I have an upcoming commission that Kyuujitsu no Warumono-san fits perfectly, so I’ll be discussing it there. But in trying to capture the appeal of this show, I struggle a bit. It’s a vibe, absolutely. You probably know the vibe I mean, and the niche on a schedule series that provide it fill (if we’re lucky in any given season). A show doesn’t need to have depth to fill that niche, necessarily, but the best of them do. I strongly feel that this one does, and not just because the protagonist is basically my avatar. But the sales job is so soft that one can totally ignore that and still enjoy Warumono-san (as indeed I suspect most viewers are).
If Mr. Villain has two weaknesses, they’re certainly pandas and children (especially in distress). So it was fascinating to see his battle with Ranger Red (who seems to be his fated traveling companion on the journey of life – he’s on every volume cover of the manga) run headlong into a lost child with a panda. It would have been interesting to see how that encounter ended, but once the kid showed up (the battle had worked its way to the zoo) there was never any question a truce would rule the day. I got a big laugh out of that transition as the two combatants were walking away from each other, then Red got lost on the way to the lost child center (we know what his weakness is).
A hot tip from Rooney-san that there are pandas in Asakusa sends the General off in search on his next day off. But it’s not so simple. His destination is Hanayashiki – the oldest amusement park in Japan (it opened as a flower park in 1853). It’s always struck me from the outside as a rather dreary place, but I’ve never been much of an amusement park guy to begin with and I suppose it has kitsch appeal. Still – it certainly doesn’t look to Warumono-san like the sort of place one is likely to find pandas.
Find them he does, eventually, though not in the form he’s expecting. His search takes him on a survey of the rides and attractions (there may be a bit of a motion sickness factor here). He puzzles over why Earthlings seem intent on waving at him constantly. He talks to an old man who waxes philosophical about the youth-restoring effects of such places (I’m not sure if it’s implied something mystical happened here, or that really was an old man and his grandson). And he finds an embarrassment of tiny pandas imprisoned in clear capsules (or a gacha machine, as they’re also called) and liberates the lot of them at his own expense.
Eventually a kindly park employee points him in the right direction (takes him there, actually – this is Japan) to the panda “enclosure”. And it turns out these are panda cars (Hanayashiki does have those), though the General doesn’t quite grasp the difference. Or indeed, why these pandas have black tails and the ones at the zoo have white ones. But he clearly views his expedition as a success, as he buys Rooney a souvenir as thanks for the information. And from his next zoo visit (where he meets his future veternarian friend) he back a memory of a panda gent who rather resembles Trigger, which provides him the means of making their encounters more amusing (though it seriously pisses off Trigger-san).
The post Kyuujitsu no Warumono-san (Mr. Villain’s Day Off) – 07 appeared first on Lost in Anime.
