MM! #10 — A Surprising Lack of Leather

December 3rd, 2010

 

Okay, I can buy the nun, but a traffic cop? They’re the model of sadism? Remind me to never get a parking ticket in Japan.

Impressions:

A fairly cute episode, even if it’s plainly evident that the characters and development are stuck in the spin cycle for this episode to make way for the last two. Yuuno gets it into her head that Tarou prefers a sadistic girl like Mio, so tries to become one by yelling at him and feeding him bricks, but is still small potatoes compared to Mio so off to train. Yada yada, sadism contest, yada yada, "I like the normal Yuuno the most," yada yada, status quo restored. Everybody’s ready to move onto sad faces and some sudden massive drama for the penultimate episode next week. Hopefully they’ll at least do half as good a job with the obligatory dramatic finish as they did with Yuuno’s earlier scenes. At the very least, I hope Noa stays far far away from it.

I expected a little more from the sadism contest though, especially the middle "silent sadism" part. That was just weak. The "prop sadism" at the end is also not going to go down as one of the more inspired sequences of this show. I do wish Tarou was a little more responsive and/or receptive to Yuuno instead of being a big dumb thickheaded brick. At least he rattled off that he likes her without freaking out about it, but regardless, all these scenes where Yuuno tries to touch him and breaks down could be made so much better if she got a little bit further each time or if he noticed her trying for him instead of the cookie cutter approach that they’ve been using. Show progression, damn it. Don’t just copy/paste these scenes over and over again.

*ahem* Anyway. It was back to Yuuno at least and looks like it’s going to be focused on her for the last few episodes. Her side of the story and relationship with Tarou is at least consistently and cohesively presented, even if the dynamic is stuck in the hamster wheel at the moment. Even though it’s Xebec, I’m really hoping they actually pull out an ending from the obligatory incoming drama instead of the usual big ol’ anime reset. Well, what I’m really hoping for is that no part of the ending involves Dragon Ball, but a real ending is a close second.

Preview:

Yuuno vs Mio for super reals this time.

Posted in MM! | 9 Comments »

9 Shouts From the Peanut Gallery

  • Jack says:

    Am I the only one in the Mio x Tarou camp?

    • Aroduc says:

      That’s a distinct possibility. Her development has been a bit haphazard. If they hadn’t undermined most of her earlier scenes as her dicking around with Tarou to experiment, the triangle would be a lot more believable.

    • Okita says:

      I’m with you D:

  • Gin says:

    Parking tickets are serious business in Japan…even an alien disguised as Tommy Lee Jones can’t avoid them.

  • Anonymous says:

    Asking for closure and not just a reset is probably asking for too much.

    This is anime after all.

  • The Phantom says:

    Better than last week at least, it seems to me that Yuno is the star of this show, I dont know if is the fault of the anime team, but mio is poorly characterized and inconsistent, not to mention annoying. Someone made a mistake when they did the “copy/paste/alter a bit” of taiga’s personality.

  • alex says:

    why is this thing so great

  • Gawl says:

    That was a very entertaining episode. I really couldn’t get over actually seeing sadistic Arashiko in anime format and Mio’s sadistic side is getting a bit frightening. I will agree that Tarou’s ignorance of Arashiko’s feelings is a bit frustrating, but hopefully, the anime team dishes out an ending that satisfies.

    The anime does seem to favor Arashiko hard, which is odd, considering the novels develop her and Mio somewhat equally. Mio’s dere side keeps being poorly implemented, which is making the existence of a love triangle more and more unbelievable.

    I’m actually kind of dreading what is going to happen in the final two episodes and I pray it isn’t anything absolutely revolting, like an anime reset scenario. The rage will flow strong.

  • Mesousa says:

    Xebec must really want Yuuno to be the main star, don’t they?

    I wouldn’t mind it, actually.