As I noted last week, the premiere of Nami yo Kiite Kure was a tale of two halves for me.  The A-part grated on me really hard (to the point where for a microsecond or two I considered bailing).  But I liked the B-part a lot – there were flashes there that showed something quite compelling might be lurking in this premise.  The question for me, then, was which half of that episode was more representative of the sort of show that Wave, Listen to Me! actually is.

I don’t feel I can answer that question with total confidence yet, but based on this ep I would certainly lean towards the answer I was hoping for – this was really enjoyable.  One trend about this season which I do like is that we seem to have a number of series (almost all seinen) about adults, though the flipside is that it’s showing us that alone is not enough (the series has to actually be good).  Nami is comfortable in that skin – it’s not couching its adult situations in teen anime cliches.  This actually is a series about grown-ups written by a grown-up, with a world-weary cynicism (and protagonist) that feels really authentic.

There’s a lot of foundation to build on here.  There’s a nice chemistry between Minare and Matou-san (Fuji Shinshuu is not a big seiyuu name, but he’s quite effective in this role).  Both get more interesting the more we learn about them, which is a good sign.  Matou is a bit of a lowlife – the business card “waiver” seems right up his street – but he’s sharp as a tack.  He clearly got into radio because he was bored with TV and hated having to answer to suits, and here he can be a big fish in a small pond.  I also liked the revelation that he’d been to Voyager (the successor to Gagarin, ROFL) and heard his show on the sound system – that makes what follows less absurdly coincidental.

What Matou says about Minare (whose voice apparently reminds him of a comic he used to love, though there’s obviously much more to that story) is astute as hell.  The ability to talk smoothly without sounding scripted – whether you are or not – is like gold in radio and TV.  Minare is a natural in every sense of the word, and Sugiyama Riho does a good job of portraying that.  Minare’s like a sports car with no muffler and bad steering – she’s fast, she’s loud, she doesn’t always know where she’s going, but you can’t take your eyes (and ears) off her.  She’s whip-smart too, but confused about herself and her life, a slave to her own whipsaw bursts of emotion.

This show is also very amusing.  For example, the gags about “mino was short for minotaur”, and Minare shovelling snow in her mother’s driveway were (to me) much funnier than anything in Kakushigoto (I loved the “There Was no God” and “The Earth Was Blue” – both Yuri Gagarin quotes – aprons, too).  When comedy is part of a series’ formula it’s obviously crucial for it to actually be funny, and Nami to Kiite Kure is.  But the comedy is quite grounded in real life, and Minare’s life seems to be teetering on the precipice between absurdity and despair at all times.  That’s what makes her compelling to listen to (along with her talent) and I think that’s what Matou spotted in her.

There’s an overall sense here that there’s more to everybody – from Takarada-san (Shimada Bin for the win) to Nakahara-san (clearly in love with Minare-san) to the rest of the radio gang and even Suga Mitsuo – than meets the eye. This being a (presumably) one cour adaptation of an ongoing manga is a major cause for concern, but Nami yo Kiite Kure has a lot of potential.  I think we’ve only scratched the surface of what these characters and this premise has to offer, and it took one big step out of the bubble this week.