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Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

So Long, Mr. Despair

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Essential Dazzler

19:16 / 16.08.07

And so begins Sayonara, Zetsubo Sensei a 12 episode anime about a suicidal teacher and his dealings with the faculty and his class.

Itoshiki Nozomu is incapable of experiencing Joy or Hope, even watching Baseball sent him spiraling into a suicidal funk. The team he chose to cheer for had a logo that looks like the Kanji for hair and their coach is bald, you see?

His nemesis takes the form of Fuura Kafuka an invincibly positive student (Ambitions: God, Time Traveler, pororocoian?) who finds him hanging himself in the shows disarmingly gorgeous opening scene.

Having only seen the first episode so far (6 have aired in Japan, the first 5 have been fan-subbed. I was going to watch them all before posting, but couldn't hold back.) it doesn't seem massively ground-breaking, you'll recognise all the students instantly, but it is engaging and laugh out loud funny.

Visually is where this show shines. The opening scene, as I mentioned earlier, had me floored. Almost every shot is worthy of screencapping, and the show is shot full of wonderful stylistic flourishes that keep even the simplest of scenes kinetic and enjoyable, even with the sound off.

Blink and you'll miss 'em text gags will have you poised over the pause button on rewatches the first episode has a very odd 5 frame short story during the opening credits, and the manga author communicates his various musings via the class chalkboard.

My only concern, really, is wether anything interesting arises from the cliche melting pot that is the classroom. At 6 episodes, this wouldn't matter so much, but 12 episodes is too long to drag out the current roster. Here's hoping we'll be gagging for a another 14 episodes when it's done.

As usual, it's all up for streaming at Crunchyroll, and torrents can be offered by PM.

Also, you'll be seeing a lot of this guy:

Essential Dazzler

22:16 / 16.08.07

Second Episode, The CD in the Suicide kit, BEST JOKE EVER.

Essential Dazzler

22:39 / 16.08.07

Third Episode, Gurren-Lagann references on the chalk-board!

And... I'm ruining my own thread.

MattShepherd: I WEDDED KALI!

11:42 / 17.08.07

Started to watch, but Crunchyroll has some "pay or watch this on a screen smaller than the text-entry box here on Barbelith that I am typing in right now" thing going on, and reading the subtitles gives me a headache when they're that small.

Mysterious Transfer Student

15:36 / 17.08.07

Yep, I can attest that you'll need to watch this on a bigger than Weetabix-sized screen, probably twice through each episode, to catch it all. I haven't seen something this densely funny in quite a while. People jonesing for offensively amusing, hyper-referential anime a la Excel Saga are likely to appreciate this one.

The multiple stalkers routine was so lowbrow, in contrast to all the elaborate puns involving Nietzsche and Kafka, that it had me on the floor. The same can be said for the lolicon gag at the end of #3, though for slightly different reasons.

Also, what's with all the recent anime series with stellar production values? This and Welcome to the NHK! both look and sound absolutely terrific, with as Pacific says, picture-perfect frames at every turn and superb incidental and theme music. It's certainly a welcome development with Bleach in the doldrums.

Essential Dazzler

20:59 / 17.08.07

Matt, and anyone else who's still making up there mind wether to watch this or not (Go on, it's only 25 minutes long), Stage 6 has the first episode here, in full-screen stream for free. Much higher quality than Crunchyroll, less convenient though. You'll have to search around for each episode.

Mysterious Transfer Student

22:07 / 18.08.07

I just caught up and have watched all five fansubbed episodes to date. The 'subbing group a.f.k., who were also responsible for the unofficial release of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya that we all loved so much, have outdone themselves - every little bit of chalkboard babble and Japanese colloquialism is seamlessly translated, as are the credits.

As for the show itself - Can you say 'Azumanga Daioh's sick and silly twin'? The students all have their quirks exaggerated into fully-fledged personality disorders and the educationalist whom they (sometimes, some of them) trust with their welfare might not be a pervert but is certainly quite keen on destroying their every hope for the future.

Also of note is the opening sequence which is introduced with episode four (it wasn't ready until now and was replaced for the first three episodes with a series of lightning-fast text pieces on subjects such as junk food consumption etiquette, how scary infinity is and a short story about photographs of a disturbing boy) and contains a selection of 'interesting' imagery:

[+] [-] Not safe for work or your mother's computer

Since I'm from the irresponsible cultural elite and themes of suicide, mental disturbance and sexual perversity are small potatoes to me and others here, the only element that caused me any real worries was the comic naive illegal immigrant character (another legacy of Excel Saga), but that was handled in a rather sweet manner. OTOH I'd rather it wasn't part of the show if it then caused me to have to read posts on anime blogs like the following:

"While the ’saturation level’ of Latin immigrants in Japan is a fraction of 1% compared with USA’s, oh, 20-30%, the Japanese race is a lot more insular compared to Americas. The arrival of the “Pedro” character in anime is a social reflection on the issue, and I’m glad its been largely a positive one.

The issue is generally overlooked in the anime we watch, but if Japan doesn’t do something, probably within our life times, it will begin to wither and die. That means no more anime, no more tuner cars, manga, ect ect."

Attitudes like that can fuck right off out of MY fandom.

Essential Dazzler

23:03 / 18.08.07

I was really worried about the immigration issue, but was pleasantly surprised by how well it was handled. It wasn't perfect, and it wouldn't really hurt the show for it to not be there, but it could have been worse.

Today, I was wondering about the possibility of this show getting licensed, and the new opening really made me think that it's a fairly easy bet that it won't be. The weird mixture of both touching and really disturbing imagery, lyrically and visually, is quite jarring. I'm fairly certain that's the intention.

During the first episode, I'd picked up on a vague "woah, this whole situation is really fucked up" vibe, but I just thought that was part of the funny, and to a certain extent, it is.

Both themes do a really good job of smacking you around the face and re-contextualising the show. Regardless of how funny it is, this is a show about a teacher who regularly instructs and encourages his borderline mentally unwell students to end their lives.

The show is funny, but the themes do a brilliant job of making it seem like the most awful thing you've ever laid eyes on.

Mysterious Transfer Student

23:33 / 18.08.07

I didn't mention the close which is just as visually creative and has an even better song, which I've been humming all day. The series is at an early point where the visual inventiveness and liberal-baiting themes may yet prove to have been masking a rather standard, warm-hearted anime, although from what I hear (particularly as regards some of the stuff in the manga concerning neat freak Chiri's drive to 'tidy up' the world) this may not be the case.

Perhaps I should come clean and state that, in a triumph of knee-jerk liberalism that would have Melanie Phillips' heart leaping for joy, I completely misread the blog comment quoted above. It contained a link to a NY Times story about Japan's rapidly ageing population and the urgent need for foreign immigrants to be welcomed into their society in order to buoy up the economy and keep the birth rate anywhere near what it needs to be. So fully 180 degrees from the way I read it, in that case; apologies for spreading the misconception. The blog in question is here if anyone fancies reading other opinions about the show.

22:07 / 19.08.07

Just watching episode 2. Fuura's juggernaut of positive thinking is hilariously horrifying.

"We can't possibly allow her to come out!"
"I'll take it!"

HAMMERS

uncle retrospective

09:57 / 20.08.07

Must. Not. Start. Watching. New. Anime.
Must. Finish. What. I. Started.

My flatmates veto on anime isn't helping.
Bastards.

Humm.. Threadrot ranting over.
Carry on.

20:53 / 21.08.07

Give in! Watch. I am.

I've just finished number 3, and am waiting for 4 to download...

Really enjoying the bittersweetly disturbing feeling, some of it is positively heartrending. Like Fuuru's story about her parents...

I can only echo what others have said so much faster and more eloquently than me... this will really never get licenced, will it?

Beautiful, innappropriate, disturbing, funny, twisted, touching... what more could you ask for?

Having said that, if the sharp juxtaposition between funny and dark skews too far from where it is, I may have trouble watching till the end.

Bure, Bure, Bure, Bure!

Mysterious Transfer Student

09:12 / 22.08.07

There's more on Fuura's awful family in #4 - the two halves of which are some of the best farcical comedy I've seen. Perpetually bandaged Abiru Kobushi is Bizarro Sakaki!

I think I'm in love with this show. It wouldn't be half as funny as it is if it weren't, quite frequently, almost breathtakingly beautiful. The almost theatrical style, with the woodcut title cards that introduce each section, is brilliantly done and enhances the sense of mythologised Edo-era romanticism that permeates the show.

On the flip side, the random nonsense elements frequently make me fall over laughing, like Itoshiki and stalkeriffic Tsunetsuki doing the Fusion Dance from Dragonball Z, the running gag with Komori's unexpected hiding places, and the fact that the bipolar foreign girl (gotta give kudos to the creators for not even making her specifically American, German, whatever - as far as the show and the other characters are concerned she's just *foreign*) is named Kaere Kimura.

07:17 / 23.08.07

Just thought I'd direct anyone interested to

http://www.tv-links.co.uk/listings/3/6352.

The first four episodes are available for streaming there.

Tuna Ghost: Pratt knot hero

07:12 / 24.08.07

the running gag with Komori's unexpected hiding places

I love how he just checks her name off the roster. "Komori's here..." The fusion dance had me laughing out loud as well.

More than that, though, was the discovery of Hurtful E-mail Girl. When she looked deep, deep into Fuura's eyes, past her reflection in the reflection of the reflection of herself in Fuura's eyes, and saw the word "kill" repeated endlessly, I guffawed so hard my cat threw up.

I'm really, really liking this series.

12:06 / 24.08.07

I hate that, when torrenting, a later episode will almost always download five times faster than the one you want to watch.

Like getting the burger before the bun it is.

Have just watched #3. Liked how both 'returnees' situations were handled without making their foreign status a negative.

So we have (at least) three girls following Pink Supervisor around now. At least he's scared enough of lawsuits that we're safe from a lolita scenario any time soon. Well... we think we're safe.

Phex: Dorset Doom

13:31 / 24.08.07

...Until the obligatory Hot Springs fan-service episode, number five, which is simultaneously the greatest ever obligatory Hot Springs fan-service episode and the end of all obligatory Hot Springs fan-service episodes.

Tuna Ghost: Pratt knot hero

16:59 / 24.08.07

Regardless of how funny it is, this is a show about a teacher who regularly instructs and encourages his borderline mentally unwell students to end their lives.

It's the way he does it that saves the show for me. He was like a fucked up Great Teacher Onizuka in the second episode (intentional, I wonder?). Which is cool; I like GTO but I'm a little tired of that sort of thing. One begins to wonder why they don't send Onizuka to the Middle East to bully and annoy everone into resolution.

23:37 / 07.09.07

I've just finished the first episode.
"You were...trying to make yourself taller,weren't you?" *jaw hits floor*

How can something this wrong be so funny? The only thing I can think of that's remotely like its mixture of open-mouthed horror,disbelief and comedy is Jam, but the exaggeration of the elements,and the Itoshiki/Fuura double-act,creates some great comedy.

The beautiful animation and art (the best I've seen since Akira)make the contrast even greater. I'm 100% positive it's intentional.

00:10 / 08.09.07

And the second episode gets wor^H^H^Hbetter.

Stalking to the sound of "Space Invaders" - open-mouth time again.

Phex: Dorset Doom

10:32 / 08.09.07

Episodes six through nine have been available in RAW format for weeks now, but still have not been subbed.

I am in DESPAIR!

THE FANSUB WARS HAVE LEFT ME IN DESPAIR!

If this goes on any longer I'll -ahem- "make myself taller".

Mysterious Transfer Student

10:57 / 08.09.07

Yeah, a.f.k. need to pull their finger out. Where are they?

In fairness this show is hella complicated, nearly every shot has something in the background to translate. And they might have exams or something.

But yeah, I'm kinda hitting refresh on Tokyo Toshokan like a rat on crack these days.

00:09 / 10.09.07

Episode three inserts random fanservice. As long as it doesn't interfere,I have no objections,'specially if it's Subtly Sexy Nurse Lady.

00:21 / 10.09.07

...and the idea of saving someone's life because they wanted to use your prime suicide spot is too twisted not to be funny.

Essential Dazzler

10:00 / 15.09.07

A new group has taken up subbing, and have started with episode 6, which they released earlier.

I'm downlaoding it now, but the word is it's nowhere near the quality of AFK's subs.

If I were a stronger man I'd be waiting for his.

Mysterious Transfer Student

10:05 / 15.09.07

My understanding is that a.f.k. being pretty much a one person operation, they/ze are concentrating on their other main title Lucky Star, which is in the last few weeks of its run and is more popular, before devoting their attention to SZS once more.

But I'm on such a jones for this show I don't care, tho' I'll probably get the a.f.k. release as well when it come out. Thanks for the tip.

Phex: Dorset Doom

14:21 / 15.09.07

The subs aren't great- there are a few grammatical errors which make it hard to follow and a lot of the Kanji -particularly Meru's txt messages- wasn't translated. I'd still say watch it, but re-watch it with the afk subs once they're out.
However...

[+] [-] Spoiler

Mysterious Transfer Student

15:49 / 15.09.07

Yippy skippy!

[Bure]'s subs aren't in the same incredibly detailed (and witty) league as a.f.k.'s, it's tragically true, but the show itself is still gold. It's good that we're racing through a set up and ever-expanding cast that other shows would probably milk for a run four times this length. The Dr Death scenes this episode kinda beat out the arranged marriage/Running Man section, which went on a little too long, though it did provide my favourite sight gag of the day with the two JD's suddenly rattling off into the distance in the mining cart.

I was wondering why Tsunetsuki hadn't shown up or been included in the unlikely coincidences montage until she reappeared and I realised that of course, there was nowhere her beloved Sensei could go she wouldn't find him.

And I'm forced to admit that after lo these many years, the grail of comedy anime shows has been found - panty-shot gags that are actually funny.

[+] [-] Spoiler tagged for decency, like you care, pervert

By the by, some of the more baffling inserts in this and other episodes can be at least partially understood with the help of this YouTube clip:

Side by side goodness

Phex: Dorset Doom

13:05 / 16.09.07

So- the big eyeball thing, Kaere's obligatory pantie-shot and the thing so terrible that Nozumu deletes it from his memory- what up with all that?

Phex: Dorset Doom

10:30 / 22.09.07

Number 7 is out- I say again: number 7 is out.

Mysterious Transfer Student

17:19 / 25.09.07

This is proving to be quite an educational anime for anyone curious about the ins and outs of modern Japanese pop culture - we can be thankful that two subber's groups have done "that" in order to fill a.f.k.'s shoes and ensure this incredibly detailed show gets a proper treatment.

While the doujinshi-culture satire in the first half of this week's show was a little hackneyed, the anti-media ranting in part two was odd enough to be refreshing. (Although I did guffaw with disgust at the 'fifth panel - haemhorroids' gag.) Kohji Kumeta, who we can assume uses Itoshiki-sensei as a mouthpiece for his own dissatisfactions with modern life, does seem at times as though he's auditioning for the Japanese edition of Grumpy Old Men, but the whole show is still pretty amusing.

Meanwhile, the jokes with Kimura (pantsu) and Otonashi (trolling) keep getting recycled, and the audience cries WTF? at the burgeoning closeted relationship between Ms Arai and Komori. And I continue to be tickled by the fact that psychotically anal-retentive Chiri Kitsu is voiced by the same actress as Anime Pin-up of the Year™ Yoko from TTGL.

I'd also like to share this image of Tsunetsuki, which I now use as an avatar on other fora to unnerve people. (Not modified using Photoshock.)

[+] [-] Imagine this under your desk in the morning.

madfigs #32, now with wasabi

15:10 / 11.10.07

a.f.k. has just put up their version of episode 6, which I've been desperately waiting for. They've cranked out the last 3 episodes of Lucky Star this week as well, so hopefully the rest of Mr. Despair will be forthcoming.

This almost makes up for no new Bleach this week. Almost.

00:11 / 12.10.07

Engagement failed!

This episode was great. Usual disturbing concept (arranged marriage) cranked-up to 11 and bure bure'd. We get follow-up from Chiri and Nozumo's bed-collision a few episodes back and tie it into a new, batshit plot.

Clan Itoshiki are quite, quite mad aren't they? Dr. Death and sword-happy little sister. Is my face suprised? Glad that we're opening a little further out into the world beyond the classroom. Although, you can take the anime out of the classroom but you can't take the class out of the anime. Now that we've seen Itoshiki's family an episode about Kafuka's can't be far behind surely.

One thing I've been wondering. In the opening credits the last few images are very pregnant with symbolism; Kafuka pregnant, sperm rushing towards an egg, the ova itself, which then turns into (I think) a griddled fried egg. Or a waffle. I'm not sure. It's symbolic of something, but what?

00:15 / 12.10.07

Also, was anyone else a bit suprised Matoi didn't get much face-time in an episode about Itoshiki getting hitched? She's his stalker fer cry aye!

00:04 / 13.10.07

Analyse, you fucks.

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