Mahou Shoujo Ore – Episode 5 [The episode that never was]

This episode of Magical Girl Ore revolved around the same tired old jokes we’ve all come to hate and despise. Saki’s obsession with Mohiro, Sakuyo’s obsession and creepy perving on Saki and worn out school trip jokes that 100 animes have used before…wait a second. I’m getting a memo here. What do you mean that’s not what the episode was about at all? Saki and Sakuyo didn’t show up until the last minute or so? The episode focused largely on Fujimoto, his brothers, a giant monster that was threatening to ruin the anime industry and a lot of in jokes that flew right over my head because I’m not classed in how the Japanese animation process works outside of saying i’ve seen Animation Runner Kuromi?

Yeah well, that’s the episode we got and actually it was pretty good. I said it last week and I’ll stand by it, this show is at it’s most interesting and seems to have the most to say when it isn’t focusing on the Magical Girls. They appeared as Chibi’s occasionally during the episode and commented on what they were eating, but otherwise until the end of the episode they were largely absent from the episode.

A Production Controller met a cruel and terrible fate by playing Pokemon GO, Er, not paying attention to his surroundings while trying to catch a rare monster near the river in a totally non-descript mobile game. I got a bigger kick out of this then I should of, in particular when they mention something along the lines of providing a warning not to play carelessly near rivers. It’s always bothered me how despite a large, rather humorously illustrated “pay attention to your surroundings” warning that Pokemon GO had. They had to add additional warnings because of human stupidity.
Anyway, after he fell into the river. His DNA got caught up in a giant Godzilla like Monster.
That is now carrying a part of his will and desires that anime that he was working on, I would suppose an episode of Magical Girl Ore, looking at the production prints. Get’s finished.

So it’s up to Fujimoto, his brothers, and the government to save the day and the anime industry all together. Unfortunately, like I said, a lot of the humor and shade that they were throwing on the industry flew right over my head. I did get a good chuckle out of the part where they claim the episode is a work of fiction and in no way relates to the real state of Japanese animation, kind of, probably…meaning there was actually a lot of shade being thrown and perhaps some of the problems being presented in the episode are a little too real.

They finish the production of the episode on time, but just finishing it wasn’t enough. They need to deliver the finished product to the Monster and insert it into it’s mouth before the time is up. So the Fujimoto brothers get on the scene.
This is when the plot of another country for a counter attack is put into place and the Magical Girls are air dropped in and they take out the Godzilla like Monster in one well placed kick. Wait, can they end the episode like that?
What do you mean the credits are about to roll?

So once again, Fujimoto is denied the glory of saving the day by these pesky magical girls.

This episode was really great. While a lot of it did admittedly go over my head, as i’m sure it went over the head of the regular viewer it still felt like it had something to say. It had some great commentary on the state of the industry and on Pokemon GO. This makes me stop and say to myself though, “If some of your best episodes, with the most to say don’t involve your main characters at all until the last 5 minutes. You might be doing something WRONG.”

Anyway, the preview deceived me last week into thinking this would be a fanservice episode so i’m not going to read too much into the preview for next week. I just hope the series can keep it’s upward climb in the way of parody and social commentary.