Another cute, strange, funny little episode all tied up together nicely.
What They Say:
Episode 3: After the Date, Rated R
The manager, Dino, continues to lose sleep due to watching too much late-night anime. Maika is interested in foreign animation herself. When Dino asks her why she’s so enamored of foreign countries and wants to study abroad, Maika shares childhood memories and talks about her family. Meanwhile, Dino wants to get closer to Maika and asks her out on a date.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
The great thing about 4-koma inspired anime is that they can quickly shift gears between one gag and another. In fact it’s best that they keep moving around, not letting any joke wear out its welcome. We can see that in the selection of vignettes that make up this episode.
As Maika comes into work in the morning, she steps on the manager, Dino, who is lying on the floor of the Staff Room. It appears that he collapsed, having spent too much time watching late night anime. This is just a set up for the two to compare notes on their country’s animation, leading into Maika telling us about how she become so interested in all things foreign. Apparently, growing up in a very traditional Japanese house with a family that followed traditional culture closely, she grew tired of her homeland and its ways…at age 5. This leads to some funny stories about how she wanted to express her interest in things foreign…with hilarious results.
Yes…Maika is completely nuts
Dino’s interest in her, however, only grows, even if she basically rejects much of what enthralls him (he’s definitely an over the top Japanophile). He tries to ask Maika out on a date…but she misinterprets his intentions and thinks it’s just a workplace event, inviting the rest of the staff along. Kaho and Akizuki show up (Mafuyu has more important things to do on her day off) and Dino wonders if there is some way to steer things back to a date. He thinks of giving a present, but that only results in wasted time (as well as existential depression for Akizuki and Kaho, who are intimidated by chipper sales assistants at upscale boutiques). In the end, Dino and Maika kind of connect over a cute phone/bag strap, but serious romance is not what this show is about.
As I said, being able to switch gears quickly is what is best about 4-koma works and so we move onto the next gage, when Maika finds a doujinshi left in the cafe. One of those kind of doujinshi. It’s an excuse to show us again how very pure and naive about the world Maika is while also providing us with further peeks into the personalities of the other cast members. The owner of the lost item is an unexpected surprise (unless, of course, you consume manga and anime). And perhaps a new cast member.
All in all, this show continues to be fun, with a little dash of ecchiness thrown in, but mainly for humor, not as serious fanservice (the show is quite light on service of that sort). We get a lot of funny stories that are built upon the outlines of the characters’ personalities already established in the previous episodes, but now able to draw deeper on what we already know about them to go to some outlandish extremes (Maika’s first love, for example). This isn’t deep and it’s not thought provoking, but it’s fun and light. This is the parfait of anime for this season.
In Summary:
The source of Maika’s love of all things foreign is revealed as she shares a few select stories with Dino. Then, Dino’s attempt to ask Maika out on a date backfires for the most part, since Maika is far too pure and inexperienced to understand what his feelings are. Then, a customer leaves a rather…interesting…piece of self-published work (doujinshi) in the cafe, leading to hilarious results in Maika’s reaction to it. She’s such an innocent. A good range of gags, making full use of what we’ve learned about the staff at Café Stile so far.
Grade: A-
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Apple iMac with 12GB RAM, Mac OS 10.13 High Sierra
