It seems pretty absurd to call something a bubble series when it’s more than half over.  But Mieruko-chan and Saihate no Paladin (exactly halfway finished) are the two series I’m most genuinely on the fence about.  I suppose I’m likely to finish both of them at this point, but of the two Mieruko-chan seems likes the safer bet.  I still shake my head at the gross, leering quality of the fanservice – the gratuitous shower, the jiggling boobs.  It’s not played for comedy or relevant to the plot – it just has the quality of dirty old men ogling at schoolgirls on the train at this point.  But that is what it is, and it hasn’t been enough to drive me off yet.  The rest is really pretty decent.

I’m not that nuts for Yulia as a character, and more than Hana (and perhaps less).  They’re both pretty hard-core tropey, and both have personalities that can be a lot to take.  But I do find the premise of Mieruko-chan pretty interesting, and both Miko’s friends are quite important in the mechanics of that premise.  The series is quite good at setting up the paranormal encounters, even if it can be fairly monotonal in the way it goes about it.  The whole schtick here is forcing us to see (and feel) things from Miko’s POV, and that flat-out works most of the time.

Yulia’s obsession with Miko isn’t any funnier than Hana’s relentless sweet tooth, but at least it got us one or two answers to open questions (of which there are a lot).  She uses Hana’s ebullience over her shrine pic (which is seriously fucked up when you can see what we see) to goad Miko into joining the two of them on a trip to a photo spot in the mountains – a pretext to get Miko into a disused road tunnel.  You can pretty much assume any tunnel in Japan is rumored to be haunted – they’re creepy anyway, but have a particular hold on devotees of the occult here (there’s one above Arashiyama in Kyoto that’s purported to be the most haunted spot in Japan – and it’s still in use for traffic).

Hana is a-scairt to go in as any sensible person would be, but Miko of course has legit reasons to be worried.  What really interests me about this scenario is the matter of why Miko can see the really terrifying spirits, but Yulia only the small and harmless ones – what’s up with that?  Because of her limited sight (and intellect, if we’re blunt) Yulia attributes the carnage the really bad one is inflicting on the ones she can see to Miko exorcising them, further fueling both her obsession and her inferiority complex.

Another interesting unknown – just what happens when Miko actually acknowledges these beings’ existence?  Are they capable of inflicting physical or spiritual harm on her?  It’s strongly implied here that the really scary one was about to do just that, had Miko’s 500¥ not turned out to be the bargain of the century.  And now we know what “three times” means – although one does wonder if she could recharge the account simply by returning to the shrine and popping another 500 in the offering box.

I suspect we’re not going to get all our answers this season, as the adaptation seems set to burn through most of the source material.  I see indications that this show is proving pretty popular, so I wouldn’t be surprised to see it do well enough commercially to get a sequel – though that wouldn’t be possible for some time.  I guess the fact that I’m curious enough to care is a sign that Mieruko-chan is working well enough to keep me around.