ABSTRACT
This chapter identifies alternate history fictions of the Heisei period as a medium for artists and filmmakers to explore new ties to the past. It presents theory and criticism on the alternate history (AH) genre as a way of contextualizing a reading of four works from this period: the anime Jin-Roh: The Wolf Brigade (Jinrō, 1999) by Oshii Mamoru (b. 1951) and The Place Promised in our Early Days (Kumo no mukô, yakusoku no basho, 2004) by Shinkai Makoto (b. 1973); and the novels Battle Royale (Batoru rowaiaru, 1999) by Takami Kōshun (b. 1969) and 1Q84 (Ichi-kyū-hachi-yon, 2009–2011) by Murakami Haruki (b. 1949). This chapter examines the way these fictions dynamize a “closed past” by allowing the alternate versions of the history of the radical era of the late 1960s and early 1970s to develop alongside accepted narratives of the past. In this way, the multiplicity of timelines in these fictions represents the historical experience of Heisei as a continual negotiation with the virtual dimensions of an “open” past. The large number of alternate histories produced in the 1990s and 2000s, this chapter argues, is an indication of the attempt of the historical imaginary of the Heisei period to reorient itself in the wake of the collapse of the high-growth model.
