Shirobako – 15

Meido-Kantoku and Faithful Flogger

MusAni is getting into the swing of Third Aerial Girls Squad, and it’s time to get some new people up to speed. So how did bringing a few people in for a lot of meetings go? (and by the way, that’s excellent detail on the MiG-23 Flogger in that top pic: the plane actually has a folding ventral fin so it doesn’t drag on the ground)

You’ve Got More Work!

Newbies Andou (left) and Satou (right) – I like that they gave Satou ep 3 and Andou ep 4.

That’s what every announcement means to Aoi. She’s got new PA’s to deal with in Satou-san and Andou-san, neither of which has any experience in production, although they do have different experiences. Tsubaki Andou is a big anime fan, to the point that Endou asks “Are you one of those people?” and she readily accepts the label of ‘those people’. Meanwhile, Sara Satou may have never even watched an anime in her entire life. I do think it’s amusing that she picked the job because it was closer to her house than the job she had at a department store. And maybe that’s the kind of person that Aoi needs to have around, someone who can (hopefully) do a job well because it’s in front of her, and not all these other “I’m following my dream!” kind of people.

Andou “impresses” with her knowledge of anime trivia

And like everyone else, they’re kind of thrown in the deep end. One thing that the show makes evident about the anime production industry: there is not a lot of slack. So there isn’t really much in the way of time to allow for trainees to get up to speed. They can’t shadow someone for a whole show’s production, these companies just don’t have that much spare productivity (or cash) hanging around. So they’ve gotta be productive off the bat. At least Andou is good for some comic relief, using her otaku knowledge to bring up embarrassing history of Kinoshita and Maitake.

Interminable Meetings

With your hosts Mimuji and Roro

Unlike last week with the one awful meeting that the higher ups had to sit through, this week we get the endless parade of meetings to get production going. Scenario read-throughs, location hunts, storyboard meeting, production meeting (with newbie key animator Kunogi, who manages to say one word through the whole episode, that the director had a bug on his sleeve), meeting with the out-of-office animators including Segawa, who takes the chance to rebuff Tarou yet again, supervising animator meeting, art board meeting, coloring meeting, CG meeting, subconsultant meeting with the outside CG company, filming meeting, accompaniment meeting, and probably meeting meetings. We get helped through all of this insider stuff by the greek chorus of Mimuji and Roro.

The new animator is freaked out

Time for a break, everyone to the playground!

And on top of going to all the meetings, Andou and Satou are still new at the production part, so they get a little help from Aoi as to what they need to do. I’m guessing that Aoi is helping them out with format of the different charts they should use to keep track of production as well. It seems like everything’s going along smoothly, even with some new people. And that just means that it’s time for something bad to happen, which of course it does in the person of the author, who had been completely uninvolved in the process so far. I think it’s clear that Watanabe has been trying to get the needed reviews, only to be rebuffed by Mr. Funny Story editor again and again, so all he can do is OK the start of production. Until they finally do hear back from the manga sensei, who doesn’t like the character designs.

Katsuragi is heartbroken

There was definitely a worry about the character designs from the beginning without Ogasawara Goth-loli-sama doing them. But I don’t know if that would have made a difference, or if this is more of a “failure to communicate” kind of issue. We’ll see if they tell us why there was so much of a roadblock with the sensei, if it was really those excuses like he didn’t feel well, or was busy with other stuff, or if it was that editor getting in the way. Not that that really matters in the end, since it’s still a production problem. And despite Watanabe’s statement about starting over, they may not be as far behind as that, since presumably they can keep the surrounding work, backgrounds, music, etc.

About Highway

Proving that you don't have to be young to love anime, I enjoy all genres and styles of shows. If it's not hurting anyone else, you should never be ashamed of what you like!