, while LOS†EDEN has a Latin cross in place of the letter "T".
- Multinational Team: A majority of the cast originate from European countries, though they still speak Japanese fluently.
- Japan: Ange, Mist
- France: Guiltia, Dimitri, Hyde
- England: Saga, Robin, Jack
- Finland: Eve
- Hungary: Elizabeth
- Mystical White Hair: Both members of the current ECLIPSE have white hair in their Vampire form, and they’re among the oldest blood suckers of the bunch.
- Not Allowed to Grow Old: Vampires will stop growing physically the moment they’re turned into one, and their mind seems to be stuck at that point in time as well if the 18-year-old Jack’s Bratty Half-Pint behavior is any indication.
- One-Hit Wonder: In-Universe example. O★Z has only hold one concert when they go into an indefinite hiatus due to Guiltia’s coma. Thankfully, they resume their activities two months later for the Visual Prison.
- Our Vampires Are Different: In this series, vampires are beings with high intelligence, good looks, and eternal lives. They can increase their number of mates through bloodsucking, but only human males are eligible. They don’t require blood but can have an instinctive urge to suck blood, and their eyes turn red when they are agiated.
- Person of Holding: The vampires summon their microphone/Royal Rapier from their Power Tattoo every time they perform.
- Pocket Dimension: The "Prison" is an alternate reality that exists when a vampire performs and can only be perceived and entered by other vampires. In the first episode, Ange is dragged into one when watching ECLIPSE’s performance and witnesses their and LOS†EDEN‘s display of vampirism, causing him to awaken his vampire ancestry. In O★Z‘s debut, LOS†EDEN invades their Prison as a declaration of war and an actual physical confrontation breaks out with the audience none the wiser. The Prison O★Z create in their redebut enables them to communicate and interact with Guiltia, who is in a deep coma and is all but dead.
- Power Crystal: The Blood Tears is a tear-shape gemstone that has a positive effect on vampires when they liquidfy and drink it. Ten of them grant the owner a wish that can potentially rewrite the world, and twenty of them can undo the Scarlet Moon’s penalty and bring a vampire Back from the Dead.
- The Power of Friendship: In the finale, LOS†EDEN and ECLIPSE give all the Blood Tears they own to O★Z, helping Ange gather enough Blood Tears to wish for Guiltia’s resurrection.
- Power Gives You Wings: At the climax of their first performance in the show, ECLIPSE grow white wings as a show of their power and superiority.
- Power Tattoo: The Scarlet Moon bestows a personalized tattoo on The Chosen One’s body to mark their eligibility for leadership in the Visual Prison, and said individuals can share the tattoo with their bandmates.
- Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: A combination of a dhampyr Country Mouse, a former top idol who hasn’t sung for more than a century because of trauma, a classical vocalist searching for his missing twin brother, and a Vampire Hunter isn’t the most ideal for a band. O★Z still works, and works great.
- Really 700 Years Old: Since they’re vampires, several characters have their age exceeded the 100 mark, namely members of old ECLIPSE at 250 and Elizabeth at 450.
- Red and Black and Evil All Over: Subverted. While LOS†EDEN, the main rival of O★Z, is coded by these two colors, they’re decent people who have little hard feelings towards O★Z outside of Visual Prison, and treats Ange not unlike a family member when he works part-time for them.
- Red Eyes, Take Warning: Vampires have red eyes, which glow when they pay respect to the Scarlet Moon.
- Royal Rapier: What their mics double as.
- Soprano and Gravel: Dimitri and Hyde respectively have one of the lowest and highest voice of the main cast.
- Those Two Guys: Dimitri and Hyde are almost never apart from each other, both on and off stage. The one time they are, they were forcefully separated by Carmilla.
- True Companions: All the bands have a close relationship with their own teammates
- Visual Kei: The series brands itself as about visual kei idols.
- Undying Loyalty: Mist and Jack are fervently loyal to Saga for sheltering them and giving them a new life.
- We Used to Be Friends: Guiltia, Saga, Dimitri, and Hyde were members of the original ECLIPSE until Guiltia decided to disband the group at the height of their career because he found himself unable to sing after an incident. While Dimitri and Hyde are cool with it and continue the legacy under a different brand, Saga regards his former teammates with murderous hostility even a century later since he believes they gave up too easily and dragged his life down with them.
