What They Say:
Masayoshi Hazama: a man who has become a superhero “by himself” with no superhuman powers or any sort of high-tech conversions, NONE!! Hidenori Goto: a cop who found out the true identity of “the superhero” by a strange twist of fate and thus constantly gets in trouble thanks to Hazama, the superhero. This is the story of the birth of a true hero featuring these two young men with a touch of comedy and serious drama, while they come face to face with hardships as they search for the true meaning of becoming a hero of justice in this world!
The Review: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
A girl walks through a creepy alleyway, clearly setting up for Sam Flam to save the day. What transpires next is the most atrocious and offensive thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life…And by that I mean it was hilarious, not offensive, and not atrocious. Because the creepy clearly-parody-of-rapper-or-that-sort-of-person walks up to the lady—clearly creeped out by the guy “stalking” her—and says that she dropped her handkerchief. Flamenco Girl lashes out at Sam Flam, saying that he’s saving TOO MANY people, so there’s not any more crime to fight. It’s a great flip of the typical expectations of a superhero, which Mari is not. Mari is a YouTube phenomenon and Masayoshi is a superhero. However, Mari has more qualities of a hero (or at least vigilante crime fighter) and Masayoshi is the original YouTube phenomenon.
We move forward the plot of it all a little when Masayoshi goes to his grandfather’s grave. On it, we see the symbol of Samurai Flamenco and in the scene just prior, he remembers that his grandmother was a flamenco dancer in the days of her youth. But what’s truly happening is within his own imagination, on the pages of the script he’s reading. He’s playing the role of Samurai Flamenco and his grandfather is playing the mad scientist that made Samurai Flamenco who he is. He reveals everything in a typical “I am your father” speech to him. How Samurai Flamenco came about and why he exists…but the remaining pages are blank. We get the climax but no resolution in the fantasy of Masayoshi’s script and mind.
Mari’s dejected, though. She didn’t get to fight ANY crime and she’s left picking flower petals off of a bouquet and saying “To destroy” and “Not to destroy” in turn. Her partners, and the people they’re meeting with, say she’s acting weird. When she turns and flower petals were in her mouth, it pretty much confirmed that she was acting weird—if dressing up in a superhero costume and fighting crime as a vigilante wasn’t weird enough. Moe says, “Decadence” in what could be the best line of the entire series.
The truth for Masayoshi is harsher than it appears. There’s a newspaper clipping that reveal that not every crime is so easily solved. His parents were killed as tourists and forgotten about, more than 20 years later. The local police have no recollection and the case, that may be open, is forgotten. But Masayoshi has nearly lost his desire to be a hero when this kind of travesty can happen. What can he change if something like this can happen? But Goto, in a masterstroke, calls Masayoshi a freak (hentai). He’s not a hero. He’s just a freak in a suit fighting crime. And isn’t that enough?
Masayoshi—rather Samurai Flamenco—is back when a punk is beating an old man. The punk asks Sam Flam what he’s doing and he responds, “I don’t even know!” He’s lost because he’s not the hero he thought he was. He’s just a dude. Regardless, he fights the punk with his Samurai Tape (which is 10,000 times stickier than normal tape) and saves the day for the old man. For one day, for one man, he’s the hero. And that’s enough.
Things get a little more complicated when a regular drug bust goes weird when a dude turns into a gorilla. That’s right, a gorilla. And the gorilla’s stomach? A guillotine. I think everyone can safely say they did NOT see that coming. Because who would expect a gorilla with a guillotine for a stomach to show up? No one. Not even someone who expects the Spanish Inquisition. Soon-to-be archnemisis King Torture shows up, but not before the gorilla says “VIVA TORTURE” and explodes.
In Summary:
So what was up with those last few minutes? They were WEIRD. But you know what they also were? Entertaining. And they did a few important things: 1. Sam Flam isn’t completely out of the game after his superhero existential crisis in the scene before, 2. Set up a concrete antagonist (which wasn’t necessary, but will hopefully be done well instead of just being a bad guy for the sake of having a bad guy), 3. Sam Flam failed, but was allowed to succeed. Let me explain the third point. Early on in the series, he lost a lot, but that was because of his own incompetence. But now he has some fighting skills and some toys and he hasn’t really lost since. Sam Flam has always prevailed, yes, but he wasn’t really “winning” per se. Things just happened to work out. This time, Goto and Sam Flam worked together to achieve the outcome they desired and that was earned. After all the moments, little and big, like him facing Joji or him saving Flamenco Girl or even Flamenco Girl saving him, this was decisively the biggest.
I can say two things about this show after seven episodes: 1. It has been extremely fun watching it, BUT 2. I’m trepidatious as to what direction it’ll go with the introduction of the villain. The show has worked thus far without a villain, with Sam Flam fighting through his own insecurities and against Flamenco Girl, but we’ll see were King Torture will take us.
Grade: A
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Equipment: Radeon 7850, 24 in. Vizio 1080p HDTV, Creative GigaWorks T20 Series II
I think I speak for everyone when I say….wtf just happened?
I think the last bit with the guy turning into a gorrilla was a bit out there. It came out of no where and you don’t see Sam Flam in the typical anime/western comic super hero universe (you could say it would work as a light hearted poor ?not so poor?man’s batman like the one from the movie). It worked because it seemed light hearted but somewhat based on the real world.
The guy turning into a gorilla with a guilotine stomach and the introduction of King Torture has spoiled the series for me at this moment in time. The question is how they will go from here because what they did previously didn’t really need a supernatural or a supervillain time enemy.