Fantasy Bishoujo Juniku Ojisan to – 02

「ファ美肉おじさんと絶世の美貌」 (Fabiniku Ojisan to Zessei no Bibou)
“A Guy Who Reincarnated as a Fantasy Knockout and Unparalleled Beauty”

Now that Fantasy Bishoujo Juniku Ojisan to is on its second episode, it’s easier to see what kind of trajectory the show has as far as its general content goes. For the time being, it’s a relief that the anime is more focused on being a comedy about the relationship between Tachibana and Jinguji, and doesn’t get bogged down with any convoluted world-building besides a basic understanding of RPG logic.

STACKING STATS

Much of the comedy that isn’t centered around the main duo suppressing their feelings are focused on how the salarymen interact with an RPG world where your innate skills determine your strengths. Enough of Tachibana’s skills stack in this episode to make for some really great comedy as his Troublemaker skill attracts bandits to a snoozy parochial town.

The funniest scene in the episode has to be when Tachibana’s other skill kicks in and causes men to be head-over-heels in love with her. But while it could’ve made it mean-spirited and made the comedy about Tachibana’s disgust, the scene escalates into a hilarious fight between the bandits as they all fight to the death over who gets to retire back to their hometown with a new, gorgeous bride. The imagery of Tachibana begging for everyone to stop as the dramatic music kicks in and the bandits continue to brutally maim each other ended up being far funnier than it had any business being.

Jinguji also had his fair share of humorous moments as he leads the town into the bandit’s hideout. As his nerves get the best of him, he winds up solving a strategy issue by tossing Tachibana near the gate, and then ultimately deciding to just individually toss each bandit into the ground with ease. They could’ve made it a tired action sequence where Jinguji does impressive feats of agile combat, but it was priceless to see how easy it came to him to just stuff each guy into the dirt.

Another subject of interest is how the Charm status effect works in this universe. Where, in extreme circumstances, Tachibana’s seductive qualities are strong enough to drive him into a Charmed status. But while it usually serves as a debuff that’ll cause party members to attack one another or give items to monsters, this world they’re in seems to treat Charm like a Rage debuff where a given character is amped up enough to have all of their actions intensify. It should be interesting to see if the Charm status caused by Tachibana might prove to be a hindrance or accidentally interfere with a fight Jinguji is having.

ANOTHER SHOULDER TO CRY UPON

While there was still the whole will-they,won’t-they on how much the duo like each other, there was far more food-for-thought this time around. Namely, Jinguji has had a rough episode with how much he’s being affected by the Love Goddess’ spell. Every so often, Tachibana will say something very sweet and off-the-cuff that throws him into a tail-spin.

For starters, when they find out they can summon a replica of Tachibana’s room, it causes Jinguji a ton of distress when Tachibana says that, despite not having the fridges stocked, he can rely on Jinguji to help feed them. The little jolts of enthusiasm that Jinguji gets for the idea of domesticity with Tachibana comes off as different in tone than just him merely being sprung from Tachibana’s girly appearance.

This comes further into play in Jinguji’s flashback sequence when the longing thoughts he has of Tachibana go beyond how he feels about him in the present. The most fascinating part of this is when Tachibana’s male form is fresh in his mind and his first thought after a fond memory is “I should really marry that guy.”

It lends itself to the idea that the Goddess’ curse forces someone to be in love with a person’s soul rather than their appearance considering that his actions as a man were what enamored Jinguji this time around. That is if that was the curse talking and it wasn’t Jinguji’s unfiltered thoughts on Tachibana helping him out for all these years. Jinguji might be forced to act cold to avoid letting his feelings come through and Tachibana might be resentful because Jinguji can’t help but joke about how Tachibana has more success pulling in guys than girls, but if Jinguji ends up falling for him, there might be some truth to that statement.