If you enjoy a seinen, romantic and comedy anime, why don't you try ARAKAWA UNDER THE BRIDGE (AUB hereafter) for a size. You might like it. Apparently, SHAFT has done it again! If you enjoy Zetsubo Sensei's serialization (SZS), this anime might be right for you.
I always thought SZS is the weirdest anime to date! And oh boy, how I am wrong and thus I stand corrected. When I came across AUB for the first time, I downloaded the 1st episode and watched it right away. Somehow I was hooked for some weird reason. It's funny, romantic and at the same time it is also bizarre and outlandish!
In this first episode, it is actually broken into several minisodes as they are to correspond to the ones in the manga. The main character, Ichinomiya Kou, is a very rich heir to an Ichinomiya Company. On one fine day, he was bullied and ripped off his trousers by a bunch of punks under a bridge. In order to retrieve his trousers he climbed up the bridge and unbeknown to him the bridge was under construction hence caused him to fall into a river.
Then, enters Nino, a Venusian (well, that's what she claimed to be). She saved his life by pulling him out of the water. Drenched, Kou thanked her profusely and insisted to repay her good deed. Because Kou was so insisting, Nino decided that Kou must become her koibito. As a man of his word, Kou accepted her request. Hoping to be only a part-time lover, Kou started to head home and he was stopped by Nino. Apparently, according to Nino, she claimed that she was an absent-minded girl. Hence, she will forget him if he went home and she insisted that both of them should live together, under the bridge.
Naturally, a normal human being would reject this but Kou acceded, again, to her request. However, she needed to ask permission from her landlord (trust me, this will get even weirder).
If you have a fetish for a weird girl, I'm yours!
Next, enters an unnamed Kappa. Oh yes, this is way weird. Apparently the Kappa was actually the head honcho of the river and the bridge denizens and in order to acknowledge hi authority, everybody must ask for his permission first before they move in there. Initially, Kou was ecstatic for meeting and talking to a real life Kappa but after a while he realized that he was not real. In fact, he was actually a man in Kappa suit!
Kou was so upset thinking that the Kappa-suited man was trying to con him but after a while he just agreed with him and reluctantly acknowledged him as a real bona-fide Kappa. The Kappa, in return, christened him by giving Kou a new nickname 'Recruit'. And then, at that moment Kou was finally recognized as one of the inhabitants of the bridge-river.
There is a moment in this anime that boggles my mind. When Nino introduced her name, Kou noticed '2-3' on her track-top and exclaimed "Nino-san from 2-3!" Does this mean that they have met before and that was the reason he agreed to live with her?
The reason why I mentioned SZS earlier is because for some reason, this anime has the similar mood and feeling with SZS. The dramatic pause, the sound effect (the wind, the water) and in fact some of Kou's mannerisms are almost similar with Nozomu Itoshiki a.k.a Zetsubo Sensei. It's like experiencing a deja vu.
Itoshiki in one of his fits!
Looks familiar? Hmmm... now, where did I see this before?...
Anyway, I have been only watching the first episode.... let's see how it goes. It's too early for recommendation.
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