There’s something hypnotic about watching a mohawk grow in.
What They Say:
Nakanojo attempts to disprove exorcisms. Fecchan tries to look on the bright side of life, while Sakamoto and the Professor are surrounded by terrifying dogs.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
One of my favorite characters gets to have some solid time at the start of this episode as Nakanojo returns to the small screen. With his mohawk being shaved off awhile ago, he’s been laying a bit low since then. But it’s growing back in – just the mohawk mind you – and he’s intent on being a man of science right now to disprove exorcisms. He’s so against the idea of the supernatural even though he feels like there’s something to it as it gets to him that he has to prove it wrong. And he does it by challenging a particular priests faith with some positively goofy performance piece. Nakanojo is so completely over the top here that it goes into a huge bout of physical comedy that’s just priceless.
Part of what makes the show fun is the way it does simple stuff and then goes almost over the top. There’s a piece where Mihoshi ends up running across Naganohara and she finds herself still frustrated by her to no end. When Naganoaha takes a moment to pet a kitty, Mihoshi gets so frustrated by her that she actually tries to attack her from behind with her bokan. It’s what people think of doing, but Mihoshi goes the distance. Sakamoto has a few moments here but I loved that they did a Christmas short early on as well since watching him along with Nono and the Professor is just priceless. She’s such a child when it comes to what she wants and ends up making Nono cry that you can’t help but to laugh. But just seeing Sakamoto with a colored paper chain around his neck is wonderful to see.
The best part of this episode for me though involves the Professor putting a leash on Sakamoto and basically dragging him out for a walk on his back. It’s not something that goes over well for Sakamoto to say the slightest, but it goes even worse when they end up walking by a couple of dogs on leashes themselves. Both of them are terrified of dogs, even cute and fluffy ones like this, and they’re in a terrible panic as they’re surrounded. They do get a save relatively quickly, but it’s just so adorable with how similar the two of them are when it comes to dogs. But just when you think things are going to slow down, it goes even further over the top as Yukkio and Mio get involved and it’s one of those great laugh out loud moments that the show can pull off just from the visual style of it alone.
In Summary:
My Ordinary Life works through a few different types of comedy here but they all work well individually and as a whole. The physical comedy has grown a lot since the start of the show and it’s definitely become creative with how its animated, the camera angles and so forth. With the variety to the animation styles as well, it allows it to go in any direction it needs without it seeming out of place. There’s a lot of fun to be had with all the shorts and works here, but the piece with the Professor and Sakamoto at the end was definitely my favorite, especially how it just escalated in strange and unusual ways while going completely epic when it comes to the pain that Mio and Yukko end up feeling. It’s things like this that just make me grin like a fool and want to devour the whole show even more.
Grade: B+
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Sony KDS-R70XBR2 70″ LCoS 1080P HDTV, Dell 10.1 Netbook via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.
