Outbreak Company

Shinichi Kanou is a shut-in otaku with a vast knowledge of anime, manga, and video games. One day, after applying for a job in hopes of escaping his secluded lifestyle, he is kidnapped and transported to the Eldant Empire—a fantasy world filled with elves, dragons, and dwarves. Trapped in this strange land, Shinichi is given an unlikely task by the Japanese government: to spread otaku culture across the realm by becoming an "Otaku Missionary."

To accomplish his mission, Shinichi has the full support of the Japanese government, as well as the half-elf maid Myucel and Princess Petralka of the Eldant Empire. Together with this ragtag bunch, he will overcome the obstacles of politics, social classes, and ethnic discrimination to promote the ways of the otaku in this holy land.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Foaran, Myucel Main

Mimori, Suzuko Japanese

Kanou, Shinichi Main

Hanae, Natsuki Japanese

Anne Eldante III, Petralka Main

Fuchigami, Mai Japanese

Hanaiman, Elbia Supporting

Uesaka, Sumire Japanese

Koganuma, Minori Supporting

Uchida, Maaya Japanese

En Koldobar, Galious Supporting

Miki, Shinichiro Japanese

Darwin, Brooke Supporting

Tomita, Takahiro Japanese

Garde, Romilda Supporting

Honda, Mariko Japanese

Pertini, Edoardo Teodoro Supporting

Yamaguchi, Rikako Japanese

Game Narrator Supporting

Tanaka, Junichirou Producer

Takatori, Masashi Producer

Shinjuku, Gorou Producer

Takigasaki, Makoto Producer

Reviews

Dec 27, 2013

Zelot

Recommended

This whole anime can be summed up by the lyrics of one of the songs that comes from Outbreak Company. "DA. DA DA DA DIN DIN DA DA DA"

Story: 7
This anime is a clash of modern day Japan with a fantasy land that has knights, dragons, a loli ruler, elves, dwarfs and dragons. Just imagine a brighter version of LOTR. We follow Shinchi as he has to spread otaku culture (Anime and Manga) throughout the lands of Eldant. That is pretty much the show....

The pacing of Outbreak Company was fine up until the final two episodes, which the pacing felt too ... fast as they tried cramming in a lot of seriousness that the other ten episodes lacked. The ten episodes lacking seriousness wasn't a bad thing, the show was doing a great job with those episodes, but the last two rushed into drama and seriousness.

Art: 9
Art was great! Something I found enjoyable were all the references to other shows through background art such as a parody poster of Hataraku Maou-sama.

Scenery was amazing as well they made medieval times look happy and splendid. Castle, fields, mountains, the whole thing was pretty to look at.

Character designs weren't outstanding, but unique enough to separate characters and make them memorable.

Sound: 10
In my opinion, Univer Page, the OP of Outbreak Company is my favorite song to come out of this fall season of anime. It is so cheery and the way the song starts, eargasm. Watashi no Houseibako, the ED of Outbreak Company is a very soothing song and very good to listen to while running. Both songs give off the vibe that the whole anime is trying to do, make the person watching this very happy.

The background music does a great job at carrying the mood, with a very unique song that is used during comical parts, I already quoted the lyrics of it in the beginning of this review.

Character: 8
Characters are given enough depth to make the memorable, and distinguishable. This is good since my first impression after looking at the OP was that characters would be easy to mix up. Character development was great, everyone had development outside of being interested in manga or anime.

The only problem I had was the random characters added halfway through, the dwarf and the elf. These two were added to the story and I was assuming for them to have a pretty big role for upcoming events, but nothing really happened involving them.

Enjoyment: 8
This anime was enjoyable because of the otaku humor. I found humor based around references and other things anime and manga hilarious. Multiple scenes I have laughed, and the soundtrack makes it even funnier. I also really enjoyed the one part of seriousness they did in the last episode, the only time this series did the serious business right, which makes the last two episodes worth it.

Overall: 8
Great anime for the fall season with an amazing soundtrack. I will be listening to Univer Page for a long time to come, especially when I need a pick me up.

Reviewer’s Rating: 8

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Aug 7, 2015

Benduski

Mixed Feelings

Stroy
The story is about bringing Japanese culture, name it VN games, anime, manga and other things to a fantasy world that the goverment discovered, so that's why our protagonist is sent to this place, because he has the knowdlege of all these things, Shinichi will learn how different this fantasy world is. The thing is that everything was well paced until the last 3 episodes where they throw a lot of content too fast and too much for 3 episodes, so it was ok but a little disappointing.

Art & Animation
The art style was good, the characters were a little simple but still well made.

Sound
The sound ... was good, the OP and ED song were good and it matched the theme of the anime, the songs in the comedy parts made it even funnier, overall it was good.

Character
The characters were ok, nothing special.
-Shinichi was funny and he was likeable and his facial expression were hilarious, specially his poker face.
-Petrarka was annoying at first but a little likeable later, maybe.
-Myucel the elf was sweet and light hearted, in this world shes seen as a low class.
Overall the characters were mostly ok with good moments.

Enjoyment
Mostly enjoyable, funny from time to time, helped by the songs to make them funnier, enjoyable charachters to some extent, an average anime but still enjoyable.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Jan 2, 2014

ar2000

Not Recommended

At the beginning of this fall anime season, I wasn’t planning on watching Outbreak Company. The synopsis for this anime wasn’t anything exciting nor was it intriguing. However, I decided to watch it anyway, for it was on Crunchyroll and there weren’t too many other anime I was hyped for this fall. After this show finished airing and I finished watching, I, unfortunately felt like I had wasted my time, tuning into this show every Sunday.

For the most part, the plot of Outbreak Company is nothing special. Our protagonist, Kanou Shinichi, is a reject who hides in his house all day. The reason for ... this is silly, but we can’t blame Outbreak Company for it because it was clearly meant to be a parody anime and you can tell right from the beginning. The show then immediately tosses Shinichi into a fantasy realm (the Eldant Empire) in which he unintentionally starts developing a harem. The harem part was a strange inclusion, as the beginning of this show led me to believe this would be a romantic comedy. Outbreak Co. is, indeed, a comedy, but it occasionally attempts to be serious and it fails miserably. It has plenty of ecchi elements and fits the definition of harem very well, which prevents it from blending well with “plot.” This could direct the focus of the anime towards comedy, but it may bother you when the show tries to be serious.

Thankfully, Outbreak Co. does try to be funny for the majority of the time and that is what you should expect when jumping into this anime. Much to the chagrin of many, however, the jokes in this show heavily rely on references and parody. This is awful for new viewers of anime and non-hardcore viewers because it’s hard to understand the jokes without prior knowledge or thorough research. Either that or the show throws around cultural-specific Japaneses terms so it can create a gag that might last until the end of the current episode. Comedy is really all this show has going for it, yet the entirety of Outbreak Co. involves Shinichi trying to teach the residents of the Eldant Empire about “Otaku Culture,” which creates comedy that, again, alienates new viewers. Don’t watch this anime for the plot, and only for the comedy if you’re a hardcore anime lover, or for some reason, striving to be one.

The animation is fine. Though, like many anime today, the art style makes everything shiny (hair, vehicles, skin, etc.). If you watch for a long time, your head may start to hurt. Don’t marathon this anime; not that I would recommend it otherwise. I do like how fantasy elements, such as dragons and magic are drawn, however. There’s also some ecchi so that might also be a reason to avoid Outbreak Co. By the way, every character tends to have this lower case u-shaped smile as their “default expression.” That annoyed me and may annoy you.

I have no complaints with the audio for the anime. The music was fine. The opening and ending may be sort of catchy, but nothing exceptional. I do have a problem with a lot of the dialogue from the characters Shinichi and Myucel, but that is more of an issue with the story, or characters. The voice actors could annoy you since their character roles are all generic archetypes, but they’re bearable, at least to me.

The characters are what really and truly mitigate my enjoyment for this anime. Outbreak Co. does what many anime do and builds characters directly from unadulterated tropes. I can summarize my problems with the characters in one sentence: Everyone is unoriginal and possibly so annoying that it’s lethal. The unoriginal characters may not be an issue especially if you anticipate the harem aspect. Plenty of harems are not plot-driven, or very much creative, but they can back-up their quality with comedy, or even quirkiness. Outbreak Co. does not have this leisure and it worsens because of Shinichi and his gang. All the people (and even other creatures) are absolutely obsessed with anime and manga. This could actually be funny if: 1. the show could allow people not familiar with Otaku culture to get its references, 2. not make it seem perfectly reasonable that their obsession does not hinder their work. Shinichi takes every single chance he gets to boost his ego by acting like mister smarty-pants when it comes to “Otaku Culture,” Myucel misunderstand every statement that may be misunderstood, and Petralka acts like a more serious person than she actually is (considering she looks like a little girl). These traits could allow these characters to be hilarious, but the awful dialogue and unfortunate combination of mediocre setting and bad character interactions prevents this. An example being: the show doesn’t alert us when it changes its tone effectively, so we don’t know if dialogue is supposed to be serious or comedic.

To be as frank as possible, the only reason this show is bad is because of the references that are 90% of this show. It actually isn’t so much that they’re hard to get, but more that they’re omnipresent. Without that problem, high points of Outbreak Co. are salvageable. Though, since it’s included, this anime becomes incredibly hard to enjoy. It’s quite possible for you to enjoy it if you are a hardcore anime viewer. I wouldn’t personally call myself that. The show is obviously made in Japan and therefore targeted toward Japanese viewers, but some of the issues I brought up may prevent you from enjoying it even if you live in Japan.

You should definitely avoid Outbreak Company entirely. Unless you are an anime enthusiast, it is distracting that every joke in this anime tends to rely on references to other media, or certain cultural elements. It also seems to want to parody, but never goes full force with it. Even if you get all the references, they’re more amusing than funny, and the bad character design and lack of proper storytelling doesn’t give Outbreak Co. much merit. Don’t expect depth from anything in this show and expect a lot of annoying characters as well as the lack of common sense that would be funny if done properly. I wouldn’t say Outbreak Company is a terrible show, but it limits its audience and it tries a little too hard to be what it is not.

4/10

Reviewer’s Rating: 4

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