Hataraku Saibou – 01

No one is more obsessed with anthropomorphizing stuff than the Japanese.  I’ve always chalked it up to the importance of the Shinto belief system here, where Kami inhabit almost everything, but whatever the reason it’s a phenomenon which plays a huge role in Japanese culture.  Advertising is certainly overrun with it, and it makes plenty of appearances in manga and anime, too.

Enter Hataraku Saibou, which extends the joke to the cells within the human body (and a few outside invaders, too).  It’s a cute gag but hardly original, and I don’t know if there’s enough to it to sustain a full-length series.  The humor already started feeling pretty “Groundhog Day” to me by the end of this episode, in fact, though there were some clever moments (I enjoyed that “one-way” valve bit).

The series is certainly peopled with big-name actors, and David Productions actually does a very nice job with the visuals.  The issue for me is it’s just not that funny, but as we know humor is about the most subjective thing there is in anime and everything else, so your mileage certainly may vary.

Asobi Asobase – 01

Every season there’s a series or two that was pretty much off my radar, which I end up giving a look based on recommendations from here or twitter.  Sometimes it clocks, sometimes it doesn’t, but I’m always happy to give it a shot – there’s a lot more to be gained than lost.  And Asobi Asobase is one of those shows.

Sadly, though, this wasn’t one which really clicked for me.  There were some positive signs going in – Kishi Seiji directing and Kakihara Yuuko adapting primarily.   I did laugh a few times during this premiere, but more light chuckles than anything else.  And seriously, I was sick of the deformed faces before I was even sick of the humor.

Kishi-sensei is a funny sort of director.  He can be superb, and he’s helmed some of my favorite series over the past decade.  But he’s also directed a lot of crap, frankly.  Whether the issue is that he’s only as good as the material or that he sometimes mails it in I don’t know – I suspect it’s some of both.  But he can be a bit hyperactive at times, and while it worked a treat in Jinrui wa Suitai Shimashita, that was a very different show.  Jinrui had a staggering amount of wit and intelligence behind the manic comedy – Asobi Asobase seems to pretty much be just the manic part.

This show isn’t crap, mind you – it has its moments (the Detective Conan bit, and the general premise of the Japan-raised gaijin who can’t speak English pretending she can’t speak Japanese is pretty amusing), and the cast does a good job (though Nagae Rika sure can’t hold a candle to Gotou Yuuko).  It might work for me if it were 5 minutes, but not 22.  This summer, the quest continues…