Story: Joukamachi, as I will be calling this series focuses on the town called "Dandelion Town", a place that while looks like a normal city on the outside, is actually a town ruled over by a monarchy. By proclamation of the king, his nine children will be running for election in order to raise to power as the next king. (Even though 5 of them are girls.) Not only that, but each of the nine children have a kind of superpower, each different to the others. And so here we follow the story of Akane, the 3rd daughter and 4th child to the Sakurada family and her rather rocky road to the election date.
Joukamachi falls towards the 4-koma style of storytelling rather than a normal fluid story where everything goes from one scene to another. Instead of going from scene to scene, every episode of Joukamachi has two or more minisodes that make up the entire runtime of any given episodes, which alludes to an episodic format, progressing the story into the actual election itself by the end of the entire series. (Yes, contrary to what one might think with the way the story is structured, this series actually ends with what it intended to do.) Within each episode contrary to what the synopsis might say, we follow the story of one or more children in the Sakurada family as they live their life as the princesses and princes of the nation. (It is still a slice of life after all.)
Focusing solely on the children's lives in the anime, the show puts heavy emphasis on the characters and traits of each child in the family. The issue with this is the fact that not every child is treated the same. Since there are nine children in the family, the show simply didn't have enough screentime and chose to put several members of the family into the supporting category while spending more time on others (particularly the older ones) and developing them a little more through the use of backstories and just general progression through episode to episode. While the show does have character development, it's not balanced in the sense that everyone gets treated the same way, which is a bit of a shame since Joukamachi completely devotes itself to focusing on these nine siblings.
Another issue comes with the mood of the show. Since it focuses also on developing the characters of the nine siblings, Joukamachi sometimes goes into a more "serious" tone rather than its generally carefree attitude. The issue with this is the fact that it clashes with the show to some extent and while does provide some enjoyable parts as we get to know the characters in the show, it butts heads with what we would normally expect from a comedy slice of life and creates some awkward shifts in tone.
As for the comedy of Joukamachi, the show mostly focuses on the more focused character of the series, Akane, and her inability to receive attention on account of the fact that she has terrible fright when encountered with anyone's gaze. While the show does focus on other antics that the other children have, Akane is usually gives the brunt of the show's comedy. The issue I have is the fact that Joukamachi is very repetitive. There honestly isn't much variation in the stuff that they do for comedy in that show. Is it enjoyable? Well, that depends on what your definition of enjoyable is, but at the very least, Joukamachi is a show that can and will utilize the same jokes more than once.
All in all, Joukamachi is a show that I does decent with what it tries to achieve. With several aspects of the show being unique in a comedy slice of life (such as the big family and several other things) as well as some pleasant character development despite its sudden tone shifts, Joukmachi also gave us an actual end to the show by finishing the plot that it established at the start of the series, which is honestly rare for a show that uses minisodes as its presentation. It still does suffer some issues from its overuse of gags and lack of proper attention to all members of the main cast.
Overview:
+ Unique story idea
+ Character development
- Comedy troupe overuse (with little to no variation half the time)
- Imbalance for who got development
Characters: As mentioned before, Joukamachi focuses solely on the nine siblings and their antics for trying to get themselves elected, and in some cases, not elected for the title of ruler for their kingdom. Since there are nine main characters, I'll just overview them from oldest to youngest.
1. Aoi Power = Invisible Work: Ability to memorize everything the moment she sees it.
2. Shuu Power = Transporter: Ability to transport to wherever he wants to
3. Kanade Power = Heaven's Gate: Ability to make whatever she wants while deducting money from her savings account
4. Akane Power = Gravity Core: Ability to control the gravity of any person or object
5. Misaki Power = All for one: Ability to make up to seven clones of herself
6. Haruka Power = Lots of Next: Ability to predict the outcome of anything in percentages
7. Hikari Power = God Hand: Ability to make change the growth state of any living being
8. Teru Power= Limit Over: Ability to increase his body's strength drastically
9. Shiori Power = Soulmate: Ability to telepathically communicate to any inanimate object
With their Chuunibyou named powers, the nine siblings are the heart of the series. With each of their unique powers, each of them get into various situations (usually Akane), which creates the brunt of the entertainment value for this series. As mentioned before, only the older siblings (and Hikari) really get any semblance of development for this series and as a result, several of them are left in the dust simply because they are either put into the supporting role like Haruka, or are only there sparingly like Shiori. They don't juggle the nine sibling gimmick well which does hurt the show as a whole.
Aside from the siblings, the rest of the cast is comprised of their parents, as well as various other people from around the city, the side characters primarily being people that the family interacts with on a daily basis, such as the siblings' friends, attendants from the royal guard, and the cat, who only shows up for like, two episodes disappointingly. The side characters are for the most part plot devices and only serve to move the story along as a whole. They don't play much of a role beyond that as they really only support the respective Sakurada sibling that they interact with.
Overview:
+ The siblings themselves (because the concept and execution of them was good, I admit)
- Some of the siblings were simply shoved to the side
- Side characters serve as nothing more than plot devices in order to move the plot along
Art: Joukamachi's artstyle is very standard for the level of animation one can expect from today's seasonal anime. Every character is drawn with a moe style of design and the show itself doesn't really look much different than what you would generally expect. As a comedy anime, it also uses exaggerated expressions and occasional face changes in order to showcase a comedic version as to what the character is feeling at the moment. Honestly though, there's nothing particularly remarkable about it, so there's nothing really much to say for the art style as a whole.
However, there are a couple specific things about the look that does raise a couple questions. One of the more prominent things are the cameras in the series. In order to add to Akane's shyness from attention, the entire realm of Dandelion Town is riddled with security cameras that she tries to hide away from. The thing is, these cameras are CGI pieces and are so glaring to look at that they do not fit into the series at all. They look awkward and are just honestly cringeworthy. Another thing to note is the fact that several backgrounds in the show lack some detail when they're being introduced. These still images of background shots honestly look lackluster and are severely lacking in quality, which is both easy to spot and cringeworthy to watch.
Overview:
+/- Standard moe artstyle (dependent on your feelings towards moe)
- Some details were glaringly obviously lazily made
Sound: For the soundtrack of Joukamachi, the series hosts a pair of OP and ED tracks that honestly, sound the same. They're both these very bubbly and bright songs that utilize guitars and other upbeat melodies and basically sound the same. They're pretty generic and there's really nothing particularly noteworthy about them since they don't have that specific memorable part or anything of that sort to make them a memorable track.
Overview:
+/- Average soundtrack
Personal Enjoyment: Joukamachi is a show that despite its flaws was still fairly fun to watch. There were parts of it that actually set it apart form some other comedy Slice of Life anime, which made the show a little more unique as a whole.
Did I enjoy this anime?
Yes, I did. While I do complain about a couple things, Joukamachi was overall still pretty fun to watch. Enjoying the interactions between the nine siblings was something that I got a pretty good laugh out of and in the end, it was entertaining to watch.
What didn't I like about this anime?
More than anything, the tone shift from happy to serious or vice versa did leave a little bit to be desired. Since the show had several backstories as to why some characters are the way they are presented in the series, the show shifted its generally carefree attitude in exchange for a slightly depressing one to explain the "tragedy" which angers me a bit because it does a complete tone shift and doesn't feel like the show it's supposed to be until it switches back.
Would I recommend this anime?
If you're like me and you want to watch a half-decent comedy anime, Joukamachi is worth giving a shot. While it's not the most original seeing how its comedy focuses mostly on the flustering of the shy girl, there are some aspects to it that make it a little bit more interesting to watch than one may think. But then again, comedy is subjective, so take that with a grain of salt when deciding.
