What They Say:
In a certain ward of a certain city in Hokkaido…The ward office where Yamagami Lucy has been hired employs many unique characters on its staff. Yamagami and her colleagues are full of energy and secrets as they’re hard at work (?!) in this workplace comedy!
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Based on the manga of the same name by Karino Takatsu, any similarities to the manga and anime series Working!! are only going to be natural since Takatsu is behind both of them. With it being based on a four panel strip, I’m always a bit leery of them being done as a full length episode format since it can often feel like it’s stretching things, even if there are a few years worth of material. But with A-1 Pictures behind it and a solid team, there’s more than enough to help ease those concerns and see where they go with it as it introduces us to a trio of characters that are now working in the health and welfare section of an unnamed city’s ward office.
Such a job is certainly an interesting one and definitely important since it has so many people coming in for help and information, many of which will vary in temperament based on their situation and the way their lives go. Yamagami has her first time working with someone else in one of the windows and she’s nervous enough in general and some of the clients don’t make it easier. Hasebe has taken to the job easily and even ends up running his window by himself for a bit before he’s supposed to and it’s hilarious in how he’s able to get a girls email address as that’s his main thing. The other new employee, Miyoshi, is a bit of a cross between the two and seems the most even tempered as the new college graduate going at her first job. The trio have easy ways of connecting with each other but also get involved with several other employees pretty well.
As it progresses, we get some decent workplace comedy and the struggles of the new employees, but it focuses heavily on Yamagami. We get clued in to her reason for going this route of employment, to try and find someone that she had met there once before, and it’s kind of silly but it’s not all that extreme when you get down to it. The fun with the show is the dynamic between everyone. Pairing Yamagami up with Chihaya is definitely fun since Chihaya is definitely a skilled worker here, but she gets some jealousy going based on the size of Yamagami’s chest. All of them have to deal with all different kinds of clients, especially those that just outright hate civil servants and have to suck up the abuse. As much as it does focus on Yamagami, I really liked Hasebe and the way he skirts doing work a lot of the time and forces his supervisor to get after him the best that he can.
In Summary:
With one catchy opening and a setting that is very, very rarely seen in anime, Servant X Service is a series that I’ve been both nervous about and really looking forward to seeing. So many shows are based on either school age kids or something that doesn’t involve the real world that having a workplace comedy is a great change of pace. For much the same reason that I enjoyed Working!!, Servant X Service gives us a good cast of characters going through the struggles of a job and dealing with all sorts of personalities on both sides of the customer service window. It may focus more on Yamagami than the others, at least for right now, but we get a good ensemble feeling here with a solid looking shows and good bits of situational comedy that makes me grin, though not outright laugh. But it’s an easy show to slide into and enjoy with plenty of potential going forward.
Grade: B+
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Apple TV via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.
