First Impressions / Series Introduction / Snapshots

OP Sequence

OP: 「超妻賢母宣言」 (Chousai Kenbo Sengen) by MOSAIC.WAV
Watch the OP! Mirror 1, Mirror 2

Summary:

In the middle of a city, a girl with cat ears and a tail runs from the police and escapes into a shopping district. She pauses at a fruit stand because she’s hungry, but when she tries to take an apple, a man stops her from stealing. This leads to her lecturing him back, referring to herself as Kyouka-sama, but the man tunes her out and instead notices her ears and tail. He snaps back to attention when she reveals that she’s 20 years old, and this leads to him finally introducing himself as an officer of the Paranormal Phenomena Bureau of measures, Midarezaki Ouka. Kyouka recognizes this name, but their conversation is then interrupted by the arrival of the police who are still after Kyouka. She knocks them all out with a special ability of hers that affects their central nervous system, and to Ouka surprise, she then tells him to take her to the director of his bureau. What’s even more surprising is how everyone is waiting for them there and treats Kyouka with much respect. It is at this point that Ouka’s boss gives him an important mission to save Earth: get married to Kyouka.

Before Ouka really understands what’s happening, his boss brings out a priest who reads them their vows. Kyouka is more than willing to go through with this, but Ouka has to be forced by the others in the bureau to sign the paperwork. He also finds out afterwards that he’s expected to be the father to five children. The two are then given a new home, and Kyouka is thrilled to see all the stuff that commoners live with. She tries to cook something for Ouka – using a chainsaw as a knife – but instead of eating the monstrosity of a dish that she creates, he asks her if she’s okay with getting married to a complete stranger. Kyouka explains her position by citing the Enka legend. Enka is a monster from a thousand years ago that tried to destroy everything on Earth. It was defeated by humans, but right before dying, it declared that in a thousand years, its child would appear and spread fear and despair. Kyouka claims that she’s the child, but she also admits that there are others who were found through DNA analysis. The plan that was developed was the mission given to Ouka – the harmonious family operation – where they put all of the children together in one family in hopes of identifying who the threat is. There is also the possibility that the child will feel that he or she doesn’t want to kill the rest of the family and destroy the world.

As for the five children, Kyouka has prepared a competitive game where she and Ouka search for them. The children can be identified with red armbands like the ones Ouka and Kyouka are wearing. Kyouka even has child detector equipment for the two of them, however even before the game begins, she has already decided that she’s the winner and he’s the loser. As her prize, she plans to have him live like a pet dog for a week, and this motivates Ouka not to lose. He quickly finds the first child in a supermarket – a meek girl named Yuuka – but before she can take his hand, Kyouka runs between them and slaps Yuuka’s hand. Based on her own rules, Kyouka now considers Yuuka to be her find because she touched Yuuka first, and the subsequent argument between her and Ouka causes Yuuka to start crying. The next child is located at the aquarium, and Ouka follows Kyouka there and discovers that she had data on what the children looked like all along. In any case, the child turns out to be a female jellyfish, and Ouka is forced to touch her and gets electrocuted in the process.

Along the way to the next spot, Ouka tells Yuuka that he plans to end this mission quickly and break up this fake family. Yuuka, however, doesn’t want that to happen because she had been looking forward to this. They then come across a crowd gathered around a lion facing a robot-like figure, both of whom are wearing red armbands. The robot-like figure is actually a biological weapon created from a piece of Enka, and he explains that he likes fun things, and so he’d like breaking someone strong like the lion. He identifies himself as originally being called Black Thirteen, but he’s been renamed Hyouka for this family. After the lion identifies himself as being called Teika, the two look like they are ready to fight, but Ouka steps in, trips Hyouka, and points a gun at the biological weapon’s head. Ouka tries to convince his new son not to hurt his siblings and reveals that he knows about Black Thirteen, however he feels that Hyouka isn’t a biological weapon any more and can live as a member of their family. After saying this though, Ouka admits that it’s a lie because he doesn’t understand what a family is. Nevertheless, he vows to give it his all as a father and calls Hyouka his son.

Instead of accepting this, Hyouka attacks Ouka and questions if it’s okay for him to be in a family and to stop hurting people. Right when it looks like Ouka’s in trouble, Kyouka jumps down from the nearby rooftop and kicks him in the face. With Ouka out of the way, Kyouka lectures Hyouka on attacking his father because only she is allowed to beat her husband up. What’s more, she makes Hyouka apologize to her and lick her shoe. When Ouka opposes how she’s handling things, Kyouka explains that Hyouka is a biological weapon created to attack, so the gun earlier caused Hyouka’s circuits to order him to kill the enemy. She admonishes Ouka for pointing a gun at his child, but he doesn’t want to hear that from someone who is having her child lick her shoe. The six of them then return home and find the fifth child waiting for them inside. Ouka at first thinks that this boy looks normal, but the feminine way that the boy acts makes Ouka realize that the boy might be gay. Regardless, he is able to shake the boy’s hand first and thus win the competition with his new wife. At least, that’s what he thinks, however Kyouka later tells him that the game is null and void because she’s the rule in family.

ED Sequence

ED: 「狂乱戦記 ~日常ノ神サマ~」 (Kyouran Senki ~Nichijou no Kami-sama~) by 藤村歩 (Fujimura Ayumi)
Watch the ED!: Mirror 1, Mirror 2
I don’t particularly like the opening or ending songs, but if there’s one point they get across, it’s that this series is going to be a lot of high-speed fun.

Well, I knew the setup for this series was pretty out there (putting together a catgirl, a loli, a lion, a jellyfish, a biological weapon, etc), but I wasn’t quite prepared for just how crazy/wacky/insane/all of the above it was. Kyouka alone is too much to handle because of her tendency to speak a mile a minute (she’s voiced by Fujimura Ayumi) and do Suzumiya Haruhi-esque things (aka. take control of everything and think nothing of it), but not quite to the point where you hate her. In fact, I feel sorry for Ouka having to endure someone like her in the same way I feel sorry for Kyon having to live with some of Haruhi’s antics. But when you throw a character like her into a family like this (balanced with a fairly normal and responsible husband), it brews a potentially perfect storm of craziness and fun.

If you can’t tell, I liked the first episode. I’ve had mixed success with comedic series in the past, but the setup here might be too good to pass up. The production quality here is also pretty solid (in other words no complaints), and for whatever reason, I really like the lion (Teika) and the jellyfish (Gekka) and want to see more of them in the story. If the next couple of episodes are as fun to watch as this was – next week appears to be focused on Yuuka who has scars on her back – then I might just consider following this.

39 Comments

  13. Im gonna hate to read the subs at the fast pace she talks. And/or pausing video to read the subs…=_= I can smell the headache coming. Whats up with characters having extremely hard to sub dialogue??;_;

    Kona
    Reply

  15. The speech wasn’t as fast as I thought. I was expecting constant the speed of the previews in Excel Saga. I wonder if the dad will ever fire the gun. I’m sure the robot wouldn’t be that hurt from it…

    waffo
    Reply

  17. This show has only one word “crazy”. The whole “finding your children” contest is wacky thanks to Kyouka, it’s too bad there’s no preview to show how wacky the next episode will be.

    setsuke
    Reply

  28. I’m pleasantly surprised that this show has mostly avoided rehashing typical genre tropes (other than to parody them) or recycling jokes other comedy shows have only done a million times before.

    It’s mile-a-minute energy and genuine strangness makes for quite refreshing entertainment. I look forward to next week!

    SS-Eclipse – They must be saints!

    kadian1364
    Reply

  30. i watched this and i was impressed.

    I thought itd be another retarded comedy that try to put everything ridiculous together but still fails with mediocre comedy.. but i was pleased with this episode and laughed a bunch of times, the characters seems pretty interesting although some havent been developped, and it seems like itll have its more serious part of the show too like the whole Yuka thing, and as cheesy as that might be, i like that kind of stuff >.

    Drayen
    Reply

  37. the OP song title is a ‘word-play’ on the term – 賢妻良母(kensai ryobo) – homely wife and mother.

    all the ‘indirect’ references… hahaaha…

    thx for carrying this OMNI.. (^_^)

    tonbo
    Reply

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