Oruchuban Ebichu

Ebichu is not an anime that stands out because of its art, sound or neither an amazing plot, but oh boi do I enjoy it. It brings me joy to watch ebichu's cute faces and expressions even when he is not in the greatest situation. It is definitely a weird concept but somehow it mixes my personalities in one show. I really don't care that much about her master or that unfaithful boyfriend, I simply binged this anime because of Ebichu.

You would enjoy it if:
- You are a fan of hamsters
- You enjoy/don't mind explicit content
- You are not looking for an elaborate plot
- ... You don't get easily trigger with violence
- You don't mind rusty art

Rate an 8
English sub(had some brief moments of english dubbed.)

Story
If you can look past the animal cruelty with is kind of hard to do, this make for an interesting show. I like the English language because it has a lot of play on words. That is precisely what this focus here; Except not English but Japanese. Jokes were funny to some regard but were frankly over done and kind of silly. Silly due to childlike humor and veered left when it clearly was going right seconds before in a matter of speaking.

Ecchi is perhaps a reason one would watch this. Sadly i have to ... disagree with this choice to some regard. Yes, there is a lot of vulgar humor but art wise could be better. To some regard sex scenes look almost amateur in appearance.

The decision to have a small segment of (i think) episode 13 pay tribute to episodes that came before was an interesting touch. But should not have been followed by an introduction. For as it was structured kind of seemed rather length before one got to good content.

Conclusion wasn't what i had wanted but from a comical stand point it was.

Art
There were other flaws in art such as balance. Constant back and forth between dream like art and smoother artwork. Also, are the characters having noses or are they not?

In retrospect, I'm not exactly sure what compelled me to watch this through - at a glance it didn't really seem to be my thing. I've never been huge on raunchy comedy, where styles of humour are concerned there are humour styles - and even styles of vulgar or otherwise dark humour - which I enjoy far more than sex jokes. But part of it was definitely that it was animated by studio Gainax - a surprise to be sure when I learned of it.

To date I have seen Tengen Toppa Gurren Laggan and Neon Genesis Evangelion from Gainax. The obvious choices, sure - ... but they give a fanciful, high-concept low fantasy mood to the studio - one that is in no way explored or so much as implied here. This makes sense to an extent; Makoto Moriwaki, largely known for family shows - most notably the 2005 adaptation of Onegai My Melody - so both her's and Gainax's involvement with this show do not seem particularly well at a glance. However, Gainax adapts the manga's style to a tee.

The animation is definitely the most praiseworthy aspect of the show, it moves exactly as a manga moves as one reads it while still feeling very lively visually. Gainax has shown both before and after this show that they are masters of doing a lot with a little and this show exemplifies this trait of the studio excellently. The backgrounds are often minimal and work as excellent backgrounds to the simple, thick-stroked characters on top of them. Both these designs and the usually muted colour palette contrasts with the sexual and violent themes of the show well - definitely an appeal of the manga's initial run.

The audio largely meshes well with the atmosphere the visuals build, Ebichu is goofy and cute but doesn't at all sound out of place in this world despite being a talking hamster and all. All the voice actors just sound like normal people and that's obviously what you'd want in a largely slice-of-life show. The soundtrack is minimal, often quiet melodies just ring out in the background, usually muting out when any sound effects are played. It all works in the service of the aforementioned mundanity of the setting.

Sadly, these praises mean little without a well-written show to back them. The show intentionally has a very bare-bones aesthetic so it doesn't really function as eye candy; and the cornerstone of a good comedy is good writing which I sadly don't think is accomplished here. Explaining jokes tends to be hard, but I can make two main points on why I don't particularly enjoy the happenings in this show. The first point is the most obvious, the over-reliance on simplistic sex jokes. A lot of the sex-related gags in the series mostly have to do with the sex words themselves - be it their mere existence or Ebichu screaming these terms out. I imagine a lot of the appeal to these gags is hearing the words being screamed by itself - an affect of the joke completely lost when I read the subtitle and hear what may as well amount to background noise.

Secondly, there is another formula which the show too often clings to is the cycle of Ebichu spouting something bizarre then getting attacked by her owner or her boyfriend. As the series progressed and the main cast started getting out more - particularly with the introduction of Maa-kun as a catalyst - the normally formulaic characters are at their best when there are other personalities around them to bring out different aspects of their character. Owner's boyfriend does this to a certain extent as well, but generally the more the merrier. It was fun to see these parts of the characters around the early middle of the series, but other than the occasional Ebichuman segment this aspect of the show fizzles out towards the end and not much of interest ends up happening for the majority of the series.

I feel like my not liking this could be better attributed to it not being my cup of tea. There is a lot to appreciate here, and it's very competently made, but the writing and style of humour generally made Oruchuban Ebichu a chore for me to go through. On the bright side the episodes are short, despite being a 24 episode series you could probably finish this in a lazy afternoon if you really felt like it.