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Nichijou Review/Reaction Blog - Episode 1


Bernkastel

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Okay, so we're starting Nichijou. This blog is one of a collection of reaction/review blogs I created for another forum that I made for another forum. I hope you all find them enjoyable to read.

It's an anime about a number of girls in a high school who have wacky antics happen around them. It's a standard slice of life anime formula. Azumanga Daioh  is an older example and there have been a lot of this sort of anime released, to the point that I've seen that growth get complained about. Now, Nichijou has something to differentiate itself from the others. What this shalll be apparent by the time this review ends.

We start with a very short conversation about motivation. This serves as our first intro to the main characters of Mio and Yukko, though they do get a proper introductory scene later. Then we get introduced to a girl with a winder key on her back who is cooking a fish. She yells to a professor that it's done. This professor is another girl. The professor complain about having fish. The girl turns back to find a cat now has the fish. The girl thinks that cat is worried about her winder key when she approaches it and it moves back. She says it's not a robot part. Then the cat runs off. The girl wonders if the cat is just down on it's luck and taking the fish to feed it's family. Then she runs into a person and there's a massive resulting explosion. Naturally. 

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So, there's your first taste of what Nichijou is like. We got a robot girl, who's just there without anything made of it. It's just “Oh, here's a robot girl. Now let's move onto something else”. There's Professor who's very young and yet made a robot and the end of a chase that ends in something insanely over the top.

So, here is the intro.

Nichijou OP 1

I like the OP music. It's energetic and the animation mostly matches that with, apart from a bit in the middle. There's also plenty of odd imagery, to put forward the tone of this series.

So, we return to Mio and Yukko as they meet up on the way to school. This is where we get their names. Yukko greets Mio with “Selamat Pagi” instead of “Good Morning” or something like that.  Mio doesn't react to this, instead talking about how she forget her student ID. Mio suddenly wonders if there is a thunder storm, when the two hear the sound of the explosion from the previous scene. Yes, that actually happened. Anyway, a random doll hat was blasted in the air thanks to it hits Yukko on the head. How awful. But Yukko wonders if, since getting his like that doesn't happen to people normally, that perhaps she's lucky in a way. Then she gets hit by another item. No, she's not lucky. But perhaps she still can consider herself lucky. Yes, after all, at least it wasn't raw food. That would have been truly awful.

Then a bit of fish lands on her head.

 We then get a students going to school bit, with a shot of the school sign and some shots, including one of a bunch of students and… wait a minute! Was that a cravat wearing person on a animal which is being lead via rope by a guy in a poofy 18th century aristocrat wig in that crowd shot? Well, the students at school, bit continues and ends with Mio and Yukko entering her class. We are introduced to Mai reading a real estate magazine. Yukko uses her “Selema Pagi” greeting. Mai doesn't react, making Yukko think she'll have to abandon that effort at a catch phrase. Yes, that's why she's using it, in the hops of turning it into a catchphrase. But Mai does call Yukko when she's gone to her desk to offer a return greeting in whatever language Yukko got that from. Yukko is very happy at this.

We get introduced to our home room teacher. She has this whole nervousness thing which I assume is something to make her cute. She also has a cute design, like most of the characters. It's very much a slice of life staple to have that these days. I'd say it was less the case with older stuff like Azumanga Daioh. I could imagine Mrs Yukari in a non-slice of life show. This teacher. Nope. Anyway, she asks about the budda statue she found in her shoe locker and if any of the students put it there. Yukko wonders if it was put there  by a student with a crush on the teacher. Mio sympathises with the possible hopeless crush, which Yukko compares to Mio's feelings for another student called Sasahara. Then we get a intense reaction shot from Mio. This show, from what I've seen of it, does like to put a lot of effort into animating stuff like reactions in an over the top/energetic way. It gives the show it's own style and I like it.

So, we find the robot girl is now on a roof, waking up and wondering where she is. She then decides to go home. But she encounters the tiny problem that she's stuck on a roof. Then she encounters the other tiny problem that she's missing a hand. We then have a very short bit with Mia throwing frisbee while a dog is there. You initially would think it's for the dog, but no. It turns out she's there to do some some shooting and the frisbee is a target. Of course.

Mio and Yukko are eating lunch. Yukko saved a sausage, the best bit for her, for last, with the intent to finsh lunch by declaring “Delicious!” after eating the last item. But the sausage is dropped! Oh my god! The effort to get it before it hits the floor is, well, take a look.

Link

Holy crap, that was amazing. That was so overboard. I love it.

We then get two very short bits that I suspect were for an ad break. The first is of the Professor and the robot girl playing rock paper scissors. The robot players her hand, but finds out that she has flowers in place of her hand. Naturally, the robot girl is astonished. This is followed up by Mio trying to play skip rope with random shirtless guys with weird heads handling the rope. It hits Mio on the head immediately.

We then move to a scene where the Principal is giving a speech to all students. He talks about the cold, being more likely to catch cold and how he'd go to another school if the students don't try not to catch colds. Yukko asks Mio if the Principal knows his jokes are old. She then wonders if he does know and this is some effort to show the student what hard work means. You're quite the optimist, Yukko. She then sees that Mai is laughing and wonders if Mai somehow found the Principal's jokes funny. Mai is about to say something when Yukko asks about her laughing, but decides to say “Never mind”. It then is shown that Yukko has a squid tentacle in her hair and Mai was laughing at that. Yeah, that makes a lot more sense. I'm serious. The Prinicipal is one of those people who are just awful at jokes.

Anyone thinking of telling me something like “It takes one to know one” should consider the possibility of suddenly coincidently ending up dead and buried in the place where I totally do not bury the corpses of people I've killed.

The home-room teacher, who we now discover is called Mrs Sakurai, is called up to make a message. She's nervous, especially in front of so many students. But she manages to deliver her message, which is that students should not bring goats to school. One student furiously protests this policy and declares that he'll continue to go to school by goat. Yukko points out this is Sasahara. Sakurai folds before this display and allows goats. Sasahara is happy and flicks his hair dramatically. Then he is shot to death. No one morns his passing, apart from Mio, his servant and his goat.

Okay, no, but he is shot at by another student, Misato. Sasahara gets picked up by the wig person while he asks why he must walk on his own legs, since he's the eldest son of his family. Dude, you're making Togami from Danganronpa look better and he was a rich asshole.

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Misato points ot that his family is farmers. Sasahara says he's still an eldest son. Meanwhile, Mio realises that the goat near the bikes had been Sasahara's and has a fantasy of him riding for her on his goat in a flowery field while a wedding veil is suddenly over her head.

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She then faints, the action resulting in the octopus tentacle being knocked off Yukko's head. After that, we then return to Sakurai going the rest of her student message and ends it by asking about the Buddha statue. She declares to keep the assembly on this topic until she gets an answer. It turns out it was the Principal, who meant for it to be a birthday gift, He didn't know she didn't like those sort of statues. He then repeats his explanation into the microphone. 

We then go to Mio and Yukko in front of a fire alarm button. Mio mentions the temptation to push it and Yukko gets an idea. She says that when she pressed it before, it didn't go off, and that Mio should try it. It works. Everyone storms out. Mio and Yukko are stunned. Yeah, that's why you don't press fire alarms when there isn't a fire.

We get a random section in which a reaper is asking people what clueless means, while people run away from it. Another reaper appears and the first asks it was clueless means. The second one responds with “You are”. It's a short and effective little sequence. After that, Sasahara gets called to the teachers room and is asked about his goat and why he can't perhaps use a bike instead. Sasahara just responds by telling the teacher to consider calling the goat by a name. The teacher rejects that “proposal”. 

We go back to the robot and finally get her name, Shinonome Nano. She introduces herself as a robot who lives with the Professor who made her. The Professor is doing research and so stays home all day. The robot spends her time helping the Professor, She takes some milk to the Professor, but hits her toe. She fells pain. The Professor solves this problem by removing the toe. Naturally. Okay, I guess that's less silly a reaction when talking about a robot. She asks the Professor what the key in her back is for. The Professor responds by winding it. The robot''s big toe then launches into the wall.  That's it. Also, the key's cute. The robot is annoyed at finding this out and expresses her desire to do normal things, like sleep or go to school, without the hassle that the key causes. Yeah, finding out that your creator added a feature to you that has no purpose and is such a hassle for such a petty reason is quite the gut punch to get. She wishes she wasn't a robot. The Professor is saddened by this and demands that she take her literature prize. I don't think that's really going to help.

Then we cut to a guy on a rooftop with headphones. He turns on a song, the ending credit song. That's an interesting way of transitioning to those. By the way, here's the credit song.

Link

So, this series has a lot of weirdness and energy to it. I'm loving it so far. As I was watching this series, I was also watching Azumanga Daioh. So, how how do they compare?

Now, the degree of outlandish stuff definitely is a difference from what I've seen of Azumanga Daioh. There is some weird stuff there at times, but it doesn't detach itself completely from reality apart from in the imagination of characters. Nichijou just has an actual robot be there before we even have the opening. I'd say that Azumanga has some odd characters in a regular world, while Nichijou is very much in a bizarre slice of life version of the world where crazy stuff just happens. There's also the animation. This is definitely an area where Nichijou tried to make itself different from other anime of it's type, via stuff like the over the top sausage scene, while Azumanga didn't have that need and uses well done conventional animation.

Personally, I'd say I like Nichijou more. It appeals to my peculiar sensibilities a lot with it's... how should I put it? Pure Nichijou-ness? It's a show that can be very odd, based on what I've seen now and heard about future content. Anyway, I'll work on posting more entries and getting my blog entries for Azumanga Daioh up.

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