I’m pretty close to the official opt-in with Tonari no Youkai-san. This show is genuinely interesting, because it’s more than a simple healing slice of life with Shinto overtones (which anime has had plenty of already). It’s about as comprehensive a folklore depiction as you can get, for starters, which is a plus if you love folklore as much as I do. Why do people seek bigfoot and search for UFOs? Because we want them to be real. We want the world we live in to be bigger than we can comprehend, to still have mysteries – because in the modern age so much has been explained.
HORATIO:
O day and night, but this is wondrous strange.HAMLET:
And therefore as a stranger give it welcome.
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
I think the importance of mystery to the health of the human psyche is vastly underrated. And one of the things I appreciate about Tonari no Youkai-san is not just how comprehensive its mythology is, but that it feels no compulsion to explain it. The matter of fact way in which Fuchigamori accepts its (to us) bizarre reality is part of the spell the series weaves. We did find out at least that the place is not some isolated island of youkai-human interaction – Japan as a whole accepts this, as witness the importance of Sanmoto (Mikami Satoshi, an underrated seiyuu who’s really great here), a Tokyo-based maou-turned celebrity spokesman for the youkai community in Japan.
We’ve had references to Kami already but this is the first time one actually appears. First a Bunmei, splintered off from the local Dragon Goddess, appears before Tazenbou and his fishing buddies (including a cyclops), and later the dragon Herself. As for Sanmoto, after Jirou tells him about Buchio’s struggle to find meaning in his transformation into a nekomata he invites Buchio to Tokyo. There his nekomata assistant Sakai-san (Kawasumi Ayako) makes introductions and eventually Sanmoto offers Buchio a job. He wants to start working, but to help his family – and he can’t do that by moving away.
In the end this is the meaning Buchio is searching for. Though it was already pretty obvious to us, he transformed out of a sense of gratitude to his human family (especially Mom) that a mere twenty years wasn’t long enough to satisfy. Now he has the opposite problem, since the lives of humans are a blink in the span of a youkai. But, like the car tsukumogami he meets later at driving school (ROFL), Buchio can pledge to stay with his humans for the rest of their days. The whole driving school thing is pretty hilarious, with “Wagen” (wagon) revealing that because he was a German car he had to become a Japanese citizen before he could a license. You know, because he’s now a self-driving car.
After a scary incident with a Raiju (Storm God) falling from a rift in the sky at school (Chekov’s rift), the Dragon Goddess appears before the tengu (and Buchio). She explains her appearance to Buchio by telling him she wants to make the humans she interacts with comfortable by appearing as an idol. She then warns him that while Sanmoto is okay for the moment, Buchio should never let his guard down around a Demon King. Trusting Buchio wants to think the best of everyone, and calls Sakai to share his concerns. “Everyone has two faces”, she tells him, “and that’s not a bad thing at all”.
There’s real wisdom in that. And one gets the sense that there’s a wisdom behind Tonari no Youkai-san’s perspective on life. It’s fantasy, but like all good fantasy it uses the tools at its disposal to observe reality in a way “realistic” fiction can’t. On the whole I think this show is pretty smart and has interesting things to say, and that’s a rock-solid basis around which to build a story.
Nadavu
April 29, 2024 at 4:07 amThat part with Wagen needing to become a Japanese citizen was a bit over the top unrealistic – I mean, the most he can hope for is to become a resident, right?
While I do enjoy this show quite a bit, it feels a bit disjointed at times. But my biggest complaint is that there are just too many Youkai around. I get it, Japan’s population is shrinking and Youkai don’t seem to die very often, so it makes sense that the ratio would go in their favor, eventually. But it’s starting to feel that humans are but a small minority. Were there even any at the driving school? I only saw Youkai. And I’m not sold on the idea that a Youkai-majority society makes sense when they seemingly just go along with the existing system.
Guardian Enzo
April 29, 2024 at 9:45 amAren’t there two humans in this group?
https://lostinanime.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Tonari-no-Youkai-san-04-26.jpg
Nadavu
April 29, 2024 at 8:00 pmI’m betting one of them, if not both, are human-looking youkai
Nicc
May 1, 2024 at 8:09 amThe cast grows some more in this episode as Buchio wants to figure out what to do with his new life. He’s been looking up jobs that he can take up and I’m pretty sure there are a decent amount of job openings for someone who can transform into others at will. But, it looks like he’ll have to get some wheels first as it’s hard to get around the countryside without a car. I’m just wondering if he’ll be driving in cat form or in human form. A cat-sized car should be cheaper, yeah? I expect that insurance rates will be higher for a newly born youkai too.
But first, he’s headed to Tokyo as Jiro referred him Sanmoto, who is a celebrity that’s based there. It’s somebody that could help Buchio find himself and, as you said, find meaning in his new life. It turns out all of Japan is just like the village where humans and youkai live and work side-by-side. So, is the rest of the world like this too? Perhaps the Enfield Horror and the Mothman of North America were just misunderstood creatures and Sasquatch is just naturally out-of-focus to human eyes.
He’s greeted by Sanmoto’s assistant, Sakaki, who turns out she’s a nekomata like Bucchio. Just like Yuri, she’s so used to transforming that it seems that she can hold it all day long and that her default form is human. It seems that she and Sanmoto go a long way back and he helped her when she was reborn as a nekomata. Right, Sanmoto himself is a youkai and also a Demon King with some unusual powers. Indeed, Sanmoto does offer him a job (And treats him to Thai food) which Bucchio might accept someday, but for now he wants to stay with his family. It’s driven home that he was reborn as a nekomata due to the gratitude he feels towards his family.
Then, it’s driving school time. An interesting touch earlier on is that Yuri helps run a laundromat which has washing machines of different heights. Oh yeah, I remember about learning how to drive. That was back when schools still offered driver’s ed classes over the summer. The funding for that was cut in our state and so I don’t know if that’s the same for other places. At the driving school where Buchio is at, that’s where we meet “Wagen”, a car tsukumogami. I was wondering when we’d get to see him. He can transform between a car a humanoid, though he keeps his car face in humanoid form. Yep, it was amusing that he still needs to get a driver’s licence to errr… drive himself.
Then, Buchio gets to meet a Dragon Goddess. Right, the gods have been mentioned before, but this is the first on who actually shows up. We see Jirou fly for the first time as he guides an enormous dragon from the sky towards a safe landing. She touches down in human form as to not alarm humans. I wonder who her favorite idol is. She is right that everybody has at least two faces.
The incident with the raiju is interesting as it looks like it’s not normal for something like this to happen. A rift opened in the sky and it fell near the school. Luckily, the teachers at the school were able to subdue it, though it gave quite a scare to everybody at the school. Jirou later guided it back to where it belongs. These rifts are something that are being tracked by some government agency and the episode ends on that note. It sounds like something troublesome.