This pretty much sums up the episode.
I’m pretty disappointed with the premiere of this series. The premise sounded cute enough to be right up my alley, so I was curious how it’d be, but gosh, it was all over the place. The premiere really makes it difficult for me to grasp whether or not the slap-stick comedy is going to be the more dominant than the storytelling of this series, especially when I have heard of good things about this story as well. And while it did crack me up with its innocent humor, it wasn’t enough to make me invested enough into this series to want to watch the second episode. It certainly didn’t help that the art feels terribly outdated, and the characters while they are uh, quite wacky and ditzy, it makes it really hard for me to take them seriously – and I honestly don’t know if they are meant to be in the first place.
So we have Haku Gesso and Susu who are (unbeknownst to them) destined to be married, but neither of them is interested in being matched. However fate is a funny thing because the two of them are now paired up to work together with Haku helping Susu out on become a genuine fox spirit. Her client is a woman who has been reincarnated and has no memories of her past as a Princess whom loved a youkai.
To be fair, Susu’s clumsiness has its humor because of how innocent and naive she is. When she makes mistakes, you can’t help but laugh not at her, but the situation everyone is in. All you can think of is, “Oh gosh, what a mess. Total chaos.” And really that’s the best way to sum up this episode, total, chaos. Not fun to see her be punched around though. That’s when it’s sad to watch.
I wasn’t expecting Haku to be a 30 years old, he looks and acts anything but thirty – he is more like a man-child, the instantly becomes a five years old at the sight of candy, and will use that as a currency to work with or help people such as Susu – especially if it’s limited edition or some crap like that. Also implied he might not be human? Certainly raises questions for me.
I’m not even going to bother with trying to explain in depth about the Unification League. Basically it’s supposed to be the strongest alliance that kept the balance between humans and youkai (demons). Oh, Ri and Cho are the families in charge of the organization, it’s implied that Yaya might be involved as well.
So yeah, looks like this is going to be a pass for me this season. If it improves, then maybe I’ll binge-watch it at a later date. (Or rather, maybe I’ll just watch the source material instead)
Possibility of Covering: No
Possibility of Watching: Low
…There isn’t a source material to read. This is a Chinese anime that’s being remade as a Japanese anime. And it does start out rough: even the original version didn’t get many fans in the beginning. It took it some time to get its feet under it, but once the main plot really got going it actually became quite good. This one episode went through 2.5 of the original Chinese episodes (they were non-standard length), so we should hopefully get through things quicker.
Also also, the protagonist isn’t 30 years old. He was lying so he could appear on the matchmaking show. He’s in his late teens. (They changed his name for this adaptation, and it’s screwing with me. At least Susu is still the same.)
I’m not trying to say you should cover it: I realize that doing so would be a pain until it starts becoming more coherent. But my personal experience is that, if you’re willing to keep watching it, you’ll end up enjoying what you see.
(Made the adjustment from read to watch, thanks!)
Wasn’t it based off a Chinese Webcomic/manga though? That’s how I first heard of it, unless it’s actually the other way around.
Good to know that he’s not 30 years old (because that would’ve been super weird), but eh, hard to grasp it’s a joke among the chaos :\ Would you say the originals were this chaotic within the first few episodes?
That being said, I’ll take your advice and be cautiously optimistic, I’ll see how next few episodes are, but regardless it is unlikely I will cover it unless it redeems itself in a big way in Ep 2 or 3 since I’m already committed to Touken Ranbu, and possibly Ballroom.
As far as I know the animated form predates any printed works for this series, however I will admit to not exactly being tapped into the various communities regarding Chinese media, so it is possible I am mistaken. It has always been referred to as a donghua everywhere I’ve seen, however, which is the term for Chinese animation.
They made some slight additions and scene modifications, but on a whole this matches very closely to the original version. Looking back and comparing them, a lot of them are practically identical aside from perhaps a slight graphical upgrade (and a language change, and renaming of several characters…) So yeah, the chaos matches it just about perfectly.
At this pace… hmm… episode 3 should start getting into better content. That’s episode 6 by the original count. Although we probably won’t get all the way through it in episode 3, which is a shame… Anyway, this series always has an element of that chaos, but the writing gets stronger and the characters more compelling later on. Especially once we get past the beginning story with the Sand Foxes and into the story surrounding the protagonist and Susu.
Interesting, thanks for confirming that. I’ll keep an eye on it then! 🙂