Namiuchigiwa no Muromi-san episode 01

Okay, this is one weird way to start the season but I just had to. Going into this series I had no idea what I was going into. Let me round up the weird and wonderful way I came onto this series: So I'm somewhat of a big fan of Mermaid Melody PPP name-is-too-long, I say somewhat because I never finished the first season and went all the way with the second season, but more importantly, I love the mermaid girls and even some of the bad girls :P

She's.... flying....

This of course being around 2004 when I fell in love with 13 minute anime due to that year being one of my most memorable and super charged in my life until recent years, and when I saw the episode counts drop from the very common 24/26 down to 13/12, I lamented the rarity of 13 minute series.


And this series has Tamura Yukari being, well, a hilarious mermaid, what's not to like? You don't get to spend half an hour watching this, it's only a quarter of an hour, and it has laughs filling up much of that 12-13 minute span? It was a great watch, time well spent, and out of the episode 01's I saw this week, this one has got to be my most enjoyable overall when you factor my checklist of fun:

• Time well spent (AKA having a :D face more often than a :< face)
• Don't back up the truck (When the story is comprehensible for most of it's airtime)
• Mission Complete! (when you get what is expected out of the series instead of going WTF?)

I can't envision Muromi-san without Tamura Yukari's voice, I just can't.

TIME WELL SPENT

For 12 minutes, for a good director, how do you want to spend those 13 minutes? Back in 2004, they were adapting Ren Ai games (ahem, visual novels cough eroge) into 13 minute episodes, and that didn't really work out (princess hour was funny when they tried to go serious with W Wish and hilarious with Final Approach in the same half hour block XD). So Muromi-san was time well spent for me because it was only 10-11 minutes of fun (1 minute or so for the hilarious J-pop x Hard Rock OP), and those 10 minutes were as plain as day: you got a guy who goes fishing, and fishes out Muromi-san. Except this mermaid doesn't go all Little Mermaid on Mr. protagonist, she goes so far as to insult his hobby XD

Fishing isn't a joke folks, and in all my times fishing, I never caught a fish, but lost bait doing so. I'm like 0-for-all-time, and the first rule of fishing I learned was.... never call it "not hunting" >_> Okay, that wasn't the first rule, but it's a hobby that needs patience, and maybe I'm just jealous I didn't have a Muromi-san bothering me when I was fishing :P

Don't back up the truck

For 10 minutes, they hit it well because it's plain simple: it's Takkun fishing, and Muromi-san being... Muromi-san. I never thought they could add what they did in 10 minutes: you get the hilarious idea about Starfish, we get to see a red-eyed bird for a second season in a row, we learn about jellyfish and underground shopping malls. Not once did I feel like they were throwing something completely unrelated to me, I got laughs, and probably the only question I had was, what in the world was with that hilarious OP? It's so gloriously unscientific :D

deredere Muromi-san wants you to watch!

Mission Complete!

I came here for the mermaids, I got some one. It's only 10 minutes or so, so I'm glad they focused on Muromi-san, but I am looking forward to the other mermaids (I got a thing for the blue ponytail and the ditz), and seriously, that episode 02 preview is just dying for my full on attention. I can't wait for that :D

For now this episode wins my weird and wonderful weekend comprised of Date A Live, Photo Kano, OreImo & Hyakka Ryouran Bride. I have yet to see the rest of Spring 2013, but for 10 minutes, I thoroughly enjoyed myself.