It takes the dumbest-sounding pitch in the 2018 season, hot boys who are also antique firearms, and plays it with a completely straight face in a world where owning a weapon gets you erased. That contrast is the whole appeal. The World Empire has flattened everything after the nuclear war, art is all that survived of the old arms, and the resistance fights back with muskets that stand up and introduce themselves. The Four Sacred Guns anchor it, Brown Bess and Charleville and Napoleon and Kentucky, each named for the real weapon they used to be, which means the gimmick doubles as a history lesson you didn't sign up for. It's a rhythm game adaptation, so the insert songs land like they're the actual climax, and honestly sometimes they are. You either roll your eyes at episode one or you're in for all twelve.

In the era following a nuclear war that ravaged the entire world, the World Empire holds absolute power and its people live oppressed, their freedom taken from them. Owning any kind of weapon is banned, yet a resistance group keeps up a hidden struggle against the regime. Its members fight with antique guns once kept as pieces of art. The spirits of those old weapons then appear as the Musketeers and join the resistance, as though drawn by its spirit. Their enemies are the incarnations of modern guns sent out on behalf of the Empire. In battle, the Musketeers can enter a mode known as Absolute Noble that greatly strengthens them, and they carry hope to the world. Alongside the action, the story also shows their daily lives, with moments of laughter, confusion and pain, as they stay loyal to the cause they fight for.