TRILLION GAME – Episode 1

What’s it about? Haru and Gaku aren’t afraid to do whatever it takes to get to the top of the top of society—which, to them, equals becoming trillionaires. But in order to go from the simple life to living like kings, they’ll need to leverage every skill they have to turn their sky high dream into reality.

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I credit my first experience with a rags-to-riches tale to everyone’s favorite canine from 1995, Wishbone, a chatty Jack Russell Terrier who self-inserts himself into classic literature. In this case, he dreamed himself into The Prince and the Pauper. Er… correction: The Prince and the Pooch, since this is a dog protag. Still, this is when I learned of the concept of the underdog getting a taste of the good life.

Trillion Game is decidedly not a series with a charming tiny dog. If anything, it’s the antithesis, and completely unenjoyable despite being written by the same person who crafted the quite entertaining Dr. Stone. This…well, I won’t speak too much up front. They say time is money, and I want to use this space and time wisely, so let’s get into this “thrilling” premiere!

Episode 1, “The World’s Most Selfish Man,” is pretty clear about its goals from the beginning: it’s all about the ducats, that paper, those benjamins times a busloads of cold, hard, cash. It’s all about the high life, the luxury of having it all and living a life where anything can be bought for the right price without a single thought. 

Only its leads are your everyday lower-middle-class dudes. So how are they gonna go from middle-class rags to the 1%-of-the-1% riches? 

Trillion Game’s story has gotta start from the bottom before it can get to the top, and it starts with the conniving Haru and socially awkward nerd Gaku uniting their dreams–well, Haru’s dream–with the mutual dream of dominating society.

In many ways, this initial journey is quite relatable: it’s filled with the early adulthood stumbles of trying to find a job, of trying to establish that platform in order to actually secure the bag. But Haru never lets go of his ambitions and instead of working his way up the ladder, he leaps right to the top in a ploy that feels like real-life wish fulfillment. With plenty of swagger on his side and a bit of that early twenties rizz, Haru’s sure to turn the world of the uber rich on its ear as he bets against the world and stakes his place as one of the world’s most self-serving and selfish men in a story to rival Crazy Rich Asians’s opulence.

And yet.

Trillion Game feels like it should be so much more than it actually is. This episode introduced a bunch of characters and establish the plot perfectly fine, including introducing a genuinely badass girlboss who clearly has it together, even if her role so far is a product of her father being the bank’s president. Yet it also feels dead on arrival, incredibly hollow and just…disappointing in a time where actual people are barely surviving; and meanwhile, the super rich plan their escapes from climate change decimated towns and their eventual escape from the planet, leaving those of us who didn’t want to game the system–i.e. willingly become reckless monsters–behind to suffer. It just didn’t do a damn thing for me, and I hate to say that as someone who genuinely likez to find something good in each premiere.

Trillion Game just…sucks. It just sucks. Okay, well the ending is a bop. But the rest sucks.

It doesn’t help that the premiere so desperately wants you to think Haru is the hottest shit to ever decide to work at a prestigious bank and let me tell you, he’s hot shit alright, but it’s more the variety I’d find on the sidewalk in Texas when the temperature was set to Repent and Revelations outside. He sucks: he sucks so much, and he’s the exact kind of discount Andrew Tate meets Elon Musk guy that so many people idolize, and for what? Do you think this kind of person is going to save you? Do you think this kind of greed trickles down?

You know, I couldn’t help but think of Kakegurui, a series that I’m quite passionate about, and how much that differs from this. It’s a series that also plays with large sums of money, that flaunts wealth on a disgusting level. But I think the execution is so startlingly different: the curtains frequently get pulled back to show the ruthlessness needed to play the game. It even shows the downsides of a system built on gambling, though half the fun of the series is how ridiculous it is. Here in Trillion Game, this just feels…too real in its underlying cruelty. It doesn’t feel like it’s just this joyful romp, or even a girlboss moment like say, Ocean’s Eight. It just feels like two cis men doing what cis men so often do: taking advantage of everyone before, during, and after they get what they feel owed by society.

I’ll give this to Trillion Game: it holds fast to the cosmic truth that no one ethically gets that much money. At least that’s pretty clear, though I think I’m supposed to side with our protagonists. Yet side with them I won’t do because ultimately, this show is a testament to how much one man can really, really, really fucking suck from the moment he parts his lips and decides to say literally anything.

If Tennoji Haru has a million haters, I’m one of them. If he has a thousand haters, I’m one of them. If he has one single hater, it’s me. If he has zero haters, it definitely means I have left this world. If the world is against Tennoji Haru, I’m with the world. If the world is for Tennoji Haru, consider me the biggest hater. Gaku is fine for now: his biggest crime is following along with Haru on their malicious rise to the top, and yes, it is malicious, even if it’s meant to be viewed as fun. Plus, he’s such a nothing character that I keep forgetting he exists unless he’s actively on screen.

Ultimately, my personal beliefs and general hate of the rich have led me to this: there is no such thing as an ethical billionaire, and there certainly aren’t ethical trillionaires. There is always blood on your hands when you reach those heights, whether that’s literal, metaphorical, or the Occam’s razor mix of the two. You cannot retain genuine humanity when you have so much money it’d take centuries of lifetimes to see it gone.

You can watch this show and ignore the world around it. You can, hypothetically, sit down and enjoy Haru and Gaku’s rise to the top. You can even vibe with nepo baby Kirika. But I don’t think this show is worth it. I don’t think it’s ever going to feel good or less scummy, and quite frankly, I don’t think Haru is ever going to suck less. You kind of can’t when you look up to the kind of disgusting wealth he does. I think if you’re going to watch, watch critically, but that’s also just me. I’m sure there’s an entire audience who’s going to watch this for the distinct art style and claim online that the feminists are being too serious about a show that’s supposed to be over the top and fun. This is just my opinion, after all: I always encourage folks to watch for themselves, especially with media like this in a time where shit like this just feels like a slap in the face.

Ultimately watch if you want and see where you sit with Trillion Game: just don’t expect me to be among the viewers.

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