First Impressions / Nourin

「クッキングババ」 (Kukkingu Baba)
“Cooking Grandma”

Well, it was definitely good enough to start full-capping this episode. It’s a start!

Nourin continues to be just as random as ever, but I’d say this episode was an improvement. For all the struggles that Nourin is going through with its character stability and transitions, the show reveals its strong points best when it cuts restrictions on comedy. Unmarried women are painted unlikable. The flat chested and the enormously endowed are ridiculed and objectified. Everyone shows their fetish and is mocked. But hey, it’s all quite funny, at least worth a few chuckles if not some outright laughs! Those laughs are not necessarily directed at witty dialogue or well written scenes, but the sheer limits of making all the characters suffer is just a waft of fresh air that happens to elicit a smile.

For example, it’s been quite awhile since we’ve seen a teacher so…deprived of her happiness and sex. In our world she’d be swept up in a heartbeat (some people do stick their thing in crazy), but in Nourin, everyone be sick of her terrible advances. She can’t teach, nor cook, nor stay normal for at least five minutes. She’s been overwhelmed by the powers of loneliness and as a result she takes it out on every single youthful and happy individual in this world. The last occurrences I could ever remember this happening was in Azumanga Daioh or Lucky Star (yes I’m aware there may be more recent examples), yet even those were not to the scale of crazy that this teacher achieves. Naked sushi anyone?

This…I like. Oftentimes the teacher role gets largely ignored in a school-set anime, where sensei takes a backseat to her energetic gakusei. Here we get an episode specifically aimed at the teacher herself, where all of her nastiness and fanservice takes center stage, mocking AKB48, middle age, and the sexually desperate all at once. Hers is a humorous caricature that Nourin has worked on well, and it’s quite a shame that we don’t get to see her more often, nor will we ever get a moment to develop her character–although brief, her moments in the past leave a lot of questions to be raised, such as, “why in the world would such a cute girl get shunned by her classmates?”

Overall, the addition of Natsumi-sensei has brought up Nourin another notch in its comedy, just as the last episode had done with pushing the boundaries of yuri and mocking the stereotypical protagonist-protagonist hookup. The boke-tsukkomi was strong this week, the parodies were off the charts, and the random just keeps getting randomer. Sure, it’s all a bit hastily put together and could use some polishing, but Nourin is definitely shaping itself better with each passing episode. Now does anyone still want that sushi? Any takers? I swear it’s hygienic.

Full-length images: 17, 18.

 

ED3 Sequence

ED3: 「ポニーテールの四十」 (Forty Ponytails) by Bekki (Saito Chiwa)

38 Comments

  1. I feel so bad for Becky, going through forty years with nothing exciting happening to her and staying single for so long. However, doing those stunts, including that one involving nyotaimori was a little disturbing. XD

    Plus, those facial expressions are like looking into one’s soul *shudders*

    Dualash
    Reply

  2. This was definitelty one of the most random anime episodes I have ever seen and I gotta agree with Zanibas, that the show is keep getting better and better.

    I just loved the Princess Mononoke reference in the beginning and it was funny enough at the moment the students, which threw Bekki outta the window, how at least one of them touched her ass while doing that lol!

    ~fineyristensen
    Reply

  4. This episode was definitely out of left field. More in line with the humour of South Park than anything, which isn’t a bad thing at all. The immortal discussion of which breast size trumps all and the numerous Becky face references made this episode though.

    Pancakes
    Reply

  5. Funny thing is, I’m sure there are a number of single, (near) middle-aged adults out there who wish they could just let themselves out like Becky-sensei does. Maybe not nearly as overly-sexually, but just acting out and such.

    HalfDemonInuyasha
    Reply

  10. – Way to go Zanibas for mentioning Azumanga Daioh. Now I wonder who’s more of a terror, Becky or Yukari-sensei(I’d say Yukari mainly because of her trauma inducing driving). Also I’m not sure if it was intentional or not but this has got to be the second time I’ve seen Chiwa Saito voice a blonde teacher also named Becky, only the Becky in Pani Poni Dash is a child genius that somehow gets along with her students.

    – https://randomc.net/image/Nourin/Nourin%20-%2008%20-%20Large%2024.jpg

    At first I thought Becky got into lots of fights in High School, but since this anime does parodies a lot I’ll assume she also suffered from Chuunibyou.

    Zhinvu
    Reply

      1. Yeah, you’re probably right. It’s more likely she was brought in due to a fight than being a chuunibyou, unless maybe if she was disturbing the peace or something. It was because of Becky-sensei’s eyepatch that the chuunibyou theory came in.

        Zhinvu
        Reply

      2. Eyepath + bandaged arms actually :3. However, Chuunibyou wasn’t the first to do it, nor did it popularize the look first. I do see both sides though–maybe the dual references were intentional.

        Zanibas
        Reply

  13. The comedy in this episode was… I don’t know, hit-and-miss?
    While Becky is an awesome character, sometimes she’s a bit… Much for me. And sometimes I just don’t find her funny. Most of the time I do though.

    For example, I didn’t really like the first part in the fields. I didn’t dislike it either though, it just didn’t really leave me with any kind of impression.
    However, the second part in the classroom was awesome.
    And the cooking class scenario was at times funny, at times not.

    All in all, I enjoyed this episode, not just as much as others seem to have.

    Anonymosity
    Reply

  17. I find it funny when i see comments about how the guys were gay for not taking Natsumi invitation. You might be in it for the sex but you’ll leave with a knife in your jugular if you end up trying to dump her lol. I’d imagine that she would be pretty obnoxious too. I kind see her as a more extreme version of Koko from Golden Time xP

    leatherhead333
    Reply

      1. Yes, i saw your comment. But then Words are Powerful. But, words combined with Visual things like Pictures, are more Powerful. Our Eyes see more then your Mind can read

        Not to be mean

        Germanguy
        Reply

  21. Haven’t seen it yet, but did one of the students (after she piled all the food on her body) actually say something like “No! You’re ‘way past the ‘best used by date’??? That’s COLD!!!!

    SmithCB
    Reply

  23. as expected just like how they returned to comedy after episode 4, nourin is back to its comedy only plot after the serious episode 7. and being someone who haven’t read the LN, i wonder if all of this comedy will be main plot important later or is actually necessary. because i really believe that the anime would have been better if they maitained the same blend of emotion from episode 4 and 7.

    i think that, there would be a serious episode on 10 or 11 (just like other 1 cour anime)but i dont know, perhaps i should expect the worst given the amount of remaining episodes which is 4 and is too short to make a one final push for a climax..

    TheLastIdiot
    Reply

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