Boy, I tell you what – this series is quite a specimen. I know I’d sure as hell never have the balls to pitch a story idea like this week’s episode. One can’t help but be reminded of Seinfeld, especially it’s meta storyline where Jerry and George are writing the sitcom within a sitcom and pitching it to NBC. “A show about nothing”, indeed. “A bunch of kids get a plate of jelly doughnuts, they eat them and argue over who ate the one with mustard in it. There’s a show. That’s a show.”
“Ich bin ein Berliner”. Contrary to urban legend the locals didn’t imagine JFK was calling himself a jelly doughnut in 1963, because Berliners never called it a “Berliner” – only people from elsewhere in Germany. Berliner Pfannkuchen are indeed jam-filled pastries, and Germans do indeed play a game where one or more of them is randomly laced with mustard instead of jam (a strange game to be sure). A subject of interest for a high school newspaper? I guess that’s in the eye of the beholder.
Last week I asked “Was this interesting? I guess, sort of”. Paste that here. When you describe this episode (Goc help those of us tasked with trying) it sounds monumentally dull. And I didn’t find it to be – so I guess if nothing else this was more interesting than it should have been. But that’s a pretty low bar. I feel like an idiot for not figuring out that it was Osanai-san that ate the grenade Berliner, as in hindsight it seems pretty obvious. But I wasn’t on the verge of falling asleep or anything as Jougarou was solving the case. Astonished that someone decided to put this on television, yes, but not bored senseless.
See, I think this concept works with Seinfeld (in all likelihood the funniest sitcom of all-time) because it was driven by humor. And in fact Seinfeld worked best when it was simplest – observing the absurdities of everyday life rather than contriving extraordinary events. Many consider “The Chinese Restaurant” the ultimate expression of the Seinfeld ethos, and that’s the vein in which “The Habanero Berliner” (title original) plays out. But this wasn’t trying to be funny – it was played straight. Can you imagine “The Chinese Restaurant” or “The Parking Garage” with little or no humor? Do you want to? That’s basically what Shoushimin Series in this mode is. And that’s why it needs plot in a way Seinfeld didn’t. And it’s already halfway offer, let’s not forget…
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