Winter 2020 First Impressions – If My Favorite Pop Idol Made it to the Budokan I’d Die, The Case Files of Jeweler Richard, and Uchitama?! Have You Seen my Tama?

I think this is possibly the longest title I’ve ever had for a blog post, and probably one of the more confusing. I saw an amusing video recently on the seeming propensity for light novel (and, by associate, anime) titles to be extremely long, and at what time in fandom history that started to become the case. This tendency can be frustrating when you’re trying to keep new and unfamiliar series straight in your own mind, especially if you’re not also familiar with the agreed-upon shortened versions of the titles. I think that using more words to describe something isn’t always the most successful manner of doing so; it’s why I have, however unsuccessfully, attempted to make my writing more concise over the years. But I suppose when something’s literally called I’ve Been Killing Slimes for 300 Years and Maxed-out my Level, you at least know what you’re likely to get out of the experience.

If My Favorite Pop Idol Made it to the Budokan, I’d Die

Streaming: Funimation

Episodes: 12

Source: Manga

Episode Summary: Ever since she saw them perform by chance in a park one day, Cham Jam super-fan Eripiyo has been rooting for Maina, the most reserved member of the idol group. In short, Eripiyo is obsessed; she buys all of Maina’s merch, comes to every single live event, and startles her fellow fans with the sheer extremity of her devotion. Maina even seems to have picked up on the obsession, as she turns and runs or acts coldly whenever Eripiyo is around.

Eripiyo, for her part, has gotten kind of used to a life of suffering for her fandom, even waiting outside in the beating sun for hours to be first into a special Cham Jam fan event. By the time she’s inside the venue she can barely look Maina in the face, much less get a good picture with her. Her sudden bout of self-awareness makes her doubt whether or not Maina even wants her as a fan, but as it turns out Maina’s shyness toward Eripiyo is due to her own unexpectedly complicated feelings.

Impressions: Well, this episode is a complete minefield if I’ve ever seen one. The culture surrounding idols and idol groups dredges up a lot of very frustrating, contradictory feelings for me. On the one hand, as previously stated many times I like cute things quite a bit, and many if not most idol groups are pretty cute – cute clothes, cute dances, cute music… Sure, it’s a factory-produced sort of cuteness, but so are Sanrio mascots and I like that kind of thing. My issue with idol culture is that it promises in its idols a sort of pre-packaged cuteness for the consumption of a particular audience, and that audience has since decided that their money spent on products and event tickets entitles them to some say in the lives of the girls and young women in these idol groups. Theirs is a life lived without privacy, where being outed as having a love-life or for saying something “untoward” (no matter how minor) forces them into a position where they must “apologize” to their fans and atone for trying to live their own lives. I have a lot of issues with it, which are only compounded by the fact that the general set up invites grown men to obsess over younger women who project a faux sort of innocence and availability.

In this case, the superfan in question isn’t a man as would typically be expected, but instead a young woman. I wouldn’t necessarily call it a “trend” by any means, but it’s definitely a trope in some comedy anime for women to behave in a traditionally masculine way as a form of humor that subverts typical gender expectations. I have mixed feelings about this too, but that’s probably a rant for another time. What it boils down to in this case is that, as a woman among a sea of men, the way that Eripiyo distinguishes herself is by being ten times the fan as her male counterparts – ten times as obsessive, ten times as passionate, and ten times as creepy. There’s a lot here to unpack about the effort that women are sometimes forced to go to in order to be acknowledged in spaces that have typically catered primarily toward men – both fandom spaces and places of employment – but the end result is that we’re supposed to laugh when Eripiyo gets a nosebleed, or shows up so early to a fan event that she almost collapses on the pavement, because these are goofy, obsessive things that usually only men are assumed to do. No matter the gender of the person performing these acts, though, creepy is creepy.

I think that’s why the “twist” at the end of the episode, during which we learn that Maina’s shyness and standoffishness is due to affectionate feelings toward Eripiyo rather than the revilement that it at first appears to be, falls flat for me. As someone who’s seen the effects that stalking can have on other people and who’s been on the receiving end of behavior that, in retrospect, was definitely boundary-stomping, seeing it played out in front of me, even in a light-hearted way, prompts flashbacks to feelings that I’m not particularly interested in experiencing again. Maina’s secret emotions, that we the audience are privy to, gives a pass to Eripiyo’s gross behavior that it shouldn’t be getting.

This is a fact that, for me personally, slices like a knife through any kind of good humor the episode attempts to establish. It’s unfortunate, because the episode is otherwise very colorful and well-made, and anime about adult-aged women is rare enough as it is. This is just another case where the intended reaction is roadblocked by some very specific, very visceral feelings on my part.

Pros: The episode is very colorful and decently-animated.

Cons: Stalking behavior gets muddled with gag humor and falls flat.

Content Warnings: Blood (comedic: nosebleeds), general obsessive/possessiveness.

Grade: C-

The Case Files of Jeweler Richard

Streaming: Crunchyroll

Episodes: 12

Source: Novels

Episode Summary: Seigi, much like the meaning of his given name implies, has a strong sense of justice. This was instilled in him by his grandmother when he was young, as a result of some of the hard times she went through. Which is why it’s no surprise that, when Seigi sees a man getting hassled on the street at night, he steps in to rescue him. The grateful man is a foreigner named Richard Ranashinha de Vulpian, and his trade deals in the value and history of gemstones. Seigi has such an heirloom, and calls upon Richard to deduce some of its history.

Richard reveals that the stone, a small sapphire in a delicate ring setting, is likely stolen, which lets Seigi know that Richard is the real deal. Seigi’s grandmother picked pockets to survive as a single mother, and while her reasons were understandable, now that his grandmother has passed on Seigi would like to return the ring to its rightful owner. As it happens, Richard is closer to the original wearer than one might expect, and from this woman Seigi learns the details of a completely different side to his grandmother’s story. He realizes that the owner and the thief weren’t as different in circumstances as he might have assumed, and Seigi gains more perspective on his grandmother. After all is said and done, Richard offers Seigi a part time job at the gem appraisal shop he’s about to open.

Impressions: As much as we might want to believe in the simplicity of things like “bad” and “good,” human morality is rarely so clear-cut. For me, the best entertainment is that which is willing to examine the gray areas wherein people lead messy, complicated lives and can’t be easily classified as either heroes or villains. The protagonist of this series, Seigi, loved his grandmother and learned from her to be a good person, despite knowing about the actions that she was forced to undertake as a single mother in an era when people like her had very little outside support. It’s an empathetic look at a person’s struggles that I feel is very uncommon for a medium that tends to tell its stories with dramatic absolutes.

It’s also very uncommon for a series to be so forthright about the challenges women faced (and in some cases continue to face) within a society that expects them to tread a very particular life path. Seigi’s grandmother couldn’t find a “real job” to support herself and her young daughter, because society expected for a mother to stay at home with her children. Likewise, the woman from whom the ring was stolen was trapped in a very different kind of social prison, set to be married off to someone not of her choosing in order to assure her family’s continued fortune. The commonality between the two women was their lack of choice, and the revelation is that, rich or poor, their situations really weren’t that different. I sometimes think that the people I see ranting on the internet about people on welfare or those who commit petty theft for something to eat would do well to understand that, aside from a few financial circumstances (which in the case of wealth could be swept away quickly from an unfortunate job loss or, in the US at least, from medical-related bankruptcy), they have more in common with people in poverty than they might realize. That’s really the great thing about fiction; it allows us the perspective to understand other people’s circumstances and to (hopefully) choose to show compassion rather than hatred toward them.

While this episode was certainly thought-provoking to me, it’s also the type of story in which nothing particularly dramatic happens. While it’s billed as a “mystery” series, I find that genre marker generally doesn’t apply to anime-style storytelling; the mysteries are either too simple, or they’re a doorway into which human drama takes over. In either case, I don’t think this series is made for wide appeal, at least as far as anime fans are concerned (I do believe it’s a story with wider appeal as a drama that might be interesting to people who aren’t typically into anime, however). As for me, this episode, its mellow atmosphere, and its small-scale but poignant story hit me just right. It’s just the kind of quirky human drama that tends to attract me, and the upscale, genteel subject matter certainly doesn’t hurt, either.

Pros: Tells a very human story that delves into society’s gray areas. Mellow and soothing atmosphere.

Cons: Will likely be boring for most viewers. Seems to fall into the “mystery” genre very loosely.

Content Warnings: Attempted suicide. Attempted forced marriage. Minor physical fighting.

Grade: B

Uchitama?! Have You Seen my Tama?

Streaming: Funimation and Crunchyroll (Crunchyroll stream begins on February 10th)

Episodes: 11

Source: Spinoff of Tama and Friends

Episode Summary: Tama is a little cat with a spot on his head and a kinked tail, and he’s very good at getting lost. When his owner Takeshi realizes that Tama is missing, he does the same thing he does every time – he puts “missing cat” posters up. As it turns out, Tama is just wandering Ward 3 with his best friend Pochi. Along they way they discover all sorts of interesting things, like treats, other friends, and a new dog in town.

Later the other dogs try to meet that new dog, but hold off once they discover how much of a weirdo he is. The cats, on the other hand, hear about a paradise called “Waiha,” and they search all over to discover what this magical place could be. While doing so, one of them narrowly avoids getting hurt. It’s then that Nora, a stray cat, lets them know what Waiha actually means.

Impressions: This certainly seems to be the season for characters with animal ears, doesn’t it? I genuinely didn’t know what to expect from this series until I started doing a bit of research in preparation for this review. Only having seen the key art for this season, I had no idea that this was an adaptation (or a re-imagining, I suppose) of a much older children’s cartoon starring Sanrio-style cutesy animal characters. This incarnation, besides looking much more modern, also has other… differences.

This version seems to take after material like Sanrio Boys in that it couples attractive human characters with a classic kid’s property to very unusual effect. In this case, the animal characters occasionally appear as their original character designs, but more often as their humanoid versions. They trade fur and wet noses for stylish clothing that reflects their differing personalities and circumstances. I wouldn’t say the effect is off-putting so much as it is extremely strange and I’m not sure exactly how to react; the characters flip back and forth between both designs even as they behave exactly as their animal natures would indicate. Luckily when they’re interacting with other humans, they aren’t also shown in their humanoid versions (although that would be hilarious, don’t get me wrong). I think my reaction to it all is best summed-up by “huh.”

I was surprised to learn that this particular adaptation was airing on Fuji TV’s noitaminA anime block. It’s been a while since I’ve talked about noitaminA, but to summarize it’s a broadcast block traditionally known for airing animation that appeals to adults who aren’t necessarily “traditional” anime fans. For a long time it seemed to be targeting women viewers, but over the years there have been quite the variety of (mostly) very good anime series that have a fairly wide appeal. This series seems starkly out of place when compared to many of the past noitaminA series, but considering the franchise’s age it may be the nostalgia factor that’s the key. Kind of the way in which the new She-Ra Netflix series seems nominally targeted toward tweens, but definitely appeals to adults my age who grew up with the original.

In any case, while I wouldn’t call this episode great, it was definitely entertaining. It has to be one of the goofiest and unintentionally strangest anime episodes I’ve watched lately. If anything, watching the characters bounce between both of their forms with seemingly little rhyme or reason gave me a good chuckle, and sometimes that’s more than enough.

Pros: Both the animal and humanoid versions of the characters are pretty cute in most cases. The episode is definitely funny (whether intentional or not).

Cons: Seems odd for a noitaminA series.

Content Warnings: Animals in mild peril.

Grade: B-