Shangri-La

Adapted for TV from a Japanese science-fiction serial novel turned into a manga, this intricate tale is set in a cyber-punkish world warped by global warming, roughly a half-century into the future. While encroaching seas and jungles create subsistence-slums full of refugees, a less obvious consequence arises from a carbon tax that penalizes industrialized nations that generate smoke. An oligarchy of wealthy speculators make huge fortunes electronically manipulating carbon markets, including an especially ruthless trio comprised of Kewpie doll–like children who operate incognito behind workstations and virtual-reality avatars. Heroine Kuniko is a pink-haired teen daughter in the family behind Metal Age, an anti-authoritarian grassroots co-op. Fresh out of juvenile detention she plunges into intrigue involving the military, the profiteers, a mysterious mutant princess with deadly powers, a sensuous and sinister femme fatale serving as Japan's prime minister (who looks about as Japanese as Jayne Mansfield), and a promised safe haven that is not what it seems. Turns out that Kuniko may also not be who she appears to be. Only a fraction of the questions are answered in this first half of the saga, but viewers will be hooked by the dystopic combo of high tech, high finance, shojo action, and “science” that is indistinguishable from magic. Compiling the first 12 episodes from 2008 in a dual-language set, rated TV-MA, this is highly recommended. [Note: Shangri-La, Part 2 is also available.] (C. Cassady)