Working!! #01 — To Catch A Predator

March 7th, 2010

 

Starring Chris Hansen.

You know, I’ve gotten used to having weekends free. I can just sit around, catch up on random stuff, translate some tentacles, make a week’s supply of muffins and then have muffins for lunch and dinner for the next two days… you know… the good life. And then random new shows air their first episode a month ahead of time. Dammit, Japan.

Impressions:

Well, this was… something. The ‘touching’ story of an admitted pedophile and the restaurant he works in. I hope you are a very very slow study, because the jokes in this show are repeated so many times that Xerox should be sueing A-1 for infringement. The entire first half of the episode is "Taneshima is small… ISN’T THAT CUTE?" I think A-1 may be getting a tad jaded with the anime viewing population lately. It’s a shame too, because this show is actually pretty well made from a purely technical standpoint. I’m not going to do anything so crazy as to say that it impressed me, but the animation and movement was a lot more fluid and resorted to far fewer formless blobs than most shows of this ilk, and especially the ones that A-1 makes. This is probably the closest that they’ve come to striking a decent balance between character art, background art, and animation.

Sadly, though, the writing is where it really collapses. Keitaro The pedophile is just about the only interesting one of the cast, and that’s only interesting in the same way that I find loach interesting. The rest of the cast is cut right out of the same cookie cutter collection as a billion other terrible pseudo harems. The idiot loli, the older girl sensitive about her age, the one afraid of men, the one with a sword (except when they forget to draw it), and both a sullen and a friendly male sidekick. Maybe they’ll differentiate themselves from the moulds eventually, but given that they spent 10 minutes on "TANESHIMA IS SMALL!" I wouldn’t put any significant amount of money on that bet. Belated Edit: Scamp pretty much nailed the show’s entire humor formula, and there’s really very little outside of that.

Overally, I don’t really have a strong feeling about it. If they picked up the pace a bit, or varied the jokes a little a lot more, this would be better, but I’m already really tired of the only four or five jokes that were in this episode, and the thought of hearing them again week after week fills me with something other than enthusiasm… although there’s probably at least even odds that that’s actually just one of the three blueberry muffins I had for dinner fighting back.

The actual broadcast starts on April 4th. Maybe I’ll reevaluate my opinion then. Or once I figure out what the hell is even airing next season.

Posted in Working!! | 14 Comments »

14 Shouts From the Peanut Gallery

  • hashi says:

    Complete disagreement here. I thought that was a hilarious episode, with just the kind of absurd and humane humor I love. The characters were unique, the lines droll, and the characters all wonderful. If it continues to be this good, it could get into the same league as Baka to Test or even Seitokai no Ichizon, for me. The voice-acting was excellent, especially from the two central characters: the 16-year-old moe-con played by Fukuyama Jun and the 17-year-old loli played by Asumi Kana. Ah, well, senses of humor differ. Your opinion may be a better guide for your readers than mine is.

  • Vegetarian4Life says:

    It’s nice to finally see a fun to watch anime without excessive fanservice!

    I agree that it was pretty hilarious and well made.

  • skurai says:

    Figures that they had to make the loli older than the guy, still I have to say she does look childish, hard to see her having 17 years, kind of makes you wonder if there are girls like that in the real world (I have yet to meet one, but that’s just me).

    • DmonHiro says:

      Yes, there are. I know 2. One is 22 and the other is 21, and they both look like they’re 15.

  • vucubcaquix says:

    My 22 year old sister is 4’10”, so my suspension of disbelief tends to go very far when it comes to older characters looking like lolis.

    In short, I kinda liked this episode, as my younger sis is also very short and very cute.

  • skurai says:

    Good to know that someone has seen such a rare breed lol

  • Anon says:

    So, you don’t like it? What a BIG surprise.

  • Rei says:

    I really really enjoyed this first episode :P

  • Anonymous says:

    That’s a lot of muffins.

  • Fate says:

    Uh, I thought this was really meh.

  • Thomassmash says:

    Yeah I agree, this was just..just..too normal!
    loli
    sword girl
    young oba-chan
    phedophile

    those are really common and even more if they don’t stand out, at least in some animes they have weird clothing or characteristics! but this was totally meh, except for the daphia

    • Kaisos says:

      How is the LEAD being a pedophile and a waitress serving tables while carrying a katana “normal”…?

      I mean, sure the show is generic as hell, but you don’t see stuff like this too often.

  • Anonymous says:

    Kannagi looks far better than this show by the way.

  • TOP2NE1 says:

    While I don’t agree that this show is as mind-blowingly mediocre as Aroduc makes it out to be, it wasn’t as amusing as others seem to say either.

    Most of what the lead says is fairly funny. I mean as of now, he’s the show’s saving character. Meh, we’ll see how the next few go.