Author: ninjarealist

Some Quick First Impressions: Comedy Shorts

by ninjarealist, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

JK-Meshi!

jkmeshi

Short Synopsis: Three girls banter and teach you how to make Japanese snack food.

As a comedy anime this show is laughably bad and clearly produced on a minimal budget. The characters do not move and the CGI is some of the ugliest I’ve seen. The writing might be even worse…but how is the recipe? Well I gave this one a try and can honestly say that miso soup with fried tomatoes and sesame seeds is delicious. Can I recommend this anime? Absolutely not. But if you’re interested in Japanese cooking you should skip the tv show and check out the recipes.

Potential: 0% (but worth checking out the recipes)

 

Hackadoll

hackadolllone

Short Synopsis: Inept, moefied, androids cause mayhem in their laughable attempts at assisting humans.

So apparently this show is an ad for a Japanese news app, which is ironic, because this is frankly some of the best animation I’ve ever seen in a TV short like this. Of course Trigger are known for front-loading their work, both in terms of animation budget and writing quality, so I’m guardedly optimistic about this show. But the first episode was a lot of fun, both visually and comedically. I will definitely be following this.

Potential: 75%

Komori-san can’t decline 

komori-san

Short Synopsis: A school girl is unable to refuse requests and develops special skills as a result.

I found this show to be lacking in both humor and taste. Which is a shame because I love the art style and the voice actors seem to really be trying. But the comedy is just not very funny and what makes this show truly repellent is the overdone breasts fanservice that borders on fetish material. Maybe someone else will like this style of show but I found it dreadful.

Potential: 15%

Hakone-Chan 

Hakone-chan

Short Synopsis: A shrine deity revives in the form of a child.

This is a pretty bland narrative about a shrine deity and a boy who is of course in unrequited love with the girl of his dreams. But I like how direct the narrative is and how capriciously Hakone-chan behaves. This is nothing ground-breaking but for the most part well-executed. But of course the creators have to go and throw in a stupid fanservice joke, which doesn’t bode well for the future but I think I will keep watching.

Potential: 45%

Magical Somera-Chan 

Somera-Chan

Short Synopsis: Somera and her sister endure random acts of violence.

This is a screwball comedy, which I usually like, but I guess this just isn’t my thing. The animation and voice acting are great and I can’t point to anything specifically that I found problematic about the writing but this just didn’t make me laugh. The again, unlike some of these other comedy shorts, I definitely think this show will have a following. It’s just so bizarre that I think some people are bound to love it.

Potential: 35%

Psycho Pass 2 – 03 – 04

by ninjarealist, posted in Currently Watching:, Psycho Pass 2

Episodes 3 and 4 of Pyscho Pass are difficult to talk about. This show has been extremely consistent so far. The staff have handled this sequel with an understated confidence that’s hard to dislike. I still don’t find the show to be as atmospheric as the original, and I still like the dialogue less, but the narrative continues to be engaging. I think where the narrative has really succeeded is in avoiding extraneous clutter that would detract from the major themes of the show.

However, this is both a strength and a weakness. While Psycho Pass 2 doesn’t waste time, the direct style of writing can be a bit predictable at times. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who saw the drinking scene between Aoyanagi and Ginoza as a clear death flag. And one episode later, sure enough, Aoyanagi gets turned into red pudding . This show is clearly trying to shock the viewer and I think it would do a better job at this if the plot was a little more surprising. But that’s a minor quip.

I think a bigger quip would be that if they were trying to shock the viewer with the violence in episode 4, they didn’t do a great job. The hand-to-hand combat shown in the first part of the episode was quite disturbing, and really succeeded at unnerving me. But this effect was sort of ruined with the gratuitous dominator shootout at the end, which honestly felt kind of cartoony to me.

And then there’s Mika Shimotsuki. As much as I hate to admit it, she’s really become the wild card in this series. Her ethically questionable decision-making raises some interesting questions, questions that don’t have easy answers. Chiefly, was her inaction simply malicious or does it speak to more undestandable flaws in her in character? And is her rage against Akane simply the result of a bad attitude or is her anger rooted in the trauma that was inflicted upon her in season 1? Is Mika just a testament to the failure of SYBIL to produce a healthy society? These are tough questions and I’m excited to see how they get resolved.

Akatsuki no Yona – 03

by ninjarealist, posted in Akatsuki no Yona

Hak and Yona flee Soo-Won’s men, but Yona’s mental and physical condition continue to deteriorate. Yona and Hak are both haunted by memories from the past. This was easily the best episode in the series so far. Whereas the first two episodes primarily took place in the present or the future, this episode is mostly spent in the past and it’s a great choice. A lot has happened already and I was concerned that the characters might start to wear thin if the action continued unabated for another episode. Thankfully, the staff realize this, and have devoted an entire episode to fleshing out Hak and Yona.

For example, in the first two episodes, it’s implied that Hak has romantic feelings for Yona. The flashback in this episode made it abundantly clear that this is absolutely the case, and raises bigger questions about the nature of their relationship. For example, how does Hak feel about the fact that his hands are clearly tied both by duty and friendship? We also get hints at the true nature of King Il and Soo-Won’s father, suggesting that the picture might indeed be more complicated than either Yona or Hak appreciate.

As a backdrop to this, we get Yona and Hak’s travails as they flee through the woods. It’s an interesting juxtaposition. Yona’s idyllic memories of childhood are contrasted with her haggard and borderline-catatonic appearance in the present. This contrast helps reinforce how emotionally devastating all of this is for Yona. In one memorable scene, Yona is covered in leeches while bathing. She reacts feebly and is too weary to even remove them from her body. Hak is forced to do it for her. It’s a sad moment that conveys how drastically Yona has changed from the happy-go-lucky character in the first episode.

I’m really excited to see where this series goes if it continues to be this good.

Psycho Pass 2 – 02

by ninjarealist, posted in Psycho Pass 2

Episode two continues right where episode one left off and progresses about how you might have guessed. Akane chases the mysterious villain pulling the strings, getting only cryptic responses from Kitazawa. Shimotsuki confronts Akane with her misgivings about Akane’s handling of the arrest. And we finally get some subtle hints towards Kougami’s existence and how his disappearance might be affecting Akane. The first suggestions of Kougami were handled quite well. We never hear mention of his name, but we do get a nice pair of scenes that suggest Akane does indeed miss him a lot. In the first scene Akane visits a therapist to gather information about Kitazawa. The therapist suggests that Akane should take time off work, which she does, in another scene. This leads into a beautiful scene where Akane is second-hand smoking the same brand of cigarettes that Kougami liked. It’s a striking scene, because Akane and her apartment have never looked more gloomy or depressing. She de-activates the holo in her room, when her computer notices damage to her wall, and you can see that beneath all the holographic effects, her apartment is just a dingy room, with some tables and pillows. To me it felt like the writers might have been making a statement about how, beneath the perfect exterior, Akane is indeed human and potentially starting to show signs of deterioration. This is a nice change from her portrayal in the first episode, which seemed a little too Mary Sue.

This episode was mostly Akane, but the other characters also get some development. It’s a mixed bag. The biggest disappointment for me is the handling of Shimotsuki’s character in this episode, which just felt a little clumsy. In the first episode they set her up to be this big rival for Akane and there was lots of foreshadowing that suggested she would display some serious antagonism towards her superior. Based on her sordid history with Akane and Kougami in the first season, I expected her to display a lot more malice and intensity towards Akane’s forgiving attitude with Kitazawa. But in the second episode, Shimotsuki is effectively just played for laughs and cheap fanservice. Her “big challenge” to Akane has so far amounted to her sending a negative report to Akane’s superiors. Even Akane seems to find this response laughably limp-wristed, although, in defense of Shimotsuki, I’m sure she doesn’t realize how intimate Akane is with the Sybil System. And predictably, we get a flirtatious moment between Shimotsuki and Yayoi, who seem already destined for some type of romance. The new enforcers are ok. Hinakawa is essentially a non-character at this point but Tougane gets some development in this episode and I found him to be quite the intriguing character. He’s a former therapist, an heir to a powerful industrialist family, and it’s repeatedly suggested, in both the OP and the cinematography of the episode itself (such as the screenshot of him I posted), to have some sinister secret. That’s an interesting mix of attributes. And Keiji Fujiwara does a great job with this role. The voice acting in general in this new season is very good but his role stands out to me as the best.

We also get some more development of the new villain and I like the direction they’re going with him. In the first episode he seemed too similar to Makishima, another cold, calculating, techno-genius manipulating other nefarious characters to do his bidding. However, in this episode we begin to see that the new villain is actually quite sentimental, and potentially suffers from some type of mental instability. It’s revealed that the undidentifiable holo he used in the first episode was made using a dead girl as a model and projecting what she would have grown up to look like (pretty nifty). At one point in the episode he even cries on-screen, which is something that Makishima would have never done sincerely. So it seems that while this new villain does have many of the same types of skills that Makishima had (and some even more incredible ones) his personality is starting to seem much more human. Probably the most vexing new character is Aoyanagi (who, like Shimotsuki, was a minor character in season 1). I’m not really sure why they brought this character back when they’re already using Shimotsuki’s character to fill the role of “pro-Sybil inspector giving Akane a hard time”. Aoyanagi is far more ruthless than Shimotsuki, and her position as Akane’s equal (whereas Shimotsuki is a subordinate) gives her much wider latitude to oppose Akane. Still, in a 13 episode series that has so much ground to cover, and given that they’re already doing such a weak job of developing Shimotsuki, I can’t help but feel they should have left one of these characters out.

In general, this was a good episode. I like how most of the new (and sort of new) characters are being developed and I like that this season seems to be establishing a different kind of thematic heart than the first series. For me, the first series was more about looking at whether an industrialized society is better served by ethics that support human agency or ethics that support utilization of knowledge to organize society most efficiently. It offered a lot of compelling arguments both for and against the Sibyl system and the way that it sacrificed human agency in favour of a more efficient society. Psycho Pass 2 seems so far to be less concerned with the social ramifications of the Sibyl system and more concerned with the questions of justice raised by the crime coefficient. It’s the age old question of what purpose the justice system serves. Does it exist to reform criminals? Does it exist to punish them? Does it exist to protect the dominant social order from dangerous elements? The first series established that the Sibyl system is a mix of all three that masquerades as a reformatory system. And it seems like this season’s villain wants to demonstrate that, if the Sibyl system truly wants to reform people, the use of the lethal eliminators is wrong. I think that’s a great direction to take this show because that was the biggest question mark from the first season? We repeatedly see all of these people get killed off in brutal, some times arbitrary, fashion, and there frankly wasn’t enough serious interrogation of whether such overwhelming force was justifiable. So I’m glad that this second season seems to be primarily considered with examining that question.

I also think the cinematography, animation, and sound all continue to be quite good in this new season. Nonetheless, this episode still had a little bit of that same lifeless feel I complained about in the first episode. The events just progress too quickly and mechanically, and there is just not enough breathing room to let the atmosphere develop properly. This is a shame because you can tell that the staff have done such a great job on all the production aspects. But so far it really seems like this new season might have been better served by two cours. Still, I was impressed by the writing in this episode. It was definitely a big improvement from the first one.

Akatsuki no Yona – 02

by ninjarealist, posted in Akatsuki no Yona

In the first impression I said I didn’t expect Akatsuki no Yona to succeed if it went down the serious drama route. However, after watching the second episode, I’m starting to think I might have been wrong about that. There were still a lot of moments that felt corny or derivative to me, such as the stand-off between Hak and Soo-won in the middle of the episode and the flash-forward at the very end (I don’t really think the flash forwards have been very effective as a narrative device), but the writers made some inspired choices with the main characters that left me feeling encouraged about the direction this show is headed. I really like how they’ve handled Soo-won’s character. A story like this can live or die by the quality of its villain. If the villain is too sympathetic it can lighten the dramatic heft of the narrative, which can be really bad news for these type of operatic, character-driven, period pieces. If the villain is too sociopathic they can rapidly wear thin. However, the character of Soo-won strikes a nice balance between this. He’s a very cold person, to be sure, and it’s hard to empathize with his methods, but his motives honestly feel pretty reasonable to me. It’s easy for me to imagine the bitterness he would feel looking at Yona’s peaceful castle life and knowing that it was built on the violence and subterfuge that killed his father. I mean maybe we’ll find out later in the show that Yona’s father didn’t actually kill Soo-won’s father, but I hope the writers don’t go that route because honestly, it feels like a very believable backstory in my opinion. And it’s a backstory that really forces you to think about whether Yona is actually in the right here. If what Soo-won said is true, then perhaps Yona bears some form of guilt by association? I also like how we see moments of remorse peeking through Soo-won’s cold facade, like when you can see him wince momentarily after Yona tells him how she planned to confront her father about denying Yona the chance to marry her. It shows that there is a feeling person under there but those feelings have been buried under mountains of circumstances. And it makes for an interesting dynamic between him and Kye-sook, because even though Soo-won seems to be firmly in control of his fate, you can tell that Kye-sook is a Lady Macbeth type of character, prodding him to be more and more ruthless.

I also like how they handled Yona’s character in this episode. Often times, when shows portrays these types of “Princess forced out of the castle” situations the writers struggle so hard to make the trauma seem intense that the protagonist can seem unbearably histrionic or downright schizophrenic in their inconsistent and constantly changing reactions. I thought Yona went through a very nice and clear transition from initial shock at learning her father was killed, to denial of the situation, to fear that her own life was in danger, to anger and frustration that her osananajimi had betrayed her, and finally to a near catatonic breaking point as the fatigue and despair begin to set in. Throughout it all, her responses felt very natural and understandable for someone in her position. And the writers didn’t overdo it with the screaming and crying. I felt like most of the time Yona just seemed lost in her thoughts, almost unable to comprehend what was going on around her. Indeed, rather than being a player in the events of this episode, Yona is mostly just swept along in the torrent of events. I like this understated approach because it makes for some really powerful moments when Yona’s emotions come to the surface. I mean that hug at the end was so powerful and heart-warming. The entire episode Yona is just buffeted about by various people objectifying her and trying to kill her for reasons that have nothing to do with her personal life. You can see that by the end her sanity is about to break entirely because she feels just completely helpless and alone in a world that has completely changed for her in the span of a few hours. And then Hak, who despite his white knight persona had been pretty business-like towards Yona throughout this episode, lets down his own defenses to give Yona a moment of warmth and vulnerability with that hug. It was as if he was trying to say to her, “Don’t worry. Even if everyone else is treating you like a political figurehead, you’re still a human being to me.”

My biggest gripe with this episode, which was also a gripe I had with the first episode, was the terrible fight scenes. And I’m sorry if you liked them, but from my perspective after two episodes they’re just downright bad. I don’t mind that the fight scenes are short, or that the main characters don’t shoot fireballs out of their swords (at least not yet). I think those were both great choices. The problem is that the fight scenes just don’t feel real. Sure, there is blood and screaming, and loud sound effects when Hak swings his glaive around, but it just feels cartoony to me. I chalk a lot of this up to the fact that, although other aspects of the fight choreography feel more grounded and realistic, the actual physics of how the weapons impact and how the corpses are tossed through the air like volleyballs, is just comically unrealistic. And in spite of how well animated most of this show is, the animators do a really uninspired job with the death animations of all those nameless grunts that are constantly getting killed off. It makes the fight scenes feel like you’re watching someone play Dynasty Warriors (and no that’s not a compliment). The big issue here is not that the fight scenes themselves are bad, it’s that the bad fight scenes and comical death animations really take you out of the moment and just kill the serious atmosphere that the creators have otherwise done a great job building with the excellent soundtrack and cinematography.

Still, this was a good episode that really left me encouraged about where this show is going.

Some Quick First Impressions: Amagi Brilliant Park, Psycho-Pass Season 2

by ninjarealist, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

Amagi Brilliant Park

Short Synopsis: Our protagonist is kidnapped by an emotionless girl with a musket.

Ninjarealist’s Impression: A bitter and narcissistic ex-child star, a creepy and falling-apart theme park whose few visitors are outnumbered by vermin, a cast of characters named after American hip-hop stars: these are just a few of the bizarre elements that make up the first episode of Amagi Brilliant Park. And if you’re unable to imagine how all of that could fit neatly into one show, let me reassure you: this debut episode is laugh out loud funny. Comedy is probably the most subjective of genres, but what sets Amagi Brilliant Park apart from the crowd is that it’s quite clever. For example, the choice to name the main characters after hip-hop stars. It’s an inherently funny choice, but a lesser series might be content to simply play this for cheap jokes. But in Amagi Brilliant Park these names are actually used as ironic commentaries on the lead characters’ attributes. The emotionless girl, who is constantly shooting at people with a musket, is named after famed stoic and shooting victim, 50 Cent. The self-absorbed child-star protagonist takes his name from renowned narcissist Kanye West. That’s the type of subtle humor that this series uses. It doesn’t just stop at the usual manzai jokes (although it does those very well), it utilizes the bizarre setting and strange characters to play with the viewer’s expectations and force us to laugh at the morose absurdity of it all. In this way, Amagi Brilliant Park reminds me more of a show like Humanity Has Declined than the typical KyoAni fare that many expected this series to be.

A lot of what makes this show work so well is the excellent direction, which fleshes out the setting with lifelike visuals. Much of the humor in the first episode is driven by the surroundings, a theme park so poorly-maintained that it feels more like a haunted house than a place to unwind. And what really drives this home is the director’s use of short but intricate scenery shots that direct the viewer’s eyes to important details, which might be missed if they were placed in the background. Crows eating from a spilled trashcan, aging animatronics struggling to speak outdated lines, a bored child sitting with his parent in an empty auditorium, playing video games, as the uninspired show girls struggle to feel relevant: brief shots like this make the setting feel almost like another character in the show. This is gracefully mixed in with the comedy and never bores the viewer or verges into scenery porn. Much of these exposition shots are jokes unto themselves.

Amagi Brilliant Park is by no means a perfect show. There’s plenty of dumb fanservice and, while the dialogue is usually quite funny, it can sometimes feel extremely corny and derivative. That’s what worries me the most about this show. While I loved the first episode, it showed unmistakable signs that it might devolve into something less unique than what we see in the first episode. The use of dramatic flashbacks late in this episode suggests that this show intends to get serious at some point. And I have some doubts about whether this series can pull off drama as well as comedy. Still, this is was an impressive first episode and I’m excited to see where they go with it.

Potential: 70%

Psycho Pass Season 2

Short Synopsis: Our protagonist is a cop hunting criminals in a “Minority Report”-style dystopia.

Ninjarealist’s Impressions: Full disclosure, I really liked the first season of Psycho-Pass. The show had a lurid, hollywood, feel to it that made it seem almost as much like an American action movie as an episodic sci-fi anime. And as much as it pains me to say it, I’m just not really feeling as much of either influence from Psycho Pass 2, which seems much more rooted in modern anime. The main characters have gotten cuter, the soundtrack has cut down on the orchestral instruments and upped the amount of electronic ones, and the script, no longer written by Gen Urobuchi, doesn’t quite have the same edge to it. That’s not automatically a bad thing, but something seems like it’s missing from this sequel. Akane is still a badass, the premise is still great, and the setting is still super cool, but the show sort of feels like some of the life has been sucked out of it. There’s just not a whole lot in this first episode that compares favorably to the original series. With all of that being said, I still liked this first episode. While I’m disappointed that the staff seemed to be making a concerted effort to up the number of cute girls, I do like Shimotsuki’s character and I like how they’ve set her up to be so antagonistic towards Akane. It’s essentially the same relationship she had with Ginoza in the first season, but in reverse. And maybe that sounds boring to some of you but I for one am excited to see how Akane deals with an upstart who questions her authority. The new villain is also an obvious retread of the villain from the first season, but again, they’ve made some interesting choices with him that should provide some serious challenges for the main characters. If viewers can get past the fact that this show seems to be a downgrade in quality from the original Psycho Pass, I think they might find something to like here.

Potential: 65%

Some Quick First Impressions: Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works(TV), Akatsuki no Yona, Orenchi no Furo Jijou

by ninjarealist, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works(TV)

Short Synopsis: Our heroine is a plucky magician who summons a wise-cracking familiar.

Ninjarealist’s impressions: The much hyped Ufotable TV adaptation of Fate/stay night is here and let’s just get the big questions out of the way right up front: yes, the first episode lives up to the hype and no, this show is not for people who are unfamiliar with the Fate franchise. So if you haven’t seen the first adaptation, or the prequel, then you might as well just stop reading now. That’s not to say you might not get something out of the show, but the biggest failing of this adaptation is that it’s just not very accessible to newcomers. Events and characters get thrown at you so fast that you’ll have a difficult time following along if you don’t have a basic idea of the plot already.

Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works really succeeds in all the ways you would expect from a Ufotable adaptation of a TypeMOON property. The animation is gorgeous, though I found myself less impressed with the flashy special effects and more impressed with the small details, like the hammers on Rin’s alarm clock or Archer absent-mindedly playing with a pendulum in the Tohsaka study. These small touches really go a long way in enhancing the atmosphere of the show. There are some noticeably horrendous textures that become especially obvious in a few scenes, but overall I was struck by how many of the visuals, especially the indoor vignettes, reminded me of still images from the visual novel. It’s not just a good-looking adaptation either: I like the script. Rin has never been more likable and Archer is wittier than ever. Their antics repeatedly made me chuckle and play out almost like an 80’s buddy-cop movie. I think a lot of why the dialogue works so well is the consistent pacing. On the other hand some aspects of the show did feel overwrought. The characters, while endearing, are prone to rattling off extended monologues that often feel a bit hamfisted. The Hideyuki Fukasawa score isn’t bad but honestly, the best parts of this episode are the parts with no music at all. I hope that in future episodes this show uses a little less music. This is especially problematic in the fight scenes, which do feel a little bit overdone, a feeling that is only enhanced by the epic, orchestral, score. Still, this is a quality adaptation that manages to hit most of the right notes. It’s hard for me to see fans of the franchise being disappointed by this. My biggest criticism is that it’s just not very accessible to everyone else.

Potential: 75%

Akatsuki no Yona

Short Synopsis: The protagonist is a princess in a “Romance of the Three Kingdoms” style fantasy setting.

Ninjarealist’s impressions: Like many anime fans on the internet, when I first saw the preview for this show I was reminded of another Studio Pierrot series, The Twelve Kingdoms. I’m a big fan of that show and from the classical Chinese setting to the red-haired protagonist, Akatsuki no Yona seemed almost like it was inspired by that venerable series. Alas, appearances can be deceiving. Beyond the superficial similarities Akatsuki no Yona doesn’t feel anything like The Twelve Kingdoms. If anything, it feels more like an adventure series in the mould of Full Metal Alchemist or recent Studio Pierrot-influenced product The Legend of Korra. That’s not necessarily a bad thing and in a lot of ways Akatsuki no Yona seems to be getting this formula right. Yona manages to be a surprisingly likable character and her banter with the other characters actually made me chuckle pretty consistently. The audio/visual presentation is extremely good with a very solid performance by Chiwa Saito as the lead. Still, while this show seems to have a lot of the elements of a good series, it feels kind of soulless so far. The thematic content is pretty shallow and the aristocratic setting is lacking in any sort of grit to make the world feel lifelike. Then again, the show clearly has a lot of ground to cover, so I wouldn’t be surprised if we get more of that later on. But a bigger issue for me is the direction. While the individual shots look great, the pacing feels a little too convenient. Characters always show up exactly when you would expect them too and dramatic moments unfold in a way that feels a little too scripted and artificial for me. Contrary to what you would expect from the first episode in an adventure series, there isn’t much action and the action we do see is not particularly well-choreographed. It’s unclear to me whether this will change later in the series. Lack of action isn’t usually a bad thing, but if the narrative and thematic content continue to be so weak then I can’t see them carrying the show. Akatsuki no Yona does have most of the elements of an entertaining adventure series and I think it will be a modest success if it goes that route. But if the show is trying to be something more serious I’m not encouraged by this first episode.
Potential: 50%

 

Orenchi no Furo Jijou

Short Synopsis: Our protagonist has a cute merman living in his bath.

Ninjarealist’s impressions: I’m a big believer in short comedies. Teekyu and Poyopoyo are some of my favorite shows in recent memory, and they really demonstrated why the short format works so well for humor. A common problem with full-length comedy series is that the first episode will use up all the jokes and the rest of the series goes downhill from there. This doesn’t happen as often with short comedies because they’re over so quickly that there just isn’t enough time to use up all the jokes. It’s clear after the first episode that Orenchi no Furo Jijou still has a lot of cards in its hand. So far the series has barely scratched the surface of what a high-school aged boy and his handsome, physically-affectionate, merman friend might do together in a bath. The first episode was surprisingly funny. The Merman, is just completely, over-the-top, ridiculous, both in appearance and personality. This is accentuated by his seiyuu, rookie Yuuichiro Umehara, whose voice manages to be both deep and effeminate at the same time. Seeing him tease the deadpan protagonist was funnier than I expected it to be. Still, as many joking anime viewers have pointed out, this show is essentially Free! in a much smaller pool. It’s a cute guys doing cute things show. That’s not inherently a bad thing, but it doesn’t usually make for the most interesting viewing. The hilarious OP, and the sheer absurdity of the premise, both seem to suggest that this show might be a parody, and I do like parodies, but I’ve been burned too many times in the past by comedies that promise parody and just fail to deliver it. I can’t recommend this show to anyone but serious slice-of-life fans.
Potential: 35%