Summer 2022 First Impressions – Uncle From Another World

Streaming: Netflix

Episodes: 13

Source: Manga

Episode Summary: Seventeen years ago, Takafumi’s uncle was hit by truck-kun, and while his earthly body seemed to be in a coma in the hospital, his mind was far, far away having adventures in another world. When his uncle finally wakes up, Takafumi assumes that the weird language he’s speaking is just the ramblings of a crazy person, but once his uncle demonstrates some honest-to-goodness magical ability, Takafumi begins to understand the potential for profit he may have just stumbled into.

While their YouTube career starts as a bit of a slow burn, Takafumi learns more about his uncle’s experiences while his uncle wrestles with catching up with seventeen years’ worth of technological advances and changes in the video game console landscape. While his uncle has always seemingly had issues dealing with real human relationships (his fondest memories are of video games), Takafumi learns that his uncle may have inadvertently become closer to a young woman in the other world than he may have realized at the time. As Takafumi and his uncle try to work out a way of sustaining themselves and their meager lifestyle, could his uncle’s “interesting” past come back to haunt him?

Impressions: Within the past year, having been put through my fill of extremely similar first episodes of isekai anime, I started to have thoughts of potentially coming up with my own take on the genre, examining the psychology of someone who’s been hailed as a hero in another world being forced to return to our world and live as a normal human being again. Like most of my big ideas I’ve made literally zero effort to follow through, but I sometimes return to it as an interesting thought experiment when I’m feeling especially down about having to watch yet another male power fantasy play out before my very eyes.

Uncle From Another World isn’t exactly a full expression of this idea – while Takafumi’s uncle clearly didn’t have the best time in either the real world or the fantasy world the story doesn’t seem to be directly about any potential emotional or psychological scars he may have received due to his experiences. However, it is a very fun, and funny, look at how someone transported to another world might actually be treated by the locals, as well as a pretty humorous overview of how video game and anime culture have changed and mutated since the turn of the 21st century – something which will feel especially relevant to people around my own age cohort (I graduated from high school in the year 2000).

There’s a gag that repeats throughout the episode in regards to Uncle’s Sega fandom and how the console wars was at one time a very big deal in gamer circles. I remember this stuff vividly, and how important it was at one time to pick sides and formulate an identity around that (I’ve always been a Nintendo fan, but weirdly enough I had both consoles). Some of the advertisements from that era seem tacky beyond belief (and a lot of them were sexist, to boot). It definitely was a time and place, but compared to a lot of the post GG gaming internet, it certainly feels funny and quaint. It was fun to briefly relive some of that via this episode.

This episode actually managed to make me laugh a few times, which is honestly a real feat. While I can’t claim to know whether or not the show’s central gag will remain funny throughout its run, I was much more entertained by this episode than I would have expected and think that this might be a fun one to pick up (especially since Netflix is actually posting it somewhat weekly rather than all-at-once as usual).

Pros: I like how this episode reveals some of the positives and negatives about our modern world. Back in 2000-whatever, we didn’t have to deal with YouTube (or its related comments sections), Amazon wasn’t the huge overwhelming force it’s become, and there weren’t smartphones to keep us constantly “online” with no reprieve. Life certainly wasn’t all rainbows and roses, but there were benefits to being able to completely log off. That being said, I’m not sure I’d trade my modern life to go back. In any case, I think this creates an interesting conflict for the characters in this series, even if it isn’t the main focus.

Likewise, I hadn’t realized how much of the culture of anime and its related media was being codified in the early 2000s because it was happening organically as I was living through the midst of it. I think this fact lends an interesting angle to Uncle’s character. He’s kind of a “loser” in love and in life, but because he was removed from the equation prior to the rise of the more malignant brand of “women owe me sex” character, his perception of his situation is more in line with being unlucky than anything else. It’s not great, but it’s better than the alternative, anyway.

Cons: I worry a bit that some of the humor can be too cynical. A lot of it arises from Uncle not really understanding the full implications of some of his own experiences, as well as the general awfulness of the general population of the other world. There’s an element of tragedy to some of it that I’m not sure I like. I more prefer the ridiculousness of making money from YouTube videos of on person appearing to stab someone else (by pulling a knife in and out of an other-dimensional storage space) to laughing directly at someone’s misfortune.

Content warnings: Magical violence. Brief nudity.

Would I Watch More? – I rarely laugh when I’m watching something on my own, so it speaks to this episode’s humor that I actually had a few chuckles alone in my office. I’m not expecting anything too groundbreaking, but I’m definitely interested in watching some more.