SKET Dance 09 – 10

Blackmailing solves everything!

I’m back (finally) and that means your Sket Dance coverage is back as well. What has kept me from writing? I don’t know if I should be admitting this or not, but I have finally given up and decided to watch Naruto. That’s right. Naruto has kept me from blogging. However, 2 weeks and I’ve managed to complete the entire series up to Shippuden (which is a new record of amount of anime watched in a week for me) so that’s makes it better right…? Yeah okay, even I don’t believe that one. Well, now that I feel like I’ve wasted about a week of my life on flashbacks, on to Sket.

The Sket, who have had no recent requests, are stuck talking about the quality of figurines for lack of anything else to do. While talking about them not having work to do, Switch mentions that there’s been a purse snatcher going around. Bossun gets fired up and wants to go catch the thief, but Himeko stops him. After a pointless minute long shot of Bossun flashing his underwear, they finally have someone come to them for a request.

Your underwear flash for the day

It’s Hinohara Enta, a manga artist nobody’s ever heard of who’s going around interviewing people for inspiration for his next project. Turns out he’s already interviewed the Student Council (who then sent him to the Sket), and is a total fanboy of them. Upon hearing that their rivals, the Student Council are involved Bossun’s enthusiasm meter is suddenly over 9000 and he declares that the Sket should give better ideas so they beat the student council (also, apparently having a manga based on you equals instant popularity? … lol is that why we hired Junko? ).

Wtf is Switch playing here?! Her boobs are larger than her head. Nodoka was ridiculous to begin with, why make them bigger?!

So they start the interview and Hinohara asks who the main character would be. Bossun nominates himself and Himeko backs him up (Switch is too busy playing a crappy looking Saki game to care) of course when asking if Bossun has any special abilities, he only has his goggles and his concentration mode. Which is a cool ability in anime form, but in real life it’s rather lame. Hinohara almost leaves, but then Bossun whips out his slingshot… which is also lame. With Bossun being one disappointment after another, the interview switches to Himeko. Bossun has a freak out when Himeko turns out to be more interesting than him and it’s made worse when Switch is also a better character.

The three run off leaving Bossun behind, but it turns out that all they did was interview other clubs. In his anger, Bossun grabs a bottle of non copyright infringement brand Coke, which then explodes in his face. Their teacher supervisor conveniently opens the door then asking if Bossun drank some of the Coke. Bossun then starts glowing while Chuma asks AGAIN if he drank it (He’s sitting there with a half empty bottle and GLOWING. Why do you even need to ask that in the first place?)

Oh yeah, ignore the random steaks of sunlight. They were there ALL FREAKING EPISODE for no reason.

Bossun then ages backwards and turns into a teenager with a child’s body. It turns out the contents of the bottle was actually one of Chuma’s experiments and Himeko freaks out until Bossun starts talking flipping  her shotacon switch on. After doting on him, Switch and Himeko decide to take Bossun for a walk to find the manga artist guy again while Chuma goes off to make something to help Bossun turn back to normal. They wander around a bit while everyone dotes on the adorable Bossun (minus Tsubaki who flips out when he sees mini Bossun)  and finally they head back to the club room where Chuma is waiting with the aging serum.

At this point, I was more concerned for Tsubaki’s sanity than anything else

Bossun drinks it, but it was made by Chuma so of course it doesn’t work as planned. He’s the right size (I’m surprised the clothing didn’t tear, but I guess if it did Sket wouldn’t be suited for all ages anymore xD) but he now has the mind of a 3 year old. Himeko loses all interest at this point. Eventually things are solved and Hinohara returns asking if they were looking for him. Bossun is back to normal by now, so they walk Hinohara to the school gate. However, before he can walk 5 steps, the purse snatcher mentioned earlier grabs the bag with his idea notebook in it and he lays uselessly on the pavement shouting for help.

…Right. Don’t get up and chase after him or anything.

We see the usefulness of Bossun’s slingshot and the Sket manage to catch the thief. Hinohara finally realises the awesomeness that is Bossun and leaves telling them that he has the best idea for a manga ever… Unfortunately for them, he writes about the Student Council (and everyone except the Sket) instead. Trolled again.

The next part opens with a Kimi no Todoke parody that was filmed by Switch (ugh, this reminds me that I still have the second season to watch still…) which was actually pretty amusing. As it turns out, this is somewhat plot related because there is a cursed DVD going around the school. Like most cursed DVD’s these days, it brings about misfortune to anyone who watches it and apparently no one knows what the heck’s even on it. Reiko (the one who told Switch about the DVD of doom) appears in the room and soon after, another girl name Kuramoto Ayumi shows up.

Seeing how the only time people ever visit the Sket is when they want something, Kuramoto then announces that she has a request. She talks about how her friend is depressed for some reason and that she wants them to help cheer her up. However, even after their stand up comedy routine, Yagi doesn’t crack a smile. Even after several other attempts, it seems Yagi has a personality equivalent to that of a brick wall. When the Sket ask Yagi if she’s been troubled by something like a DVD, her facial expression actually changes and in an attempt to run off, she bumps into Switch causing the contents of her bag to conveniently fly out. One of which, is an unmarked DVD (shocker). She runs off, but Switch then notes that instead of her own DVD, she accidentally took the Sket’s Kimi ni Todoke remake instead (… how did that even end up on the floor in the first place?).

Also, she looks a lot like Daisy from the Student Council

Yagi’s homeroom teacher, Yoshimura, is also concerned for her because apparently she is usually cheerful (…what?) and he enters the broadcast room just as the Sket and Kuramoto debate whether or not to watch the DVD. They end up watching it and it turns out to be the answers to the midterm exam happening the next day. Everyone is shocked that Yagi would be cheating and while they talk about her suspicious behaviour, Yagi walks in. She asks if they saw it and is interrupted multiple times by Kuramoto and her sensei (my god, let her finish her sentence people!) so she runs off.  It was also here that I remembered what happened in the manga, thus ruining the rest of the episode for me.

The Sket find Yagi on a roof where she’s having a flashback of the incident 3 years ago where she was suspected of cheating and was just as emotionless as she is today (I still fail to see why the others think she has a personality). Being awesome, the Sket tell her that THEY believe in her and ask her what really happened. She tells them how she watched the DVD she found without thinking and kept it a secret because someone blackmailed her about it later. Resolving to solve the mystery and clear Yagi’s name, Bossun dons his goggles.

Rule #532 of anime: If you are depressed, head straight for a roof, a body of water or some other scenic place and act emo. Someone will find you eventually.

The next day, Kuramoto meets the Sket and Yagi in order for Yagi to clear the misunderstanding. Yagi says that she wasn’t cheating for the forty millionth time and Bossun accuses their teacher of making the DVD instead. He claims that Yoshimura was the only one who could have entered the staff room easily and after he checked it in the A/V room, he left it there like an idiot. When he came back later to retrieve it, Yagi was already watching it and Kuramoto (who is either so blind that she couldn’t see Yoshimura hiding behind a wall half his size or thought nothing of him standing randomly in the hallway) came as well making it impossible for him to stop Yagi from getting away.

The proof of Yoshimura’s crime is on the DVD, where Yoshimura accidentally filmed himself in the reflection of a mirror or something. Caught red handed, Yoshimura does a Light Yagami and admits that he wanted to sell the video to students for extra cash, asks what the problem is and then randomly starts talking about how his hopes and dreams were crushed (while doing some excessive hand movements and laughing creepily). Only Yoshimura’s monologue screws him over as the Sket Dan has broadcasted the entire thing over the PA the whole time. Before being ushered to the principal’s office, Yoshimura tells Yagi to develop a personality or the same thing might happen to her someday too (…was this a threat or words of advice?).

“Fuzakeruna~”

After everything is cleared up (and the midterms cancelled), they meet Yagi again, who thanks them for believing in her when no one else would. Also, she smiles finally.

Well that only took 21 minutes to accomplish.

End thoughts:

….The quality went downhill a lot here. It’s like Tatsunoko decided one day: “Hey, let’s stop caring about Sket Dance and cut a bunch of corners on things!” “Wait. But won’t the viewers notice?” “Nonsense! We’ll just shove in  random well animated rays of light in EVERY SINGLE SCENE POSSIBLE to make up for it. People love  that crap.” “…But sir, isn’t tha-” “EVERY. SINGLE. SCENE.” …And that’s how the conversation went. I’m hoping this is one of those things I can ignore and it will go away but I doubt it. Even if episode 10 was an improvement over 9, it was still pretty bad. The voice acting is still good fortunately which is nice considering the stories this time around were boring. Well maybe not boring, but after remembering who the culprit was in episode 10, I lost interest because I already knew how the mystery ended. That being said, while watching this, I realised how similar it was to the first episode, so maybe that’s why I got bored…?

I liked how they went right from the manga artist’s story right into the younger Bossun one. The transition worked well and made the stories flow instead of randomly switching from one into the other leaving the first story unfinished (like how Roman’s episode just kind of ended without any resolution). It seems they’re branching off from the manga more now (I swear Dante should have shown up by now) and so far it’s working for them.

Speaking of things not from the manga, yay for parodies I actually understand! The Kimi ni Todoke one was hilarious and surprisingly, it was actually plot relevant with the whole Sawako= Sadako= The Ring= Cursed DVD thing (…for those of you who don’t get it, just go watch KnT. Or The Ring. Or both. ). I guess the thing about parody anime is that it’s funny if you actually know what they’re talking about, but if you have no idea you lose interest because you feel like you’re missing a lot.

Preview:

Another showdown between the Sket Dan and the Student Council! I’m actually looking forward to this, but that’s because I know what happens. My advice? Watch it. We get to see Himeko cooking.