In the first place, let me just say that Sono Bisque Doll wa Koi wo Suru is very good at what it does. That said, I’m a bit more unsure about whether I like what it does than I was after the premiere. This definitely feels like a series where it’s going to take a while to sort through my reactions both instinctual and intellectual. Which is a bit of a problem when it’s only 12 episodes. And that also makes one question the choice in making eps like this one, which could hardly have been narrower in focus. But it’s far too early to worry about that.
I knew the fanservice was going to be pretty heavy with this show. The first episode had a bit, but boy – the volume on that was turned way up here. As I’ve noted ad nauseam I don’t have a problem with fanservice when it’s tasteful and plot-relevant. I guess when you have a protagonist who’s addicted to eroge and another making outfits to feed that addiction, it’s plot-relevant. Is it tasteful? In what’s already a subjective enterprise to begin with (anime criticism) that’s about as subjective as you can get. It’s artfully done, to be sure. But I think I could do with a little less of it than we got this week.
A bigger concern for me, frankly, is Marin. I said last week that she was the reason My Dress-Up Darling works as well as it does. To an extent I still think that, but boy – she pushed the envelope this time. I love the fact that she’s sincerely passionate about what she loves. And that she doesn’t care what people think of her. And I love the fact that Wakana responds to that, especially the part about escaping gender stereotypes. He’s hardly flawless himself, obviously, and he can certainly learn something from Marin. And that fact that he realizes that is a good sign for his character arc.
But that whole measuring scene, wow. I mean, it took up the entire episode for starters. And the episode was basically one joke – Wakana’s supreme embarrassment. The first thing I wonder is: what are we supposed to believe about this? Are we intended to disdain Wakana for reacting how he does? Because I’ll be honest, any normal kid his age is probably going to be in the same boat. I don’t mind being kept guessing about a writer’s perspective – it’s interesting to a point. But in extreme cases (like Shigatsu wa Kimi no Uso) that perspective can be warped enough to be a deal-breaker. This is nothing like on that level but it is a cautionary note.
Ultimately this is most important for what it says about Marin as a character. And frankly she’s either unbelievably (choice of word intentional) clueless, or a bit of a mean-spirited tease. I find it hard to buy a 17 year-old girl who plays 18+ games being unaware of the impact her actions were having. She had to know – come on. All that “what’s the problem?” stuff seemed genuine at the time, but is anyone that obtuse? If she’s not, it was rather cruel of her to keep torturing Wakana like that. And keep. And keep…
Charitably, I want to believe it’s a matter of Marin being so enthusiastic about cosplay generally and Shizuku-tan specifically that she forgets what she knows when she really throws herself into it. She had one moment where she became embarrassed herself – when Wakana held the measuring tape up to her crotch – but never once did she seem to acknowledge his discomfort. She did at least thank him at school – which she damn well should since he’s doing her a pretty big favor, but some anime characters wouldn’t have. But seriously, she needed to pump the brakes a little bit there.
Whatever the case with Marin, I suppose the key factor is where the narrative takes the story from here. The measuring thing might not have been so off-putting if it had lasted five minutes or even half the episode, rather than the whole thing. But if Sono Bisque Doll wa Koi wo Suru is basically going to be 20 minutes of Wakana being humiliated for his innocence every week, that’s going to have a pretty short shelf-life as entertainment – even with some very artful fanservice in the mix. Based on the premiere I’d like to think there’s much more to it, and to this relationship. If there isn’t this series is basically a dime-a-dozen – and what I’ve seen so far has the potential to be much more than a dime-a-dozen.
Derrick
January 16, 2022 at 4:26 pmIf only the studio could elevate this by curating better from the source.
Marin felt like heavily engineered to be a hit to the Anime zeitgeist.
Guardian Enzo
January 16, 2022 at 6:52 pmCan’t speak to the source, only the anime version. I hope she’s more like the premiere and less like this episode.
WizardOfOss
January 16, 2022 at 6:40 pmWhile I very much enjoyed this episode, I hope the rest of the series will focus more on plot and less on Plot. That final scene was comedy gold though….
Guardian Enzo
January 16, 2022 at 6:51 pmThe 1 minute at the beginning and end were better than the 20 minutes in-between.
Nellie
January 16, 2022 at 7:19 pmI believe Marin and Wakana are 15-16- they’re high school freshmen.
As a manga fan I immediately thought, “Crud, next week will have the measurements scene. I hope it doesn’t cause Enzo to rage-quit.”
If it’s of any comfort to to you, this is about as concentrated as the ecchi gets. I think I can say this much- I don’t think Bisque Doll is a mean-spirited series. Beneath all the fanservice trappings there’s a genuine sweetness to the story.
Nellie
January 16, 2022 at 7:27 pmJust to clarify- The statement between inverted commas was what I thought last week after dropping a comment on your review on the premiere. J
Guardian Enzo
January 16, 2022 at 7:45 pmThe fanservice was much less of a problem for me than a joke which wasn’t that funny being dragged out for 20 minutes. It didn’t show off either the characters’ or the story’s best side, that’s for sure.
Marty
January 16, 2022 at 8:19 pmNow, I don’t want to sound like an old curmudgeon over here, but I wad always under the impression that the difference between a two-piece swimsuit and standard underwear was context, since both sets of fabric pretty much cover roughly the same amount of skin (I could be wrong on that since I’m not a woman tho).
That being said, I remember a past review (maybe a few years ago, now that I think about it), u might’ve mentioned something along the lines of, “high school anime commonly has the students behave with the maturity and awareness of middle schoolers,” and I think that’s at the core of my issues with the episode:
Marin SHOULD be aware that her swimsuit shows a lot of skin and that would make a boy (one she literally met like, a day or two ago) very flustered.
Gojo, even for a sheltered kid’s perspective, is waaayyyyy too flustered. Like, I understood his reaction at first, but once he turned serious, I thought the joke would end there, but the episode kept zigzagging between him doing his measurements competently and being a mess.
I have heard from comments by manga fans online this is probably as fanservicey as it gets, so hopefully the shows comedy won’t rely on scenarios like these TOO much.
Guardian Enzo
January 16, 2022 at 8:51 pm‘s funny, I was thinking at the time “Seriously, Girl – do you really think it makes a difference wearing that instead of underwear?” One and the same as far as the guy is concerned.
I don’t know that Gojo was really that much more flustered than he should have been. He’s 16 (apparently), has no social life and indeed, may even have social anxiety disorder. I think we cam assume he’s never talked to a girl for more than a few sentences before Marin the day before, and now this incredibly hot chick wants him to wrap measuring tape around all her bouncy bits? I can’t even imagine how I would have acted in that situation as a frosh in high school, and I had at least a somewhat normal social life (at least as far as male friends were concerned).
DonkeyWan
January 18, 2022 at 3:11 amHated this episode. 20 minutes of measuring up waifu = 100% fan service, imo. The coy innocence of it all was pure irritation. That and the unrealistic behaviour of the protagonist. The agonising and too pure embarassment was teeth grindingly awful. The same scene replayed over and over speaks of stretching limited material to it’s fullest. I fully expected his grandad to stumble in and a trope scene to play out, but we were spared that I guess. Just felt like 20 minutes wasted to me. I did enjoy the bit where his grandfather came in and had a chat with him while he played the game at full volume. That was the redeemer for me. But much more like this and it’s getting deleted.
Rob Barrett
January 19, 2022 at 1:42 pmI’m on the fence here as well but am giving the show another week or two’s worth of chances because Miss Nagotoro also started off as a particularly mean-spirited show (I’m in the camp that reads both young women as knowing exactly what they’re doing to the male protagonists–how else to read Marin’s smile in 02-38 above?) and turned things around. The key moment in Miss Nagotoro came when the show makes it clear that Nagotoro isn’t particularly all that experienced, that her teasing is in fact a ham-handed way for her to explore her own desires and identity. Maybe the moment where Marin is suddenly embarrassed will signal a similar move here, but it had better happen quickly.
sonicsenryaku
January 23, 2022 at 5:44 amI loved miss nagatoro, even with episode 1 being the way it was. There are always signs that usually point to the direction a show is going to take: there are signs when the show may nosedive off a cliff, there are signs when a show has no real direction, and then there are signs when characters are being written with purpose, even if you don’t necessarily like them right away or find them repulsive. The moment Nagatoro had a different, more profound reaction when she looked at her sempai’s art as oppossed to the reactions of her friends; that’s when I had a feeling I had a grasp of where the show might go. Sometimes the clues are just laying there. In Miss Nagatoro, lied a duality: if you’re a hard M, you were satisfied by the intense teasing, if you liked wholesomeness, and the prospect that Nagatoro would learn to become a better individual, then you were also satisfied. The story was made with both camps in mind from the looks of it
I like being teased
January 22, 2022 at 4:24 pmIs Marin being a tease a bad thing? Are you not a masochist, Enzo? I had a girl lead me on incredibly heavily for over a year once before turning me down when I confessed to her. It really turned me on the way that she played with my feelings so much, and I’ve been a proud maso ever since.
sonicsenryaku
January 23, 2022 at 5:36 amIt’s funny, I never once got the feeling Marin was trying to be mean-spirited to Wakana, nor that she’s just unrealistically dumb/naive (there’s a caveat here that I’ll be getting into later). What I see is a girl who is not only extremely passionate about her hobby, but also deeply respects Wakana and his craft/knowledge. Marin respects Wakana so much, that she’s willing to be vulnerable to him in a way that she probably wouldn’t with others because she sees them as partners who can achieve similar goals. Once she established that connection with him, the only thing her mind can think of is; “There’s someone I can finally express my hobbies through; and since he knows so much, we’ll be best of partners. I’m so excited; it’s just you and me, buddy. We’re gonna conquer the cosplaying scene no matter what it takes.”
Clearly Marin understands that on some level, Wakana is conservative about seeing lady bits. She says it clearly enough when Wakana expresses worry about seeing her in her underwear and responds by saying, “I figured you’d react that way.” It’s just that her solution, which is to wear a bikini instead, is ineffective and ultimately doesn’t change anything. Marin at the end of the day is kind of a goofball if that wasn’t clear already; she literally pats herself on the back and calls herself a genius (which i found funny as shit) because she genuinely thinks that society’s acceptance of bathing suits in beach settings over wearing underwear would somehow make this pubescent teenager more comfortable. Marin has utterly convinced herself of this; and that’s where we see cracks in her people intelligence. She’s definitely not dumb (especially not for the sake of the plot), and it shows. She knows that her being the opposite sex would have an affect on Wakana; it’s just that she’s so comfortable with the whole process that she fails to see how uncomfortable he is. Keep in mind that in Marin’s head, she thinks she’s already done everything feasibly possible to make the experience as comfortable for him as she possibly can: She wore the bathing suit (again, not a solid solution but the humor is that she thinks she’s solved cold fusion by coming up with this), she’s told him she’s not uncomfortable, she offered to close her eyes when he was measuring her head; of course she’d be like “what’s your deal, what’s wrong; I don’t get it. Why won’t you do these measurements, man?” What she doesn’t realize, like most people in real life tend not to realize from time to time, is that you can tell someone you’re cool with something, but it’s not gonna wash away their anxiety right away. Wakana ain’t anxious cuz he worried about your anxiety, girl; he’s anxious cuz you’re hot as shit and he’s a teenage boy. As done to earth as you may be, you still got lady bits. Marin is just too busy in her own head thinking that she’s catered to the problem when we as the audience know that’s not true, which is being used for comedic effect; not to berate or shame Wakana. The joke just unfortunately went on for too long, which I would I would say hurt the pace of the episode. Good thing it only lasted 10 minutes and not the entire 20 min run of the episode.
Anyway, I don’t sense an iota of mean spiritedness and everything the anime has shown us so far would easily dispute that notion. Marin has her moments of being playful with him but they’re clearly her trying to have a bit of levity in the situation they’re in. This is just a horny, wholesome anime; nothing more, nothing less. However, seeing Marin not shame Wakana throughout the process and her treating him with respect throughout the ep were character moments I genuinely appreciated. Curious to see where this wholesome-budding romance goes. Takagi is where I go for my sweet, vanilla romance fix and hopefully, my dress-up darling ends up being good enough for me to get my horny wholesome romance fix from.