That poor bus.
Impressions:
I made the mistake of watching this episode, rolling my eyes a bit and wanting to get something to eat before dealing with it, and now an hour or so later, have basically forgotten most of it. I can’t take that as a great sign. I’ve said this about quite a few shows this season, but it really feels like a throwback to ten years ago with a somewhat horny but overall generally good natured dude in a very stale magical girlfriend kind of setup. Probably because the anime medium is so overly saturated with the RPG cheat power and idol crap that anything feels like a breath of fresh air from an older time, even when it’s stale.
The comedy around the dude unfortunately constantly reverts to him overracting and screaming, in stark contrast to the sarcastic ribbing and resigned sighs of Synduality. The girls in these kinds of shows usually have a lot more character and focus, but weirdly, the one here is the pretty bland filler character in comparison. The play on a rape scene at the end was something I could have definitely done without, though it was certainly on the more restrained side of fanservice, without the camera creeping up her thigh to the panty line or the like. It’s not particularly well animated either, certainly not enough to make the yelling expressive and energetic instead of irritating, nor well enough to make the fight be at all engaging. I’d evoke something like… Classroom for Heroes, I guess, with a lot of the edges sanded off. Without the same kind of energy or animation, both in the production sense and in the character and story motivation sense, it’s just kind of… another magical girlfriend show. With an overly energetic and overly dumb protagonist.
