Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei Specials

I love the Tatami Galaxy; it is a unique absurdist work based on college campus life with the visuals of Sayonara, Zetsubou Sensei and reminds me of a great Natsume Soseki's work called Sanshiro. If you enjoy unconventional and artsy works, I advise you to check it out.

And now, I begin my actual review of the specials by saying one word:

What.

I am not entirely sure what to expect from the specials in the first place. The show concludes well and there is no need to dive into the relationship dynamics of the male and female lead; it is even more surprising for the studio ... to think of something extra of a novel adaptation. Before I started the specials, I suspected Madhouse Studios just wanted to put something silly to appease fans who wanted more episodes.

And I was right. 3 episodes of ludicrous nonsense.

First special: 5/10

The first special involves the characters riding a submarine to Antartica to save the Earth. The comedy, or attempted humor as one observes, is reminiscent of works like Sayonara, Zetsubou Sensei. It is a somewhat enjoyable special, but it feels too random and I remember the work being about college campus life; what happened to that?

Second special: 2/10

The second special involves the characters trying to defeat the Bed Chamber Investigation Team. There is also a bathing segment that features the girls. Because that's necessary.

Third special: 7/10

The third special is actually a somewhat decent special because it refers back to the main character's hatred of Ozu. Madhouse Studios went the Studio Shaft route by increasing some great trippy visuals. Look forward to this special because it feels somewhat like an actual Tatami Galaxy episode, which is very unlike of the others.

Overall, I think the specials give a fantastic "meh". It didn't feel like watching The Tatami Galaxy except for the last special. Specials should feel like an actual episode and this series of specials mostly failed.

Reviews so far are strange, how could one like the original but shorts that are like a microcosm not? They're simply extras, does one expect a retelling of the original in the length of one episode? How also does it not seem like they simply were trying to be comedic like the original too?

They're just an addendum to a unique series, but that doesn't take away from being their own thing; third short may have been the better one but that doesn't mean they weren't all like a mini-TG (mostly the comedy).

How can anyone say this is 'nonsense' when that is the point of ... the original and others like it e.g. his other film Mind Game and Night is Short. Might as well complain about the 'nonsense' in Alice in Wonderland...

Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei is one of the best anime series I have ever seen, thanks to its combination of a realistic story (for the most part), its original art and all the ideas it was trying to transmit. However, to my disappointment, the specials included with the DVD version were nothing like the 'main' series.

These 3 shorts episodes follow the main characters from the show telling some weird fantastic stories that feature themselves doing crazy stuff to solve an even crazier problem. It goes without saying that the stories they tell are neither realistic nor have anything to do with the plot of the ... TV series. To make things worse, most of the things in the stories aren't even explained and are resolved in a pretty stupid way wich leaves you with a ''What the hell did I just watch'' impression.

Overall, even if you're a fan of Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei I wouldn't recommend watching this, as these specials don't add anything at all to the series as there's no plot at all, and it won't leave you a good impression at all (something the ending of the TV series most likely did). To be honest, this just felt like a waste of time, but at least the episodes were short.

Scorings:

Story (1/10): the 'mini-stories' told in the episodes are pretty stupid and aren't even explained (if they were, they could had been at least somewhat interesting)

Art (7/10): the art is more or less the same as in the TV series, though there is much less symbolism, there are no 'real images' and it feels a bit duller in general.

Sound (4/10): while the voice acting is what we are used to, the conversations are pretty shallow and uninteresting, the sound effects less common (as in there aren't many), and the background music unimpressive. There are also no OP/ED themes.

Character (4/10): while the characters are the same as in the main series, there's no development and they do silly things just for the hell of it.

Enjoyment (4/10): the only thing that is enjoyable of the specials is that you can get some laughs because of the ridiculous stuff that happens, but other than that, the specials are forgettable.

Overall: 4/10

The original anime was pretty interesting for me to watch, as it seemed pretty unique to other anime from the art styles and dementia-like scenes, but this special had a pretty mediocre story for me to watch.

A story of someone narrating a dream that didn't make much sense isn't a story that I and many viewers would be interested in watching, according to what I've seen and the ratings as well. A rather dull story to watch for a special.

The art was alright. It was the same as the TV series, which was neither really well made or not made well.

The voices ... were pretty well synced with the characters, but that's pretty much it. There was a lack of other background sounds or too few for me to find this realistic (within that world) enough.

The characters were not as lively as what I've seen from the series. They were quite dull and boring to me. They do appear to behave as they normally would, based on their personalities, but kind of appeared as if they were acting in one of Masaki's poorly made movies rather than in an actual dream.

I did not enjoy this very much, mostly because of the boring plot and the dull characters, and overall, I found this to be a pretty mediocre anime to watch.

The thing is, because the show concluded so well, the scenarists couldn't find what to make the Specials about... so they just made the main cast tell themselves surreal stories about the "group"... wow... on top of that, the stories aren't "narrated" by the characters who tell it, but instead are animated and voice-acted normally.
So the specials add almost nothing to the series... yeah... very "meh", right?
But! It seems like the 2nd Special references a movie the producers of Tatami Galaxy made. So that's nice I guess. *there's a moment where a character says "the girl of the apple" or whatever: https://myanimelist.net/anime/34537/Yoru_wa_Mijikashi_Arukeyo_Otome

Story: 6 - ... At least they didn't make the original series' story worse.
Art: 7 - The style is maintained from the original, (as expected,) but it seems like they rushed the animation; the faces look weird at times.
Sound 8
Characters 7 - No character devlopment.
Enjoyment 3 - You'll feel like the Specials wasted 18 minutes of your life.

This will be my review on the 'Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei Specials', or just 'Tatami Galaxy Specials'. First of, the Specials are done also my MADHOUSE, so the studio did not change. There are 3 Special episodes in total, each of them lasting around 6 minutes and 40 seconds. So they are not that long, really. I've seen that most reviews here are somehow rather negative and after watching the three episodes I can understand why they would think it but if I share this thought or not, that I will show you now. So let's begin.


Plot/Story: I am honestly not sure where these OVAs ... are supposed to happen in the timeline of the anime. In the end I think it is best to watch them after the anime. Our well-known cast is sitting in a room and telling each other stories. We'll, 3 stories to be exact...Anyway. Actually that's all you need to know about the plot. The cast is telling each other 3 stories in total, those stories differing in most aspects but keeping one particular thing the same: The appearance of a submarine.
While the main anime is great these episodes are more or less like leftovers from episodes. There isn't any grand plot in them, they are merely there to entertain the viewer who just has watched the main series. Still, each of the three episodes holds some kind of philosophical value. At least I think so, kinda.

Art: Not as polished as the main series, but that's probably the point. Each episode is colored in one single color pattern, each. First episode is blue, the second is red, and the third is white. Why these colors? I have no idea but I'm pretty sure there's a meaning behind that. The artstyle and animation is fairly simple and not refined in any way. I suppose that's also not needed since the focus of these episodes lies in their telling of the story that is unfolding as we watch. Pretty art and animation is not needed. Of course it doesn't look ugly in any way, it's just simple. But even though it is simple it has a certain Charme. One that regular animation and standard art cannot compare to.

Sound: There are no intro or outro songs in these episodes. Doing so would restrict the runtime of the actual content even further so they probably just deemed it not needed. As for sound effects and background music, I feel like it's the same as in the main series. They underline the absurdity of the events and in these three episodes they are not overboard with the music, if at all.
After all, it's the story that is important. Not the sound, or art.

Characters: The characters haven't changed, at all. And that's good. For almost 7 minutes runtime you don't really want the characters from the main show who all already have established character traits to change. Especially in this case they are just telling stories. They do not affect the actual plot in the slightest and are just there to be fun.
At the end though, they are still the same quirky and fun characters that they are, and they are fun to watch.

Enjoyment & verdict: Yes, of course I enjoyed watching it. I did like the main series so liking this one shouldn't come as a surprise. For what it's worth these roughly 19 minutes we're enjoyable and I do not regret watching them. I give this OVA a 7/10 since it was good. That's all I can say. And that's it.
So until the next review, See ya!

I'm not sure how often any specials or OVAs really need to be reviewed when they're obviously not trying to be judged by the same standards of the main show. Three 7-minute long shorts that basically add up to a 12th episode sort of epilogue to the series is fine by me. The art style and storylines are still as creative as ever, with the main "gang" telling stories revolving around a land submarine that can magically move through land without crashing into anything. The stories are fun enough and revolve around the basic dynamics of the characters, it's nothing crazy but I would say ... it's worth watching if you liked the main series.

These specials are a strange, strange ride on a submarine that turns solid surroundings into liquid.

I was genuinely pretty flummoxed watching these specials. They're only 6 minutes apiece, so it's not like I was expecting anything amazing, though I can't say I was expecting three largely disconnected stories that function based on a kind of nonsense logic that I can't really get onboard with. They're interesting in that they give us some chances to see the odd character interaction that didn't appear in the main series, but honestly, the only scenes I really connected with narratively were the ones at the end where whoever was ... telling the story was chided for shoddy storytelling in some way, shape or form. That's kind of what these were: just an opportunity to try something zany and string it together with the throughline of involving a submarine that defies physics, a harpoon, and our cast of... heroes? Hard to say at times.

Really, what you come here to watch these for is the animation. It's definitely rougher than the series is known for, but that's kind of got its own appeal to it. The color palette is pared down, often to very basic extremes, and they definitely don't always go for fluid movement. I still dig it, even if I can't say this was reason enough to go through these episodes by itself. Might appeal to others more, hence the "Mixed Feelings."

the specials interpret the events of the original work into the logic of a dream. when viewed through this lens, and with empathy towards the protagonist and what he represents in relation to the viewer of the work, the specials are harrowingly beautiful works of art. the visuals communicate this transition into the dream-state by emphasizing the printed patterns and fluid motion of the original series, but in a way that is more abstract and surreal.

"The essential constitution of a dream is thus not its 'latent thought' but this work (the mechanisms of displacement and condensation, the figuration of the contents of words or syllables) ... which confers on it the form of a dream."