It is the story of Rebecca Miyamoto, 2nd child of a Japanese mother and an American father. She graduated from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) and has returned to Japan
Each episode is one contained story that shows a particular arc within the main characters lives. Once you know all of the major players in the series you can pretty much watch it in any order you want to. Each episode begins with a small intro that has something to do with the plot of the episode. After the ending credits (which change through out the series every couple of episodes) there is a small montage that relates to the episode. That is followed by what can loosely be described as a preview for the next episode
Ok, on with the characters, because this is the best way to give a feel of the series.
Becky, as her students call her, is a disillusioned ill-tempered version of Chiyo-chan (from Azumanga). She is an 11 year old MIT grad and is now the homeroom teacher for a class of misfits. A depressed, self loathing talking rabbit, Mesosa, ends up befriending her, following her everywhere she goes, only to be continuously berated by everyone, stalked by 'god' and ready to commit suicide every time he is brushed off. Both are late for the first day of school and end up in a wooded area staring at a vending machine. Becky gets a drink out of the machine and when she complains about it being luke-warm the machine opens up. Living inside of it is a large white cat that calls himself God; he looks like he's hopped up on Qualudes. The cat tells her that its 'Body temperature-nya" and offers her a replacement. After this a robotic doll carrying a tray of tea shows up. It shoots notes from its mouth (one of which almost kills Mesosa) informing them that it is from Peach Moon and is there to pick them up. Finally they end up at school. During this time the teacher from the next room, Jijii, is informing the class that their last homeroom teacher left…
It might help to mention that in every class all of the students who are not main characters are mannequins. Each class has different looking mannequins which show up randomly through out the series. Much of the time the series is portrayed as if being filmed in a TV studio, with a view looking at the set and random crew members wandering into the shots.
Rei Tachibana is the smartest and cruelest student in the class. Through out the series she will ask the stage crew to remove the class rep, Ichijo, when she stops functioning properly. When Becky shows up Rei becomes the ringleader for abusing her. Ichijo, the class rep, is a bizarre, not-of-this world mystic. She will do random things for no apparent reason and will give even more bizarre answers when asked why she did them. Next is Himeko Katagiri, who is like a cross between Osaka
Next is Miyako Uehara, the most normal of all the students in the class. She is constantly targeted by the other student, especially Rei, for being stupid even though she studies diligently. Then there is my favorite, for humor factor, Kurumi Momose. She has the same complexes as Mesosa, in fact the entire second episode deals with Becky trying to coax her back to existence after she forgot her name. Kurumi's problem is self esteem. When ever anyone implies (literally or otherwise) that she is plain/normal, she delves into a deep state of depression and self loathing that can sometimes render her near invisible. In one scene Mesosa and her issues play off of each other as they huddle in the schools rabbit cage. Kurumi looks in Mesosa's direction and states that he is her only friend. Mesosa is overjoyed and runs towards her until she picks up one of the normal bunnies and hugs it. The final character from Becky's homeroom is Sayaka Suzuki, also known as Rokugo (6th). She is timid, quiet and is repeatedly taken advantage of because of her inability to say no.
Jijii is the homeroom teacher from the class next to Becky’s. He is a crafty and cruel old man who controls and abuses his students for entertainment. In one episode Becky asks the teachers who owns a convertible parked out side the school, so she can get ride in it. Jijii says he does which was a lie. Jijii ends up taking her on a near death car ride, of which he comments 'I haven't driven in 30 years’. One of the other more memorable students is Boheimi-chan. She is the schools resident magical girl ala-Magical Girl Pretty Sammy. She does her best to save people from bad luck and unfortunate accidents. One episode focuses on her losing faith in her abilities. Becky's class ends up staging an elaborate event to convince her otherwise. They set the rabbit cage on fire and call for her to use her powers to make it rain. It rains, but only when Ichijo and her bizarre sister perform a Shinto rain ritual.
Jijii is the homeroom teacher from the class next to Becky’s. He is a crafty and cruel old man who controls and abuses his students for entertainment. In one episode Becky asks the teachers who owns a convertible parked out side the school, so she can get ride in it. Jijii says he does which was a lie. Jijii ends up taking her on a near death car ride, of which he comments 'I haven't driven in 30 years’. One of the other more memorable students is Boheimi-chan. She is the schools resident magical girl ala-Magical Girl Pretty Sammy. She does her best to save people from bad luck and unfortunate accidents. One episode focuses on her losing faith in her abilities. Becky's class ends up staging an elaborate event to convince her otherwise. They set the rabbit cage on fire and call for her to use her powers to make it rain. It rains, but only when Ichijo and her bizarre sister perform a Shinto rain ritual.
There's the endangered giant Japanese salamander they pick up on a school camping trip. It lives a depressive life due to being endangered. It try's to consul both Kurumi and Mesosa on their feelings. There's the cat that lives in vending machines who calls its self God. He's a cruel and mysterious character who enjoys tormenting Mesosa. In one episode Mesosa arrives at school late. He finds God sitting on the gates. God tells him he's late, Mesosa replies he's not even a student at which point God opens a trap door underneath him. Mesosa spends most of the episode in what can only be described of as vending machine hell. The other teachers that are main characters are the gym teacher, Saotome, who like all anime gym teachers, is completely oblivious to reality. There is also the drunken teacher, Igarashi. In one episode Rokugo tells everyone how she looks up to her and even Igarashi questions whether that is a good thing to do. There's also, Akane Serizawa, who is a member of the drama club. She has a penchant for dressing up in costume to try and spy on Becky's class. One running gag through out the series is her dressed as a clunky 50's style robot named Roboko who has come to destroy Becky. They find out who it is but keep playing along to torment her.
Finally there are the aliens. These bizarre beings have come to earth to judge it. Their computers have chosen one person on the planet to base their review on, Becky. Through out the series they observe Becky and her daily happenings. The aliens are pretty funny, like everything else, casually insulting each other and questioning the selection of Becky to base Earths condition on. They try their best, to not interfere with the humans, but sometimes that doesn't work. One episode has the leader and a subordinate playing with a gun that makes the target speak their mind. They decide to mess with Becky and shoot her with it during class. Instead of hitting Becky, the beam hits Himeko making her fall asleep. The gun malfunctions and ends up steadily hitting her for about 15 minutes or so. What ends up happening is everyone in the class gets sucked into Himeko's dream. A bizarre world filled with ahoge and a large brutish idiot protecting her subconscious. Other then that, due to the crews refusal, the aliens try not to interfere in there observations' life. In one episode they get a bit nervous after Becky ends up fighting in a mecha that looks exactly like the aliens…it is never explained as to why it looked like them, but it did fuck them up a bit.
OK, so we covered a good portion of the characters, not a lot of comparisons to Azumanga Daioh but the ones that I could compare should help paint the picture. The characters help describe the insanity of this series but they don't quite paint the entire picture. It's hard to really pin down an overall theme. Once you know all the characters it doesn't matter what order you watch the show in. For an overall theme though, I would say Becky shapes up her students to work with her, as opposed to against her, to take on the rest of the school. The series, as a whole, is pretty in-cohesive. It is an exercise in Japanese anime/TV history, as well as other video pop culture references. Each episode is chock full of references, sight gags and homage's to these things. I like to think I have an extensive knowledge of Japanese TV, especially anime, but, at least half of the references I didn't know. So given that, the references range from the old and obscure to the current (from when it was on TV). Stuff like Mazinger Z, James Bond and Card Capture Sakura, all fall pray to the writers in-jokes. It was hard for me to watch the series and really pay attention to everything. I had to find a balance between the actual plot of the episode and absorbing all of the references. Some times the references were so frequent that I was pausing the episode every 10 seconds to read the notes the subers had handily provide
OK, so we covered a good portion of the characters, not a lot of comparisons to Azumanga Daioh but the ones that I could compare should help paint the picture. The characters help describe the insanity of this series but they don't quite paint the entire picture. It's hard to really pin down an overall theme. Once you know all the characters it doesn't matter what order you watch the show in. For an overall theme though, I would say Becky shapes up her students to work with her, as opposed to against her, to take on the rest of the school. The series, as a whole, is pretty in-cohesive. It is an exercise in Japanese anime/TV history, as well as other video pop culture references. Each episode is chock full of references, sight gags and homage's to these things. I like to think I have an extensive knowledge of Japanese TV, especially anime, but, at least half of the references I didn't know. So given that, the references range from the old and obscure to the current (from when it was on TV). Stuff like Mazinger Z, James Bond and Card Capture Sakura, all fall pray to the writers in-jokes. It was hard for me to watch the series and really pay attention to everything. I had to find a balance between the actual plot of the episode and absorbing all of the references. Some times the references were so frequent that I was pausing the episode every 10 seconds to read the notes the subers had handily provide
All in all Pani Poni Dash is an entertaining series. It's for those who enjoy psychotic comedy like Puni Puni Poemy. The characters are inventive and the sight gags don't stop, even after the credits have rolled. If you enjoy school life comedies, satire and non-sense this might just be your perfect series. Definitely not for the casual viewer, there are just too many incomprehensible things that go on in this whacked out series. So pick up the DVD's, sit back, clear your head and enjoy this ride into insanity.
UPDATE: FUNimation has made the first 4 episodes available for free on YouTube.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment