Shimoneta to Iu Gainen ga Sonzai Shinai Taikutsu na Sekai – 05
Someone’s a little too pleased with themself
Shimoneta this week takes us to places we maybe didn’t really want to go, but it was fun when we got there.
They Just Went There…
“Don’t you think you’re getting a little too close, Ayame?”
I told you it wasn’t drool. Anna’s really ramped up her pursuit of Tanukichi, to the point of getting really creepy about it. But she still doesn’t realize how creepy, raunchy and out there she is, in almost everything she’s doing. Leaning against desks, talking about “love nectar”, it’s something where everyone in both the show and the audience is embarrassed for her. That’s until she starts letting herself get a bit yandere with Ayame for being a little too chummy with Tanukichi. I know that some people throw ‘yandere’ around a lot, and that I usually resist that when it’s more just jealousy and “Oooh, I’m gonna get her!” shakes fist, but when the person you’re talking about is holding the point of scissors to her perceived rival’s neck, that meets the intent to murder that’s required. Especially after Anna punched through a chain link fence to grab Ayame.
Not the tongs! Not there!
Anna’s obsession of lust even interferes with Tanukichi’s attempts to help the SOX cause in hiding the drawings and maps to the Porn Forest, since he can’t get away from her. She even starts asking for his “love nectar”, and while normally a guy would be kinda into that, it’s obvious that Anna’s not understanding at all what is going on, and that really puts Tanukichi off. The qualities he idolized about Anna have been utterly destroyed, and yet she herself has no idea that the things she’s doing, the things she’s desiring, are the very things that her mother has tried to keep her from knowing about, in the name of “teaching everyone what is right”. And it does set up an interesting future conflict in that I don’t think we’re anywhere close to Anna giving up her monomaniacal pursuit of Tanukichi’s loins in hopes of sating her urges, and yet if her mother finds out about it, something pretty horrible would happen to someone. I almost start to wonder if this is the kind of thing that Ayame, as Anna’s supposed best fried, needs to bite the bullet on and try to get it through Anna’s skull that what she’s doing isn’t just love.
It’s love when you try to destroy the object of your lust, right?
Fuwa-san to the Fore
Fuwa takes matters into her own devices
In the other concurrent plot, there is still the conflict between the morality signing of the H-Kinshi pledge and the Porn Forest raid. And while Ayame and Tanukichi have given up on rallying the students to their cause (of distracting the guards), Hyoka has taken the initiative on her own, and engendered the support of all the students who were going to to go to the rally. She even employs a great strategy to get all the guards out of the way by sacrificing all the boys to draw the Decency Squad off. That doesn’t work against the Nishikinomiya secret weapon, tho. Anna has tracked down Blue Snow and exhibits more supernatural abilities in chasing her. Ayame’s also feeling a little guilty (finally) at having blackmailed Tanukichi into the whole SOX thing, so she willingly leads Anna away to let him break free.
I love Ayame’s facepalm…
But even though Tanukichi has resisted openly the whole time, he’s also realizing that he kind of likes the excitement of the ‘terrorism’ they do. And I think that seeing Anna’s wholesale misunderstanding of her body’s reaction to Tanukichi has kind of knocked a few petals off that rose, while also maybe making him think that Ayame might be right, that the students need to know more about their bodies and what it means to be growing up. So faced with a possible choice of abandoning Ayame and clearing his name, he still turns down the terrorism path and creates his own character… without a name yet (I’m gonna bet his name becomes “Madanai”, even if it means “Don’t have one yet”). But even though he’s no match for Anna, her body realizes it’s Tanukichi even if her eyes can’t manage to put it together (this is someone who never put 2 and 2 together to realize that her best friend Ayame is Blue Snow, either), and faced with an unresolvable dilemma, she runs away instead of dealing with it. But they still have to deal with her mother’s press conference, and manage to even disrupt that, replacing the stack of pledges with a stack of dirty pictures, getting Sophia in trouble and torpedoing the H Kinshi law, at least for now.
Bonus NSFW Section
Based on my reading of the end of the first LN, the story’s just gotten to the end of that first volume (although they could have put the manhole joke somewhere else, that and the high five is what I read). That would be a nice pace, getting through 5 episodes for one LN. I’m always for a show that takes its time with the source material, especially if the source material is good. I’m kind of surprised that that was all in one volume, but I have to say that I’m pleased that it’s been such a good adaptation. JC Staff has really done a great job, and between this and Prison School (and even the reactions for Shokugeki no Souma), they’re really flexing their raunchy muscles, as well as making an entertaining show here. This is absolutely tied with Jitsu wa Watashi wa for my favorite show this season, I hope they both continue to fight it out.
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!
POWUH: iLurker with 1 comments
Nobody is talking about THE COOKIES, and the bottled love nectar?
BLASPHEMY!!
POWUH: Meta Team and Spammy Tamer with 7115 comments
It’s something that one just doesn’t talk about. And again, I think that’s kind of the point. Anna’s ignorance has taken her so far past the boundaries of acceptable discourse that she’s even shocking the terrorists.
POWUH: Meta Resident and LN Informant with 1529 comments
Based on my reading of the end of the first LN, the story’s just gotten to the end of that first volume.
Did you read an English fan translation, or did you read the actual novel itself in Japanese? Because AFAIK no English translation exists.
I wonder what inspired the author to come up with something that could easily surpass the raunchiness of 50 Shades in the West. Too bad Shimoneta will never become mainstream reading outside of Japan’s otaku circles.
POWUH: Meta Team and Spammy Tamer with 7115 comments
In Japanese. I haven’t read the whole thing yet, I just looked at the last few pages to see if it was the end of this episode, or if it was something that happened in a prior episode. But it was the bit about the high five, followed by the bit about the manholes. So unless they moved that part, it’s the end of volume 1.
There’s very little that is ‘mainstream’ reading material now. I don’t know if this LN series will get a bump from the anime, but there’s certainly plenty of material to go. I can’t see them getting through more than 2 more LNs in the rest of this series, and they might stretch just one, I don’t know how much is in each one.
POWUH: Meta Resident and LN Informant with 1529 comments
If you do read the book(s), can you tell us whether the source material is raunchier than the anime?
How good are you at reading Japanese, anyway?
POWUH: Meta Team and Spammy Tamer with 7115 comments
I’m good enough + use a dictionary to figure out what the text says. I’m probably not good enough to understand a whole lot of innuendo, so I probably will miss most of it in that particular book.
POWUH: Meta Team and Meta-Analyst with 3844 comments
Oh god, I just realised what was in that clear box. Cannot unsee and unthink.
POWUH: Meta Team and Spammy Tamer with 7115 comments
You didn’t figure it out last episode when they put the chastity belts up on the big screen?
POWUH: and LOLi Defender with 10998 comments
Both have writers and directors that understand how gags should work, and the keen difference between jokes and natural humor.Both also understand how to make characterization; and its not shoving a cliche onto a character design and calling it a day. Also, what both do to leave somewhat unspoken is worth a ton of viewing pleasure.
Seaweed head has the makings of a true Magnificent Bastard, speaking of cliches and tropes.
…and most of all it’s nice they made Anna the type of character that she is. I predicted she was much more than she seems, but them took that even further, skewering that predictability.
POWUH: Meta Team and Spammy Tamer with 7115 comments
I love the kind of supporting character that Hyoka has become. She’s not captured into the orbit of the main characters, but sometimes intersects with their interests. She also catches on faster than most of the others (“congratulations on your terror organization”). And she’s got that great deadpan that works perfectly.
POWUH: Meta Resident and LN Informant with 1529 comments
Not even Wikileaks could surpass the great leaks streaming from Anna’s skirt!
On the plus side, maybe she’ll be too dehydrated to catch SOX next time. She IS losing a lot of fluid…
POWUH: Meta Team and Spammy Tamer with 7115 comments
The rainbow was entirely uncalled for…