Tag: heavy fanservice

Heavy Object

(24 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Exposition, the anime ! Adapted from a light novel series, of course.

Okay, here’s a quick summary of the premise : in the future, conventional weapons (and even nuclear missiles) have been rendered obsolete by the titular “Heavy Objects”, ball-shaped mechas with impressive firepower and even more impressive shielding. So now wars have become skirmishes between Heavy Objects. This first episode goes into much more extraneous detail than that, but that’s the gist of it.

Characters

Qwenthur (sic), our protagonist, is a mechanic student who’s enlisted into a military outpost in the middle of nowhere, so as to study the Heavy Object stationed there. It’s an old, non-specialized model, which is all the best for him to learn as much about the tech as possible. And then, PROFIT ! (He’s very vague about how merely knowing how those things work will allow him to easily become an engineering tycoon. Surely the field is already crowded as heck ?)

The thing you quickly notice about Qwenthur is that he. never. shuts. up. Which is doubly bad, as he’s also our narrator : even with his mouth closed, his inner monologue will drown the audience with tedious and clumsy exposition. I usually don’t mind Natsuki Hanae, but by 3/4ths of the way through this episode I was yelling at the screen to just shut the — up.

“The Princess” (who may have an actual name) is the Heavy Object’s actual pilot. Supposedly super-elite and stuff, but she spends most of the episode idling around on standby, or taking a gratuitous shower to liven up Qwenthur’s droning narration. (And of course additional material states she’s 14. Urgh.)

Major Capistrano is the local commanding officer, at the grizzled old age of 18. She’s actually coordinationg the operations of at least 4 other Heavy Objects, if her tablet display is any indication. Or maybe it’s just a casual game/training program she plays ; she certainly looks horribly bored doing so.

The show makes it look like there are only five people total on the base (with Qwenthur’s hardass boss at the mecha maintenance shop, and his best pal/rookie radio operator), despite the vague suggestion more soldiers are around.

Production Values

Well, the direction makes it darnedest to liven things up, with decent battle visuals for the Heavy Objects and some desperate fanservice scenes, and even the music swelling around to try and make it epic, but nothing can overcome the dreary exposition.

Overall Impression

Oh, dear. I came into this cautiously optimistic, as the same author’s Index series led to a decently entertaining anime series… but gods, this is unengaging on every level. I’m used to screenwriter Hiroyuki Yoshino being widely inconsistent in his adaptations, but this is an unfortunate failure to weed down the inherent wordiness of the source material. The already rather flat characters become mere vessels for the exposition, what little humour filters through isn’t particularly funny, and the script even goes out of its way to state that Heavy Object warfare just isn’t very interesting period. Why should we care, then ?

Very disappointing, and I won’t be bothering with any more episodes.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Fall 2015

Summer 2015 capsules

Out first show of the season is My Wife is the Student Council President (Okusama ga Seitokaichou!), a series of 8-minute shorts adapted from an erotic comedy manga series. I have to say I feared the worst from the title. An underage wife ?

The good news is that the premise doesn’t involve any actual marriage yet and merely involves the student council president being, er, very “sex-liberated” (condoms for everyone !), and aggressively pursuing her vice-president. So far, he’s not receptive at all to her stalker ways ; which anyone would be even without the huge stick in his ass.

The bad news is that it isn’t really funny. I just can’t laugh with the show, as I find the title character more horrific than cute. And the boring, by-the-numbers point-of-view character doesn’t help matters.

Don’t bother with looking this one up.

 

Wakaba Girl is a typical adaptation of a 4-panel gag manga as a series of 8-minute-long shorts (extended OP sequence included). It’s basically a “cute girls being cute” affair, with the central gimmick of its heroine Wakaba coming from a very high-class family and being delighted to attend a normal high school where she can make normal friends. Cue many jokes from her being more than a bit sheltered.

It’s cute, reasonably well-paced and funny, and doesn’t overstay its welcome. That’s plenty enough reasons for me to keep watching.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Summer 2015

 

Wakako-zake is a series of 2-minute (OP included) shorts about a woman who eats out at restaurants, with the constant in her menu being alcohol. And, er, that’s it. Not much in the way of jokes or story (aside from a couple of dudes trying to pick her up), just some food porn. Pass along, nothing to see here.

 

Sequel Watch !
– Dragonball Super picks up a few months after the Majin Buu arc, which means we’re ignoring Z’s epilogue with Uub and its timeskip. (To say nothing of GT.) The good news is that no knowledge from the recent movies seems to be required ; the new antagonists are introduced properly and seem to be heading towards their first meetings with the heroes. The bad news is that it’s a very slow start, reintroducing the dozens of members of the supporting cast and what they’re up to now. Even then, I think we missed Krillin & family, as well as most of the minor useless members of the Z-fighters ; we’re mostly focused on the extended Son/Briefs/Satan households for now. There’s little in the way of actual plot right now, aside from the Supreme Kais worrying about new villains showing up anytime now. But then they always do. Since I actually like the more slice-of-life comedy segments of Dragonball, I’m not complaining. (Although less Goten/Trunks screentime would be a relief.)

– Speaking of reintroducing dozens of supporting characters, Durarara!!x2 (Middle Part) feels it was the time to introduce more new characters. And hey, it does makes who comes to try and finish Izaya off in his hospital room a genuine surprise. A nice callback to his introduction, but still unexpected. Aside from that, it’s mostly a matter of positioning all the pieces back in place.

– Symphogear GX – Determination to Fist has a positively metal opening action sequence that’s going to be hard to top. It does unfortunately show again that Aoi Yuuki is miles behind Nana Mizuki & Ayahi Takagaki in singing talent, but them’s the breaks. At least we get another Nana Mizuki/Yoko Hikasa duet. Not feeling the new antagonists yet, but I’ll give them time.

– Gatchaman CROWDS Insight… I have no clue where they’re going with this new team member and the alien. But it’s certainly very energetic and colourful as usual, and Hajime is still very fun. (“Berg, shut up-su!”)

– As for Working!!!, I’m fearing the ship may have sailed. I quite enjoyed the first two seasons, but this reintroduction episode left me quite cold. Maybe it’ll pick up steam later on, but this wasn’t a good start.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Summer 2015 – Page 3

 

I’m sure that, like me, you rolled your eyes when Bikini Warriors showed up on the schedule, especially as an adaptation of a line of “sexy” figurines. The good news is that this series of comedy shorts makes its tired cliché of a premise the central joke. Yes, those bikini-style armours are ridiculous and can’t protect much ; let’s have fun with that ! And frankly, the few chuckles it raises are enough to overcome the rudimentary animation and the obnoxious fanservice. It just about gets away with it, and that’s the best it could have ever hoped for.

Million Doll is an adaptation of a web manga series as 8-minute shorts. It’s an exploration of idol fandom culture that just rubs me the wrong way. I think that’s because it seems to lionize its shut-in protagonist and agree with her contempt of the more dilettante fans who are quick to move on from an idol group to the next… never mind that she’s already much creepier and unhealthy than all of them combined. It’s a show that requires you to adhere unconditionally to the glamour of the idol subculture (and dismisses its unpleasantness as coming from a few icky fans), and that’s not something I can get into. It doesn’t help that it’s barely animated, and suffers from a downright ugly CG-animated dancing opening sequence. Avoid like the plague.
SuzakiNishi the Animation is a weird beast. It’s notionally an adaptation of voice-actresses Aya Suzaki & Asuka Nishi’s radio program, where they discuss business models. In practive, this is a series of “comedy” shorts depicting them as new transfer students in high school. The gags are trite and there’s just nothing here that builds upon its name characters or the original premise. Really don’t bother with this.
Kurayami Santa is a bizarre oddity : a series of horror shorts set in the 60s that’s half animation looking like it came from that period, and half actual vintage live-action footage from then. It features a demon looking like a creepy child who punishes evidoers, but in cruel and circuitous ways that make you shudder more than applaud. While I’m intrigued at how this came into being, there’s a gap between that and actually finding it entertaining ; it’s just too weird for me.
Danchigai is an adaptation of a 4-panel gag manga about five siblings rough-housing each other. (Well, they mostly all gang up against the one boy, second oldest of the lot.) It’s very mildly funny, but nothing to go out of your way for.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Summer 2015 – Page 5

Prison School (Kangoku Gakuen)

(12 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of a cringe comedy manga series.

Characters

Kiyoshi, our protagonist, has enrolled into yet another of those high schools that used to be female-only but are now opening up to boys. That’s less awesome than it sounded at first to him, since it’s hard to mingle into the massive numbers of girls.

So he soon finds himself into the small social circle of the few other boys who joined up : Takehito the history-obsessed nerd, Shingo the handsome guy who’s got relations, “Joe” who’s always sick and spits blood when stressed, and “Andre” the fat guy. It doesn’t help that they’re all horny dudes, and soon embark in a massively ill-conceived attempt to peep on the girls’ baths. Kiyoshi himself has misgivings about this, because of…

Chiyo, the one girl in his class with whom he’s managed to strike a conversation, thanks to their mutual love of sumo wrestling. (Well, technically Kiyoshi is just parroting what he remembers of his mom’s passion, but close enough.) You can be sure their relationship is going to crash and burn horribly.

Of course, the five peepers quickly get caught, thanks to the vigilance of “the Underground Student Council”, a trio of sadists who sentence them to build their own prison on schoolgrounds, and spend a month there. Unless they want to be expelled outright for their shameful behaviour ?

Production Values

The animation feels a bit stilted, especially for dialogue scenes ; you get the impression the animators had trouble bringing the manga’s quirky artstyle to life.

The fanservice levels are quite high, and there’s some degree of censorship going on here (especially in the bath scene), but nothing too obnoxious.

Overall Impression

Do you love seeing dudes getting repeatedly beaten up by castrating dominatrices ? (A fate they kinda deserved, honestly.) Well, then you’re in luck. Heck, even the boys themselves seem to enjoy it somewhat.

There’s a lot of buzz about the manga being the funniest thing ever, despite the dodgy premise. I’m not quite seeing it, at this point. There are some really good gags, and the show certainly knows how to ratchet up the absurdity quickly. It’s got awesome sight gags such as the five boys getting spy catsuits out of nowhere for their night expedition.

But there’s the huge problem of just about every character being despairingly one-note caricatures (including the protagonist), and the jokes quickly becoming quite repetitive.

The one thing that makes me want to watch another episode is the impression that the anime is rushing through these early stages of the plot, presumably so that it can quickly get to the good bits. But I only have so much patience.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Summer 2015 – Page 5

Everyday Life with Monster Girls (Monster Musume no Iru Nichijou)

(12 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of a harem romantic comedy manga series. Warning : this is often borderline softcore porn.

Characters

Kurusu, our protagonist, is an ordinary dude whose life got upended when he became a “Host” for the Semihuman Cultural Exchange program : basically, the monster-people who had remained hidden by the governments until a few years ago are now mingling with humans so as to achieve peaceful coexistence.

Miia, his charge, is a lamia (half-snake) girl. She appreciates him not recoiling in horror at her sight and is very affectionate… maybe a bit too much, as her affections and attempts to snuggle often end up with her strangling him.

Ms Smith is the government agent in charge of supervising Miia’s stay. She’s very obnoxious on monitoring them, although this is presumably partly to cover up her own mistake (as Kurusu didn’t volunteer, and Miia got to him by error). She’s very keen on enforcing the “no sex” rule, too.

The OP and promotional material promise that more monster girls will show up soon and join the regular cast.

Production Values

Very, very fanservicey indeed, with next to no censorship. You’ll get to see nearly every inch of Miia’s body.

Overall Impression

You know a show has its priorities straight when it starts off with a three-minute-long “snuggling in bed” scene, continues with a bath scene, and only after that bothers to explain the plot in a few quick flashbacks. The episode also manages to visit a lingerie store and a love hotel.

I’m sure this appeals to people with certain fetishes, but I found it rather boring. The “racism is bad, m’kay” subtext feels rather perfunctory, and the contrived reason for the constant cock-blocking makes the numerous foreplay scenes more frustrating than arousing. It certainly stopped being funny very early on.

Let’s be frank : I nearly fell asleep watching this. I just don’t care, and won’t be pursuing it any further.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Summer 2015 – Page 5

A Boring World Where the Concept of Dirty Jokes Doesn’t Exist (Shimoneta to Iu Gainen ga Sonzai Shinai Taikutsu na Sekai)

(12 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of a light novel series going for political satire.

Characters

This is set in an impossibly sanitized Japan where have been outlawed dirty words and any public display of obscenity ; every citizen wears a collar detecting forbidden words and calling the Public Morals shock-troops on them. It goes without saying that it’s a very oppressive dystopia.

Okuma, our protagonist, is mostly trying to lay low (what with his father being an indecent terrorist), wishing to lead a normal life and attend the purest high-school in the country. Okay, his motives may not be entirely pure ; he’s very admirative of…

Anna, the student council president of said school, who makes big speeches about upholding morals and stuff. She’s a charismatic figurehead, I’ll give her that. And she does invite him to help out ; since he comes from a low-morals background, he could be better at identifying terrorist acts. Because yeah, she’s so sheltered that she has little clue what obscenity actually looks like. Which makes it hard to fight the likes of…

Blue Snow, a major indecent woman, who wanders around half-naked while giving out tons of naughty pictures and spouting out dirty jokes. Also, she’s obviously Ayame, the quiet vice-president, avenging her falsely-accused father with the help of a device jamming the cuss-word-detectors for three minutes a day that he gave her.

She outs herself to Okuma, thinking he infiltrated the student council like her. When he refuses to help, she just blackmails him to do it anyway. (And hey, it’d be a massive scandal that could damage Anna’s reputation if the truth became known, eh ?)

Blue Rose’s point, beside the free speech argument, is that education (and entertainment) has become so sanitized that the current generation of teenagers (who’ve lived their whole life under the law) have no clue how sex and reproduction even work anymore. They still think and gossip madly about it ; they’ve just lost the vocabulary and practical knowledge. And that’s how she wants to help them, despite lacking actual picture references herself.

Other characters include Fuwa, a very obsessed biology student who searches madly for any clue of how reproduction works (even Ayame finds her creepy), and Gouriki, the treasurer, whom Okuma saves from being falsely accused as a train molester (and is heavily hinted to be gay).

Production Values

Decent enough. And given the subject matter, the fanservice level is quite moderate.

Overall Impression

Wow, someone has a bone to pick with the Tokyo Youth Ordinance. And, well, there are less deserving targets of ridicule, so why not.

The big question if whether the writer has managed to channel his outrage and contempt into satire that’s actually funny. And, er, I’m not sure it works. It’s got some interesting ideas and clearly something to say, but the hit-or-miss ratio of the jokes is lower than I’d like. (It doesn’t help that most of the dirty jokes don’t carry well from Japanese, however valiantly the translators are trying to convey them.)

Still, it’s not often you see actual political satire in anime, so I’m willing to give it some rope to find its legs.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Summer 2015 – Page 2

Punch Line

(11 episodes)

What’s it about ?

“Once he sees underwear, humanity is destroyed!?” is the tagline for this project. It’s as good a description as any of the plot of a series that also features sentai super-heroes, ghosts, and time-travel. And panties, of course.

Characters

Yuuta, our protagonist, is in a bit of a pickle. He had a near-death experience in the course of his bus being taken hostage, and unfortunately something has taken over his body. So he’s stuck as a ghost, looking for a way to retake his body.

Chiranosuke is a friendly neighbouring cat-ghost who gives him a lengthy explanation about this, and gives him some pointers about a book that could help him. (Nope, I don’t trust him either.) Also, he informs Yuuta that while seeing underwear and getting excited will super-power him, doing it twice in quick succession will doom humanity immediately. Like, meteor falls and everyone dies. Fortunately, as a ghost Yuuta can tell causality to take a hike, and go back in time to retry a better path as many times as he needs. Since that involves navigating through an apartment complex with a number of female tenants, that’s going to take more than a few tries.

Mikatan is one of his neighbours. He’s been introduced to her a few months ago as just a semi-famous singer, but secretly she’s Strange Juice (sic), defender of justice ! And she doesn’t do that bad a job of it in that bus hostage crisis the series opens with.

Meika, who seems to run the building, also helps her out as mission control. Which might explain why Mikatan’s got a secret entrance to an underground base in her flat.

There’s also Lovera, the dodgy medium (who by a suspect coincidence was also on that bus), and Ito, the NEET.

And then there’s this cocky dude who seems to have orchestrated the bus hostage-taking, and is already at it again that night. I wonder how he fits into all this.

Production Values

WOW. Studio MAPPA have become known for drowning their latest projects in budget and producing impressive animation, but they’ve outdone themselves here. The bus hostage crisis is by far the most gorgeous and well-paced action sequence of the season so far. And then there’s the camera loving to move around in any shot to convey Yuuta’s disorientation, an effect that can’t be cheap to animate.

Also, kick-ass soundtrack. Apparently that’s from the most successful music producer in Japan.

Of course, there’s no going around the fact that much underwear is on display here. At least it’s varied and never boring.

Overall Impression

Well, that was weird. But it’s utterly manic in a way that agrees with my sensibilities : it knows how to use each and every second of screentime to display something awesome, funny, or both. And it’s got great comedic timing. (Best joke of the episode : Chiranosuke turning to his laptop to complete his exposition, and having to shut down a window with cat porn before resuming without missing a beat. Second best joke : Mikatan doing an elaborate transforming dance, only to finally put on her Strange Juice costume the old-fashioned way, while Meika just rolls her eyes.)

After a while, the underwear fanservice even becomes a portent of DOOM rather than actually titillating… Which is of course the central joke of the series. It a show that wants to eat his cake and still have it, while having the audience cheer it on. For me, it works.

This is just as good as I was expecting. No way I’m skipping it.

via [In Which I Review] New anime, Spring 2015 – Page 4.

EtoTama

(12 episodes)

What’s it about ?

A comedy show about the the cat being left out of the Chinese zodiac… Wait, Wikipedia claims a manga adaptation of this started publication in 2013. How long has this TV show been stuck in the pipeline ?

Characters

Takeru, our male protagonist, found a cheap house to inhabit. Unfortunately, it’s haunted by…

Nyaa-tan, the personification of the Cat zodiac sign. Which doesn’t exist in the Chinese zodiac, of course. (She blames the Rat.) She intends to reclaim her rightful place by… actually, I fell asleep halfway through this, so I have no clue what her zany plan entails. The only thing I can see is that the house is no longer standing by the end of the episode.

Takeru is also harassed by all 12 of the other zodiac signs. There’s a running joke of nobody remembering those past the Snake, so I’ll take that as a cue not to bother listing them all. The only one with a degree of distinctiveness is Chuu-tan (ie the Rat), who smirks in the background while wearing a dominatrix outfit. Of course she does.

Production Values

Nothing to write home about. It’s okay, I guess, although some of the signs’ outfits are more than a bit fanservicey (especially Moo-tan !).

Overall Impression

Ah, the token series that completely puts me to sleep in spite of its hyperactivity. But then, those one-note characters are unengaging, the central joke isn’t particularly funny, and I just can’t bring myself to care.

Next show, please !

via [In Which I Review] New anime, Spring 2015 – Page 4.

Triage X

(10 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of a very fanservicey manga series about hospital-themed vigilantes.

Characters

Arashi, our brooding protagonist, and pointman of the vigilante team. Also a high-schooler, because fuck plausibility. His tragic backstory : both him and his best friend Ryu were caught in a terrorist attack, and the only reason he’s the lone survivor of that is that the surgeon used parts of Ryu’s body to piece him back together. So now he’s regularly having visions of kid!Ryu, acting as a sort of moral compass.

By the way, the surgeon was Ryu’s father, and is the one who founded and directs the vigilante team Black Label. (They need to excise the cancers of society ! he exposits with a completely straight face to a team that must have heard that speech dozens of times already.) Other members include :
– Mikoto, Arashi’s direct partner, who drives him around on a motorbike, if possible with crazy stunts. Such as erupting into a room from a window… on the fourth floor. (How she managed that is left refreshingly unexplored.)
– Oriha, the bomb maniac, who also does stuff like an impromptu musical idol number in front of utterly bemused goons. The camera does its best to ensure we know she wears panties.
– Yuuko, a spotter who shows up sunbathing in a bikini during the opening mission. Her boobs are the first thing the episode opens with.
– And several more boring members. All of them in some kind of nurse/doctor-themed outfit.

Together, they fight crime ! Their initial target was the corrupt head of a construction company ; the other half of the episode is devoted to his son, who is intent on inheriting the family business, and kidnapped an accountant about to talk to the cops, as well as his daughter. Why his daughter ? Because he needed someone to gratuitously torture, and the accountant just wouldn’t do !

Tatara is a grizzled cowboy cop who showed up slightly before the heroes in that second case, and without the backup needed to handle the dozens of goons in the building. Frankly I have no clue how he hoped to arrest the son on sheer bravado… which really doesn’t work here. I think we’re supposed to believe his interference fucked everything up, with the accountant getting shot and the right-hand-man managing to escape, but frankly I’d rather blame our “heroes” for being more showy than effective and bungling this on their own.

Hinako is a schoolmate of Arashi’s who’s got a crush on him, but clearly her flat D-cup has no chance against the likes of Mikoto (who also attends the same high school). Poor girl.

There’s a stinger with a bunch of other villains (most of them female) plotting something in some room where they forgot to put on the lights. Since they’ve got distinctive character designs and some behaviour quirks, I presume they’re gonna be important ; but it’s left to future episodes to give us a clue as to what they’re actually up to.

Production Values

This is the kind of show where the adverts promise that the DVDs & BluRays won’t have any of that pesky steam or random white light. On the other hand, the gratuitous shower scene is the only point where that comes into play ; and it’s only the tip of the iceberg for the fanservice here, with most of that uncensored.

Overall Impression

What makes me roll my eyes here isn’t the obnoxious fanservice. It’s how drab and serious this tries to look despite how ridiculously exploitative everything is. Arashi is drowning in angst, Ryu’s father seems to actually believe in his rants, and I’m apparently supposed to take Tatara’s feelings of impotence somewhat seriously. Ahah, no. Alas, there is such a thing as being too deadpan, and the show crossed the line. I really hope the manga author had his tongue firmly planted in cheek ; unfortunately, that nuance is lost in adaptation.

One episode of this trainwreck was enough, thank you.

via [In Which I Review] New anime, Spring 2015 – Page 4.

Magical Lyrical Nanoha ViVid

As it turns out, I won’t be doing a full review of Magical Lyrical Nanoha ViVid ; it relies way too much on prior knowledge of what happened in StrikerS (the third anime season in the franchise). Gods know what a newcomer would make of our kid heroine’s Vivio ability to transform into an adult body, or of the Numbers in general. Or the whole “your majesty” thing. Quite frankly, I’m tempted to go and rewatch StrikerS myself. (After all, it’s a perfectly okay show only let down by being a sequel to the notably superior A’s second season.)

So, let’s take the point of view of someone who’s watched all three prior anime seasons, but hasn’t bothered reading the ViVid spin-off/follow-up manga. Is this worth watching ?

The good news is that it’s surprisingly relatively light on loli fanservice. Oh, it’s there ; we get a few gratuitous shots of Vivio’s underwear, and a lingering transformation sequence that takes the time of having her every garment explode. But I was expecting much, much worse from this manga’s reputation. As it is, it’s a bit of an annoying distraction but still tolerable. First season level, basically.

The show itself manages to be just entertaining enough for me to keep watching. Vivid is cute, and her interactions with her two moms is heartwarming. (Lol on the writers still being coy about the Nanoha/Fate relationship, but then the series is from the point of view of a 4th-grader.) It even makes a game attempt at giving the Numbers distinct personalities, helped a bit by half of them being in jail at this point. (But I hope not in Jail, that would just be gross.)

What really makes the show interesting to me, though, is reading between the lines of Vivio’s narration and dialogue, in the light of the context provided by StrikerS. That gives a completely different dimension to Fate’s freaking out over Vivio’s adult form, for example. The constant tight rope act of doublethink between Vivio’s innocence and the viewer’s foreknowledge is quite stimulating indeed.

There’s not much of a plot yet, aside from a crazy girl randomly assaulting people as a background thread. But that’s good enough as a starting thread, and leaves plenty of room to reintroduce the rather complex premise and the tons of characters ; which is what this opening episode really needed to do. (StrikerS was 8 years ago, after all.)

So far, so good.

via [In Which I Review] New anime, Spring 2015.

Food Wars (Shokugeki no Souma)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of a shonen manga series proving that food porn can go to far.

Characters

Souma, our protagonist, is the son of the owner of a small eatery. While not as good as his father, he can still produce food delicious enough to make customers orgasm on the spot. (This is not an euphemism.) He also inherited a competitive streak, as well as the willingness to experiment with some very dubious new recipes. Well, you learn from your mistakes and all that.

Their restaurant is under attack from a group of very conspicuous real estate sharks, who want to get their hands on this price spot. This is the kind of show where they can seriously barge in and demand our kid hero to prepare a meal, just after making sure to spoil all the meat in stock. Cue a mwahahah or two. Souma of course takes them up on their challenge, and manages to still produce something incredibly delicious. Now get lost, and never come back !

This is the moment Dad chooses to come back from a trip and announce he’s closing shop anyway, and sending Souma off to a cooking high school for training. But not any cooking high school : an elite one where barely 10% of the students make it to graduation.

The OP & ED sequences show off a bunch of Souma’s future schoolmates… wait, why does one of the dudes wield a chainsaw ?

Production Values

The big selling point here is the intricate fantasy sequences whenever people eat food. They’re borderline pornographic ; you know what you’re in for when you’re hit barely a few minutes in by someone eating a terrible squid-peanut butter combination, and it turning into tentacle rape. (And of course there’s a brick joke with the girl actually enjoying the experience…)

You won’t be surprised by the fact that most of the fantasy screentime (or even the “real” food orgasms) is devoted to women. Because of course.

Overall Impression

/facepalm

I’ll give it to this show : it doesn’t commit halfway ; it takes the “food porn” moniker and goes to town with it. It’s got decent comedic timing, and the score knows how to emphasize the (well-animated) action.

But dear gods, that’s some creepily obnoxious fanservice indeed. Well-executed, but there’s no way I can recommend watching this, unless you’re really into that kind of thing. I knew from a few minutes in that I’m not, and won’t be bothering with another episode. One was hard enough to watch.

via [In Which I Review] New anime, Spring 2015.