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[jtv] you know,
I don't particularly like anime or manga, but when they make actual live-action TV dramas of manga, it's often really good. I think this is because, rather than having 52 animated episodes of stupid with a lot of dead time, they cram 52 episodes of plot into 12 episodes, which means things actually MOVE.
In the last year I've really only regularly watched Ainori, which is a reality show, and then whatever the Friday 12:12am show was. Sometimes they were just plain bad (and I avoided one or two) and sometimes just plain bizarre (like Shigeshoshi, the one about the guy who was an embalmer), and sometimes they were bizarre and entertaining (like Guren Onna and Walking Butterfly), and of course there's the current Mendol, which is also in the realm of entertaining-yet-WTF. It's the one about the three girls who want to become idol singers (played by three real idol singers from the AKB48 troupe) but end up becoming a BOY BAND to disguise themselves and avoid a bunch of criminals.
Well, anyway, what gets me is, this show has actually been, all things considered, relatively heavy on plot, as well as heavy on stupid, but funny nonetheless as the fact that NOBODY NOTICES THESE THREE BOYS ARE REALLY GIRLS! or even BELIEVES IT WHEN THEY FIND OUT! is just plain amusing in its own way. However, the last episode was essentially a "Hikari, Umi, and Fuu Become Friends" sort of episode, which bugged me. And as a stupid wasting-plot-time plothole: if Jiro is a professional photographer, who always carries around a BIG HONKING DIGITAL SLR CAMERA, when Asahi shows him the mini-SD card that she finds hidden in the keitai charm that the criminals dropped, WHY THE HELL DO NONE OF THEM KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH A MINI-SD CARD?? I mean he's sitting there reading a "how to use SD cards" book -- I realize that's just a preview for the next episode -- but come ON, you guys all have cellphones and cameras and whatnot, I can't imagine there's anyone in Japan who seriously does not fucking know how to view photos on an SD card.
On another note: Ainori this week, so Shrek works his ass off at this small job carrying a ton of 60-kg bags of sugar through the bazaar there in Jordan, and for busting his back for 5 hours he gets 1500 yen equivalent in money... which he uses to finally ask Momo out on a freaking date, and he takes her to the market and to a cafe, and buys her perfume, and you know what happens after the date? She calls up the show's producers, then calls up Umeo -- the other guy -- and confesses that she's in love with him.
I wonder if Shrek is just going to retire after he has a nervous breakdown, when he finds out about it (they actually ended the episode with the producers calling him up to the staff room, and as he opens the door ominously... "NEXT WEEK!!" slams on the screen. Even the hosts were like "omfg WHAT?")
I'm glad Momo will finally be off the show -- I kind of associate her with the time period where it was her and Kuro and Miya-kun, and to be fair Yamaji said it best when she joined the show and told Momo, "I was a huge Miya-kun fan, I was really rooting for him to take you back to Japan." Not that I don't like her, but it's just that her storyline has finally truly, truly gotten stale. I hope Umeo says yes and they go home together and are all happy and stuff, and then we can deal with the love triangle between Tadachi, Yamaji, and Maamin, which I bet anything is going to turn into the same psychotic thing that was between Neko, Chaba, and Teppei, right when I moved to Japan and first started watching the show regularly (there was like, one psycho confession, one girl totally losing her marbles, and him retiring because he missed his job).
In the last year I've really only regularly watched Ainori, which is a reality show, and then whatever the Friday 12:12am show was. Sometimes they were just plain bad (and I avoided one or two) and sometimes just plain bizarre (like Shigeshoshi, the one about the guy who was an embalmer), and sometimes they were bizarre and entertaining (like Guren Onna and Walking Butterfly), and of course there's the current Mendol, which is also in the realm of entertaining-yet-WTF. It's the one about the three girls who want to become idol singers (played by three real idol singers from the AKB48 troupe) but end up becoming a BOY BAND to disguise themselves and avoid a bunch of criminals.
Well, anyway, what gets me is, this show has actually been, all things considered, relatively heavy on plot, as well as heavy on stupid, but funny nonetheless as the fact that NOBODY NOTICES THESE THREE BOYS ARE REALLY GIRLS! or even BELIEVES IT WHEN THEY FIND OUT! is just plain amusing in its own way. However, the last episode was essentially a "Hikari, Umi, and Fuu Become Friends" sort of episode, which bugged me. And as a stupid wasting-plot-time plothole: if Jiro is a professional photographer, who always carries around a BIG HONKING DIGITAL SLR CAMERA, when Asahi shows him the mini-SD card that she finds hidden in the keitai charm that the criminals dropped, WHY THE HELL DO NONE OF THEM KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH A MINI-SD CARD?? I mean he's sitting there reading a "how to use SD cards" book -- I realize that's just a preview for the next episode -- but come ON, you guys all have cellphones and cameras and whatnot, I can't imagine there's anyone in Japan who seriously does not fucking know how to view photos on an SD card.
On another note: Ainori this week, so Shrek works his ass off at this small job carrying a ton of 60-kg bags of sugar through the bazaar there in Jordan, and for busting his back for 5 hours he gets 1500 yen equivalent in money... which he uses to finally ask Momo out on a freaking date, and he takes her to the market and to a cafe, and buys her perfume, and you know what happens after the date? She calls up the show's producers, then calls up Umeo -- the other guy -- and confesses that she's in love with him.
I wonder if Shrek is just going to retire after he has a nervous breakdown, when he finds out about it (they actually ended the episode with the producers calling him up to the staff room, and as he opens the door ominously... "NEXT WEEK!!" slams on the screen. Even the hosts were like "omfg WHAT?")
I'm glad Momo will finally be off the show -- I kind of associate her with the time period where it was her and Kuro and Miya-kun, and to be fair Yamaji said it best when she joined the show and told Momo, "I was a huge Miya-kun fan, I was really rooting for him to take you back to Japan." Not that I don't like her, but it's just that her storyline has finally truly, truly gotten stale. I hope Umeo says yes and they go home together and are all happy and stuff, and then we can deal with the love triangle between Tadachi, Yamaji, and Maamin, which I bet anything is going to turn into the same psychotic thing that was between Neko, Chaba, and Teppei, right when I moved to Japan and first started watching the show regularly (there was like, one psycho confession, one girl totally losing her marbles, and him retiring because he missed his job).
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Maybe he'll retire...
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All my favorite anime series end. That's what I like about them.