ABENOBASHI MAHOU SHOTENGAI
Excel Saga without all the annoying screaming
Review by: M.H. "Jane, Stop this crazy thing!!" Torringjan
Length: 13 episodes
Genre: Parody
Watched: 13 episodes, subbed
I walked into anime club one afternoon and a funny thing happened to me. Someone insisted on watching a new series by Gainax called Abenobashi Mahou Shotengai. I hadn't heard of it before, so I figured, "what the hell?" By the end of the first episode, I'd changed my opinion slightly to "what the fuck?!" The series lives off of the crowd that Excel Saga left wanting more of the outrageous, over-the-top stylings laid down by Nabeshin, Excel and company. The one major difference: No Nabeshin this time.
Plot summary: Asahina Arumi and Imamiya Sasshi are two normal kids living in a small shopping district in the middle of Tokyo called Abenobashi. Arumi's family owns a small restaurant in the middle of the district, which is being threatened by another one of those evil corporations (the enemy that nobody can possibly like) who wants to build a shopping mall in place of the shopping district so that shoppers can shop to their shoppingest. Arumi's family decides to leave their home to find better employment, which does not sit well with Sasshi. However, after an accident involving a pelican statue and Arumi's grandfather, strange things start to happen around Sasshi and Arumi, ending up with them finding themselves in the Abenobashi of another dimension. Kind of like "Sliders," only with a lot less bad acting.
Artwork: The artwork is vivid, colorful, and detailed. Everything fits well to the mood of the series and the particular episode. The best part of the artwork is that it makes it easy to tell what is being parodied, which is part of what makes it good parody. The character designs are original, and part of the humor is the forced insertion of characters into roles that they wouldn't normally be seen in. The only problem with the artwork is that it sometimes tends towards the grotesque to try and be funny, which tends to put me off of a series.
Music: The music in this series generally takes on a bouncy mood, since the jokes are usually the focus, and there's little real emotional impact. The only times that it deviates from the norm is during scenes where the music is meant to directly parody something else. Overall, it works fairly well in its own right, but wouldn't work very well on its own. The opening theme, however (which is incidentally enough performed by Megumi Hayashibara in a further attempt to take over the anime world), takes direct inspiration from Excel Saga in its nonsensical lyrics and play on modern J-pop stylings. It usually fits in nicely between Excel Saga's opening and Love Hina's opening on my Winamp list. The ending theme is meant to be a sort of "cool down" with its slow music and fairly reasonable lyrics. I say it could be left out.
Characters: Arumi is the more level-headed of the two dimension-hoppers. She takes the more rational viewpoint in any argument, which usually degrades to Sasshi being a hopeless fanboy pervert (a character that any anime fanboy can relate to) and Arumi wanting to get the hell out of that dimension. Sasshi is, as mentioned a moment ago, a hopeless fanboy who has Arumi's best interests in mind, even if it doesn't often seem like it. The other characters that recur are all bit players in the series, playing different roles in each dimension, while maintaining their general characteristics that make them recognizable. Aki is the crossdressing guy who has all the information about what's going on, somewhat reminiscent of that same character in Tokyo Godfathers, Sakuya is Sasshi's sister who looks somewhat like Rei Ayanami, and Munemune is the mysterious woman who shows up in each dimension, usually serching for Utas. Gramps is Arumi's grandfather who runs the French restaurant with Pops and has an affixation on the French language. Finally, Utas is the shady wizard who seems to know more than he lets on and usually clues the two in on how to get out of a particular dimension. He's about the only other character who maintains his personality and role between dimensions.
Plot: With the style being parodied changing from one episode to the next, one would think that a recurring plot would be impossible, but they managed to squeeze one in anyway. The originality of actually tying in the parodies with the overarching plot is a nice touch, and when the series decides that it needs to address the big plot, it doesn't even skip a beat with the comedy, much as Excel Saga did. The fourth wall is used to the advantage of the plot in this series, as opposed to Excel Saga, where it seemed somewhat abrupt and forced at times. Unfortunately, the nice touch of having seemingly unrelated plots come together, as in Exel Saga, was absent for the most part in this series, maybe due to the shorter length of the series.
Chicks!! There is very little eye candy in this series, and the major problem is that whatever eye candy there is has an underdeveloped personality due to the changing dimensions. The only really constant personality is Arumi, and she's just a smidge jailbait. However, she's a nice, take-charge sort of gal with a level head and open to reason. So, those of you who aren't into the dangerous girls, I suppose you could wait a couple of years. Munemune is... well, she's got large breasts, anyway! And, she's usually fairly scantily clad, which always helps! Unfortunately, the only facet of her personality that we see is that she always chases after Utas, which means that she's extremely dedicated to her men. And by gosh, that's plenty enough for my liking!
Overall: I really enjoyed Excel Saga when I watched it, because anime is an infinitely parody-able genre, and if it's done right, parody is the best type of comedy. The excessive style that Excel Saga used was very well-performed for the most part, and as such, it's a good series. However, even moderation can be a good thing, as demonstrated by Puni Puni Poemi, which I didn't appreciate at all. Now, even with the lack of Nabeshin, another series has revived my hope in the parody genre, which I thought to be dead after Excel was finished. This series deserves a good, long look with a healthy sense of humor and a bit of a tolerance for the grotesque.
IN A NUTSHELL
+ Strong parody
+ Nice artwork
+ Original plot
- Somewhat underdeveloped characters
- No Nabeshin
Rating: 8.5/10
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