Upotte!!

Upotte is an anime with beautiful premises that teaches us the importance of assault rifles, nah I’m just messing with you, Upotte is an anime cliché that has appeared in several other anime that came out during 2012. As you may have known, we are currently in a sort of era of anime that has lasted for over few years now, right after famous cute comedies such as K-On and Lucky Star came out, I call this era the moe era. In my opinion, Upotte is just one of those anime that try its best to be one of those cute comedy masterpieces, only adding ... one different aspect that K-On and Lucky Star don’t have… assault rifles and another thing that we see oh so common in anime these days, fan service.

When I first watched Upotte, I felt as if I was transported to the last few years of my childhood where the big kid elementary schoolers were required to learn about the gloriousness of puberty. And if you don’t know, is not something most people my age probably enjoyed. Upotte ended up using the right amount of strange fan service to make me feel as if I was watching a puberty video on assault rifles, this time mixing the mysteries of the female body with the parts of a variety of assault rifles. As a result, my body was in no way ready and if I was a man, I would probably have as they call, “the weirdest boner right now.” That my friends were one of the most weirdest and perverted 25 minutes of my adolescence.

Now there was only one reason for watching this anime, and it was merely to increase the number of anime I watch. But I did something I totally regret when watching this anime, I used my brain. Upotte is an anime that does not require you to use any percentage of your brain in order to understand the plot which in a way is a pro and a con. So when I watched further and further of the anime I just turned off my brain and stared at my laptop probably looking like a hormonal boy when he stares at a girl in a bikini.

The first half of Upotte mostly focuses on getting to know the main characters in their comedic lifestyle as preteen girl guns. This of course may be quite hilarious and enjoyable for some people; however it was nothing to talk to your friends about. What I mostly enjoyed in this anime were the facts given to us on what type of guns these girls are, and as a result, I can now tell you useless information about the history of these guns. For example, the gun L85A1 was a defective gun created by Britain since they were so behind in military weaponry. Another thing I greatly enjoyed about this anime was its serious moments it has, they are small, but they give you goose bumps. Lastly, the most enjoyable thing about this anime was its childish way of introducing guns. Usually when you think of anime with guns, you’d probably think of a blood bath or maybe a war scene, but Upotte introduces these guns in a very fun and fresh way, while still having action packed moments.
The music in Upotte is relatively peaceful and upbeat, but it is definitely not the best. I didn’t find it to enjoyable and is most of the time skipable. The same goes for the art and animation as well, however, they did add a lot of small and extra details on the weaponry making it look intricate and amazing looking.

Upotte is one of those anime that are boring in the very beginning, but gets better and better as it progresses further into the story until we hit the climax and it just falls downhill from there, or we just don’t get a real ending where people are satisfied of the outcome. I honestly would not recommend this anime to anyone unless they just want to get some cheap laughs or if their bored out of their mind. But if you do plan to watch Upotte, don’t think. Lastly, I recommend that you do not watch this anime yet if you haven’t gone through puberty or have just started it.

Now since only five episodes of Upotte have aired thus far my trigger finger is a perhaps a little bit too itchy, but I've had this show in my crosshairs for a while now and I'm just aching to fire out a review. Don't shoot the messanger here, guys.

So Upotte is pretty much your typical show with cute girls, but with a twist: because rather than cute girls, they're cute guns instead. Now I can tell you're looking at the pictures of the show and saying "Hey Anno, I hate to be the one to shoot you down, but they're clearly human girls" and all ... I have to say to that is shut the fuck up and don't interrupt me when I'm talking to you, jackass. Sure, they look like girls because nobody wants to see a bunch of real guns waltzing around a highshool. Sure, lots of people love guns but even more people love totty. So what could be better than some gun-totting totty? Nothing, obviously.

Furthermore the two concepts intergrate themselves with one another seemlessly. The characters function just like real life guns do with only a few minor differences. In fact, apart from the fact they cannot fire bullets, the differences between the girls and their real life counterparts is purely cosmetic. Besides, we soon end up glazing overtheir "real" guns anyway (which are delightfully small, as we would expect) and forget about the distinction. It doesn't really matter though because aside from being the key premise and in a way justifying the shows existance, it really isn't terribly important.

Holy shit, I just realised I wrote two whole paragraphs without making any gun related puns, despite that being my true 'aim' when writing this quasi-review. Did you see what I did there? I used the word 'aim' as one would 'aim' a gun towards a specific target, except I meant it like an 'aim' as a synonym for a 'goal' or 'objective'. I know that was probably a bit on the subtle side and you probably didn't get it, but don't worry, it's not really a big deal. After all, having to explain the origins of a play on words does nothing to diminish the humour of it. That's why in one episode of Upotte, they spend have the run time explaining the premise behind a pun that was so obscure not even the heartiest of gun nuts and/or sexual deviants could have possibly worked it out. And as soon as they finish the explanation, we all start laughing in unison.

It may be a shot in the dark since I haven't bothered to watch anything else that has aired this season, or indeed this year, but I can safely say that Upotte is the best show that I have watched from this year. Which is why I feel sad to see so many of the reviewers here gunning it down, like it was supposed to be taken seriously in the first place. It's a series about a bunch of highschool girls and guns, what kind of deep premise could there possibly be?

In summary I would like to say that it's like a poor man's Strike Witches. Although since Gonzo went bankrupt I'm not sure that expression is suitable anymore. So I suppose I should put it like this: if Strike Witches is an M4A1 Carbine with Detachable Scope and Underbarrel Grenade Launcher, then we would have to say that Upotte is an M16A2 Assault Rifle with an extended barrel set to burst fire.

Which is basically another way of saying that it is not as well made as Strike Witches but it fills a similar role, basically that it is action and tits. Well, perhaps not "tits" but thats besides the point. The point is that if you watch Upotte then you will get a know a shit ton more about guns while pleasuring yourself as much you would with any similar anime, that is to say one where the story is unimportant and you're only looking for fanservice. Or should I say, thats the only thing in your sights...

I ran out of gun puns, so I had to reload.

Just mentioning the mere premise of Upotte is probably going to be enough to put the vast majority of people of from watching it, unless you’re the kind of person who has gone through enough classical conditioning to be immune to what ever the minds of the people of Japan could throw up next, then you may as well try to forget Upotte’s name entirely and just leave it at that.

At a glance Upotte may just appear to be your typical clichéd Japanese school girl anime, but there’s a catch, a safety catch, the girls who appear to be your pretty standard anime school ... girl aren’t in fact girls at all. Their guns.

Every aspect of the characters, be it their appearance, nationality, eating habits, what they wear, their relationships with other characters, how confident they are and even how the react to certain environments both physically and socially is entirely dependant on the gun model that they just happen to be. Subsequently, this can lead to a lot of humour of the eye rolling variant as Thompson submachine gun is given large breasts as a result of a large drum magazine and a T91 assault rifle is given a g-string as a result of an adjustable stock.

It’s worth noting that not all the characterisations of the guns are this perverse, there does exist other parallels such as height dependant on gun type and family relations influenced by manufacturer. This said, more often then not, the aspects that Upotte wish’s to bring to light are often perverse.

This taken into consideration, one thing I can assure you is that if you have not had any previous experience either in the military or owning a firearm, then your going to learn about guns, and your going to do so in a way that you probably never though that you would. Beyond the aforementioned character interactions, Upotte often takes the time to deviate away from what plot there may be in the episode to explain gun history, varying ammunition sizes, what purpose certain gun types have and other pieces of gun related information. While it may seem odd to call Upotte educational, given its niche subject matter, odds are you will probably come out knowing more then you did going in.

But Upotte doesn’t have its sights focused solely on teaching you about guns, as mentioned, this is an anime about school girls and their varying emotional happenings with one another. The main characters of Funco, Sixteen, Elle and Sig (respectively a FN FNC, M16A4, L85A1 and an SG 550) provide a varying amount of characteristics. Each one has their own strengths and weaknesses ranging from the cocky and brash to the shy and humble. All of the characters are fairly likeable at face value but throughout the series there is very little development to their characters.

What’s worse is that Upotte has a habit of introducing new characters that serve no purpose other then to fill up time during the episodes, they are incredibly shallow in character and their interactions between themselves and the main characters feel poorly thought out. The only exception to this is Japanese Teacher (note this is how he is referred to through the entire series), a recurring character throughout the entire show and the only one aware to how odd it is that the girls are all assault rifles. His casual interactions with the girls provide some light-hearted comedic moments aside from his interactions with FN FNC which range from dull to emotional in a way that doesn’t quite work. While not a hugely likeable character he does fit quite well into the show as he finds himself questioning just what is normal anyway?

This said, there is one big draw to Upotte and its characters, at times the show can be very funny, while I’m sure that its type of humour won’t appeal to all, but there where times when I found myself pausing the video to laugh out loud, not because it was so poorly executed but because it was honestly funny. There are jokes that were lost in translation and others that only the most grizzled of gun enthusiasts will get, but there are many that are pointlessly hilarious and unsurprisingly, often involved the imaginative use of guns.

In contrast to this though, and as a result of this being a show about guns, there are five episodes housing two over arching storylines with an emphasis on action sequences not seen in the rest of the show. The action sequences aren’t really anything to behold, they aren’t animated any better then the rest of the show and most shots really boil down to a character standing still firing a gun. Instead their entertainment value derives from an emphasis on realism, seeing the characters work together as teams to accomplish a goal, executing plans laid out by one another and working around their flaws holds some undeniable charm and the setting contrasts well as it explores the characters enough to further their likeability.

But as mentioned, these sequences suffer from a similar issue that the rest of the show falls under, an impossibly average animation quality. The animation is rarely ever smooth even in times when the show could easily benefit from it, and during certain frames the characters might appear off model which is also a big downer. This isn’t aided by the mediocre art direction that the show takes, while the gun’s do look nice and it’s quite clear that there has been a decent amount of effort put in place to get them to that stage, the background art just remains purely functional throughout, I never found myself even noticing it, and while this could makes sense from a composition stand point to draw attention else where, the show never takes advantage of this opportunity and suffers as a result.

Where Upotte really suffers however is in how it’s earned its age rating of 17+. Through out the show there are many scenes taking place in bath rooms. While the interactions between the characters are appropriately casual for good friends, the amount of nudity in these scenes, while never explicit, feels forced and contrast's with the feel of the show somewhat. This isn’t aided by the near constant panty shots throughout the show which again, feel forced. Other pandering’s to fan service include the unexplained cat ears and tails on AK-47’s, the unexplained dog ears and tail on a Galil and the unexplained elf ears on a Finnish rifle (das racist).

I understand that such things like cat ears are common place in anime, but the creators of Upotte realised that they could get away with just about anything so long as they provide some half arsed justification for it, in all the cases I mentioned above, no parallels are drawn between the guns and these features so in all cases it just feel's like the creators where trying to expand their audience as much as possible by appealing to varying sexual fetishes. One scene in particular depicting a sadistic lesbian Sako Rk. 95, contains content of a masturbatory nature and it feels neither well executed nor consistent with the feel of the rest of the show. While nothing on show throughout Upotte’s length can be considered flat out gun porn, the show does dip near to such low’s and consistently doesn't benefit as a result.

In short Upotte is not all that great, but what is has going for it you won’t find executed is such a fashion elsewhere, when it’s good, it is thoroughly enjoyable, don’t go into it expecting a masterpiece, but at only 10 episodes long, it’s hardly going to waste much of your time either.

Tl;dr- Operation Flashpoint: Kawaii Crisis

I watched this a few weeks ago but decided I would give my opinion on this...crap.

Story: 3/10, Alright, so the anime focuses around these girls that go to a special school because they're...guns? Yes, guns. These girls are literally guns in human form; weird. There's literally no progression except the minute bonding of the girls and their teacher, which in and of itself is completely pointless.

Art: 6/10, I've seen other reviews where people complained that the art was "bland", and I have to agree. There's nothing spectacular about the art here, unless you're into gunfire, which is alright I guess, nothing to wet your pants ... over though.

Sound: 7/10, *brapapapapapapapaaaaa!* gun noises and girls making semi-erotic sounds, cool.

Character: 3/10, oh my god these characters are stupid! Literally, there is practically nothing that is appealing about any of the characters or their personalities. No progression, barely any emotion, and just plain dumb.

Enjoyment: 5/10, I'm going to tie this one in with my overall rating, which is also a 5/10. The minuscule amount of enjoyment I found was through the semi action-filled scenes where the girls fought against this weird group of people. (Trying to retain spoiling, although after watching I really wouldn't have mind being spoiled) Also some of the facts that I learned about the guns that the girls were, like where the gun originated and its specs.

So basically if you want to waste time and watch a really crappy action/ecchi anime, then be my guest and watch this steamy pile of crap.

Moe x Guns, a wonderfully bland new combination.

For as long as humans have existed we have sought to further our knowledge and power of our weapons. From ancient times with our tools made of stone and stick we slowly progressed to projectiles. For a long period of time the battle between armor and weapon had become a tug or war. For the most part this war has been won in favor of weapons from our humble beginnings to August 6th 1945 with the first atomic bomb dropping.

A brief boring history lesson but you really learn more about guns than anything else. Upotte!! is just another ... one of those shows that comes along to really disappoint.

When I first saw this title as an ONA I was fairly excited, simply just because the lack of net original content is at an extreme low. In the end I felt nothing but wasted time and effort on history lessons of guns. What is different is that this tries too hard to make the guns seem like they're someones baby and that they try and compare human characteristics to guns.

The story of Upotte!! is non-existent, it is merely progression of these guns as they mature and eventually placed into the hands of a soldier. The references feel almost "Dirty" almost as if the show itself is for a person with a term I like to call "Gun Fetish". As each episode comes along you have a new gun introduced only to be set into the backstage so no character development occurs. The story and characters are poor at best and the gun to girl comparisons are laughable at best.

The redeeming aspects of Upotte!! are simply the art and sound. Each and every weapon are almost exact replicas of real world applications. I believe the only real purpose of this was to give some insight on weapons from various countries and their shape, form, and function. When it comes down to gun sound the representation is fairly accurate as modern weapons are no where near as loud as pre-world war rifles. Although, I have to admit the character designs to represent these guns were cute, it wasn't enough to make me enjoy this show any better with or without them.

Objectively Upotte!! felt as if it tried too hard to come up with a new moe combination only to fall on its face, but if you're a gun enthusiast give it a watch.

An interesting, if half-baked story in which various types of military assault rifles are personified as Junior High School girls. If that doesn't make sense, then congratulations, you've just recognized the major flaw in this anime's story design.

What is nice about the overall story is the characters -- we have the core 4 girls, who have to learn to work together and rely on each other in various contests, even though as weapons, their reliability and usefulness vary depending on the environment of the battlefield. There are a number of other girls, all personified weapons, who either come to their aid or function ... as opposing forces. Oddly, with all its fan service and PG-rated joking about breasts, their are no male love interests in the entire series. There are a few innocent scenes between Funco and her Sensei (did we ever learn his name?) but it never went anywhere. This series was more about girl-hood, school friends, trips and summer vacation than is is about guns and ammo.

In the end, the series attempts to provide an anti-war lesson, but it was poorly delivered and it is doubtful that younger viewers will be able to sort out that message from the more pervasive "glorification of weapons" message that the series really was mostly all about -- the "gun otaku culture" as others have mentioned.

In closing I will say that the final OVA was the best segment of the entire series. It focused solely on the main four characters as they spend a few days camping in the woods. Really made me remember my childhood where I did something similar myself.

Ok, so don't be too judgmental. This review is gonna be very bland, but here goes:

The Story-
OH WAIT, THERE WAS A STORY?

Art-
Decent, not exceptional. Well balanced art style for a generic anime

Sound-
Less QQ more Pew Pew.
...
Character-
Though the characters are generic and mediocre, the concept of personifying the personality/trademarks of a gun has not gone noticed. Good attempt!

Overall-
Average anime. I think this anime would really appeal to anyone interested in firearms. Of course, like with any anime, not every fact stated is true, but I have to give this show credit for a fine attempt at a new concept.
6.4/10

Ah yes. After years of interesting, unique stories through the anime medium, it is only logical that this is the next step. While Upotte!! may be unique, that may not necessarily be a good thing. To summarize this unholy creation in one sentence, it is a show about middle school girls who are guns. Not who HAVE guns. They literally ARE guns. Japan.

There isn't much story to this show, it's just different happenings in their very strange middle school life as weapons. The story also spends an absurd amount of time in bathhouses, for reasons unknown. I had zero interest in the story itself, and ... would have easily dropped this show were it not for the legitimate information presented on guns. A large portion of runtimes and stories are devoted to the history, functionality, and differences between guns. Admittedly, it is quite interesting, and kept me watching. If you aren't already knowledgeable about guns, you'll probably come out knowing more about them than before watching. Still, educational merit doesn't salvage a weirdly horny, mostly boring story. 3/10.

The art isn't great. During school life scenes it is quite uninspired and bland, although it picks up slightly during the action scenes. Still a lot of still portraits minus gun recoil. Mediocre at best. 5/10.

The sound is fair! It doesn't steal the show, but it is a redeeming quality of the show. The OP and ED are fair, and the guns surprisingly sound pretty heavy and real. There is good variation in sounds of guns. I'm not knowledgeable about guns enough to know if the sounds are accurate, but I'll give them the benefit of the doubt. 6/10.

The characters are quite full of tropes and common conventions, and sometimes have aspects that seem almost stereotypical or racist. Each gun has an origin country, and so they behave as though they are of that country, and it comes across as quite tone deaf sometimes. Also, somehow Americans don't know what snow angels are according to this show. Strange. 4/10.

I enjoyed this more than I thought it would just because of the neat gun commentary and information about weapons I did not know beforehand. A good 6/10.

Overall, Upotte provides interesting facts about guns and weapons in a unique fashion that is entertaining in its own way. However, this does not save the fact that the show has a fairly boring story, with stereotypical characters packed with common conventions. Gun education saves the show from being a dud, but surely doesn't make the show a sure shot. 5/10.

"You can't objectify women if women are objects." - Japan

Upotte!! is a short series that follows girls that are personified guns around as they shoot eachother, annoy their human teacher, and spout off one gun related innuendo after another.

Story 4/10:

There really isn't much in the way of a story here. A human teacher who is never actually given a name in the anime (other than being called Japanese Teacher) meets FNC (Funko), a moeblob girl that is actually a gun, on his way to his new position. She develops a crush on him because of his stance and through innuendos imagines herself being his gun. ... The rest of the story just follows FNC and her other gun friends in class as they shoot, grope, and work with each other. The story really doesn't go anywhere until the final few episodes, and even then the conclusion is pretty lackluster.

Art 5/10:

I liked the character designs and the animation was decent. The backgrounds are a style I found pleasing and the illustrations throughout "educating" viewers on the different guns the girls represent were well done. Aside from that, there's a ton of fanservice which is usually pretty tasteless.

Sound 5/10:

Sound was fine. Liked the OP. The VAs were good. Gun sounds were kind of meh for a series literally based around guns.

Character 4/10:

The teacher is a super bland character and never receives any development, he just plays a viewer insert for most scenes. Most of the protagonists personalities and quirks are based on the characteristics of the weapons they represent. The cast wasn't all that interesting and brought the entire experience down.

Enjoyment: 6/10
Overall: 5/10

I was enjoying Upotte!! enough to keep watching it, but once I had finished the series it ended up feeling really shallow without much thought other than Girls = Guns put into it. I feel there could have been a much more engaging or thought provoking story but unfortunately Upotte!! just rides the gimmick until the end.

The premise of sentient guns going to gun school where they learn how to be better guns is certainly unique. The show is almost an edutainment in places rattling off various historical tidbits about the guns and the reason for their production, along with informing the characters personalities and various gags. If you stop to google every now and then you WILL learn something about gun history and I always like a bit of the old tangential learning.

As far as how well the show actually *uses* that premise, it's a mixed bag. There are really only three big shootouts in the series, and each of ... them is a highlight, but I expected a show about sentient guns to have a bit more action. Strip away the gun premise and it's kind of a basic slice-of-life schoolgirl series where someone whips out an assault rifle every now and then.

The comedy is also mixed, some of the scenes and gags are very funny, but the show has a weird horny streak that usually comes out of left field and doesn't fit the otherwise generally wholesome tone, and this is made worse by the fact the characters are supposed to be middle schoolers. Other gags work well though, from the bizarre school festivities to the various historical in-jokes. I certainly did grow to like the various characters as things went on and you do get a feel for how their various quirks relate to the real life gun they're based on

Artistically, the show doesn't look bad, but it also doesn't wow aside from the lovingly drawn gun details and one or two character designs. None of the music really stands out either and I usually just skipped the intro after a few episodes, which is something I generally don't do.

Overall the show is alright, it does have its entertainment and even educational value, but I think a bit more action, a bit more consistency, and a bit more artistry could have pushed this concept further. It's really not bad, but there are better girls-with-guns shows out there.