And who said that dating games don’t give you real life experience? Oh, that would be everyone, wouldn’t it? I guess Mikorin never got the message.
What They Say:
Fourth Issue: “There Are Times When Men Must Fight”
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Mikorin asks for love advice from “the spokesman for girls’ hearts,” Nozaki. What is it he wants to know? Which one of two fictional girls in a dating sim game his fictional player should go home with. Yes, we are back to the realm of quick jokes, which is good.
While Chiyo is a little bit absent from the first series of quick jokes, we do get some good laughs from seeing how clueless Mikorin is, which is only topped by how much more clueless Nozaki can be. Mikoshiba apparently started playing dating sims in the interests of “research,” to learn more about girls. While he may have gotten good at playing dating sims (which, it should be noted, are mainly created by men), his ability to interact with most girls in real life remains limited. He encourages Nozaki, however, to play the game he was recently playing. Nozaki’s style of play, is to say the least, unique. He chooses the name of his manga’s male lead, Suzuki, for his player character’s name, and chooses all of the interactive options best suited to alienating all of the girls in the game. His reason? “Suzuki only has eyes for Mamiko.” So, he not only uses the name Suzuki but stays in character while playing.
So, quite a bit of laughter from playing with dating game stereotypes and the cluelessness of our two heroes. Eventually, Nozaki is forced by Mikoshiba to play seriously, which results in Nozaki’s seeming to choose the girl who resembles Chiyo the most in the game, though it’s just a coincidence. But he continues to make missteps, since he makes decisions from the girl’s point of view. Mikoshiba advises Nozaki to call Chiyo, which results in Chiyo’s conquest…ahem…in Chiyo being quite pleased and Mikoshiba being left somewhat despondent.
The highlight of the episode, however, is the further exploring of the game’s mechanics, which leads in an unexpected direction. Mikorin explains how things work, including the “protagonist’s friend,” whose role is to help the protagonist score with the girls over the course of the three years in high school. Nozaki is suspicious of the character (from writing too much shoujo fiction involving backstabbing “friends”) and imparts reasons that aren’t probably included in this type of game for why the “friend” is helping his character. But as they continue playing the game, it happens that both Nozaki and Mikoshiba seem to fall more for Tomoda, the friend, than any of the girls in the game. They feel so sorry for his sacrifice, wasting his three years of high school helping out a worthless friend (the protagonist), that Nozaki decides, right there on the spot, to draw Tomoda’s story, with Mikoshiba helping him.
When they try to think of which girl would be best for Tomoda, they come to an inescapable conclusion: the person who showed him the most attention was…the protagonist. So, the next day, Chiyo comes to Nozaki’s apartment to find the two on the floor dead tired from pulling an all-nighter. Looking at the manga, however, Chiyo is horrified, wondering what just happened…to make them write a boys’ love manga overnight. While we could see the setup coming from quite a while away, the payoff was still worth it.
Back to school, we see Mikorin in action. When priding himself on being able to juggle several girls at once (in a game), Chiyo challenges him to do it in real life. He tries talking to a group of girls…and winds up pleading for Chiyo to rescue him. The trials do not stop for him as next a group of guys organizing a mixer ask him to fill out their ranks (they’re one guy short). He shows a lot of bravado in front of them, but later is in a panic speaking to Nozaki, since he’s never been to a mixer before. Back at Nozaki’s apartment, the two do some rehearsing to help Mikoshiba. Chiyo walks in but gets a slightly wrong idea about what they’re doing, thinking that they’re acting as if they’re in a hostess bar. The three then set to work to get Mikoshiba prepared…after a fashion.
In the end, he doesn’t go on the mixer and instead sends Kashima in his place. While the boys think it’s a good thing as it improves their odds, of course we know the reality: Kashima dominates the gathering.
While some of the moves were pretty predictable (especially “Tomoda’s story”), the scenes still delivered a heavy payload of laughter as they came. From the appearance of Chiyo in the game, to the behavior of Nozaki’s protagonists, to the “special” relationship between Tomoda and the game protagonist, to the outcome of Kashima going on a mixer, we may have seen where things were headed, but they were still funny. One thing that marks out this show from many others is that there is not too much humor made at the expense of the characters. Mikorin does fall into this position a bit more than the others, but the humor is not generally mean-spirited, part of the charm of this work. Stereotypes are skewered, but without any malice. This remains a show where you can sit back, relax, and allow a smile to emerge from the quick jokes that come with the original’s four-panel format. Good stuff.
In Summary:
Another good episode of quick laughs, stitched together by the theme of relationships between boys and girls and the means of learning more about them. First, Mikoshiba is deeply into dating sims as a way of learning more about girls. When Nozaki tries his hand at one, predictably laughable results follow. Then Mikoshiba is invited to take part in a mixer, but he has no experience in such gatherings and seeks help from Nozaki and Chiyo…to predictably laughable results. The writing continues to be sharp for one of the season’s best comedies.
Episode Grade: A-
Streamed by: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Apple iMac with 4GB RAM, Mac OS 10.6 Snow Leopard