So once again we return to the land of anime making that is Shirobako. And honestly, i’ve been sitting racking my brain trying to think of a way to describe exactly what happened in this episode, but….I’ll do my best.
So the episode starts up with everyone hard at work with the Third Girls squad. Things get assigned and people start to work on it. The first notable thing that happens in this episode is that we meet someone who went to school with Hiraoka (the production assistant who doesn’t care) and now runs his own anime company.
That’s when I realized something. These past few episodes have actually been more about him than anything else. And i’m okay with this. His development is interesting to me, and I’m actually happy to see it become a focal point of the series.
Meanwhile the CG chick is asked to animate a scene with the main character in a jet and she’s very excited about it and does research which involves a helmet cam and a roller coaster.
After episode one premiers and they have a little party, the actual meat of the episode begins. That meat is, we find out from the busty animator that Hiraoka is terrible at doing his job and she doesn’t want him working with her anymore. Miyamori says she’ll talk to him but he basically blows her off after yelling at her for a bit and goes home.
See, this is the part I find interesting. Once he leaves, you see him at his house, but he acts differently around his cat, and he actually acts pretty sweet. It’s interesting because you see a different side of him, and it makes you wonder exactly what happened to him at his last jobs to make him so jaded.
Honestly, the two reasons I am currently invested in this show is voice actor girl, but also this guy. I want to see where this show goes with him. This character has an arc he has to go through. And I want to see this.
So afterwards Miyamori goes to talk with his old friends to see why he acts the way he does. They’re not certain, but they give her hints on how to deal with him. And it seems to work.
The episode ends with them all getting the storyboard from the director which is finished early.
You may have noticed that this episode recap was a bit short, but also a bit jumbled. And there’s a reason for that. This episode was by far one of the most…none plot heavy episodes i’ve seen in a while. Unlike some of the previous episodes where there was one centralized story focused idea, this episode was all over the place. Not to say it wasn’t good, it just makes it very hard to recap.
But really, with the new Hiraoka stuff, I actually found myself interested in what’s going on. He is another character that I didn’t think i’d like originally, but really has grown on me and I can’t’ wait to see more things focused on him.
The rest of cast is sort of in the background at the moment, and that’s okay. It’s very hard to have a multitude of people have the same amount of screen time and sometimes some characters need more development than others.
When it’s all said and done, this episode was nice. Without the Hiraoka stuff I probably wouldn’t have enjoyed this episode as much as I did, but It’s making me excited for the next one. So that’s good.
All in all…..the episode was okay.
6.5/10
-Hideki