In long : Rarely have I seen an anime that tries so hard and yet, never succeed, not even once.
Flip Flappers is an anime who wants to be cute, fun, creative, touching and a little bit sad. It tells the story of two young girls who each times, go live an adventure on an alternate and colorful world. With a synopsis like that, I should have love the show and yet, I ended up hating it.
The story ?While I only seen 4 episodes (I couldn’t stomach more, even skipped parts of the fourth one), there is barely a story. Most of it, it's just Papika and Cocona in the real world, then on a alternate one, fight stuff, getting theirs asses kicked, getting power-ups, winning and goodbye. They try to tease bigger stuff but it’s not the main focus ; Flip Flappers wants to create « emotions », not complex storytelling. And that could (kinda) work except but here, it doesn’t for a large number of reasons.
Each of the world is supposed to be an « hommage » to something else (Ghibli movies, Dragon Ball Z, Gurren Lagann, Hokuto No Ken, video games in general, etc...) and you’re supposed to be excited in each one of them but nope, they are too rushed and poorly conceived to make you care. Blink once and you will miss one.
And our protagonists, the ones that are supposed to make those adventures fun ? They are trash. I only remember their name because they spend so much time screaming them (I swear half of the dialogues are just them repeating over and over « Papika !!! » and « Cocona!!! »).
Cocona is a bland, cold, bitchy tsundere. She complains every two seconds, doesn’t have the guts to really stand up for anything and always act or react in the most annoying way possible. She is also supposed to be smart but that’s only said once and never seen in action.
Papika isn’t much better : the energic and optimistic one who is basically a stalker. She stalks Cocona like crazy and try to force herserlf on Cocona by touching her or sniffing her without the other consent. And other than her obsession with Cocona ? Well she likes eating and sometimes she is super-strong and can beat up giants and sometimes you can take her out in one weak blow… Yeah that’s it. She has nothing for her except looking cute, trying to be cheerful but actually being creepy and wanting to be anywhere near Cocona.
And the rest of the cast you may gently ask, how are they ? Well, there are non-existent. Seriously.
Oh sorry no, I forgot the robot. The one who is a pervert who loooooves to molest underage girls…
Yes the show has a lot of awful, awful fan service who targets underaged girls. Want to see the two num-nuts turned for no reason into furries ? Want to see a naked Cocona taking a shower? Want to see Cocona bite a metaphorical giant penis for no reason? Want to see the robot ejaculate because a naked little girl who is into BDSM hit him ? Too bad, because it’s here ! So yeah, the « cute » and « cheerful » side that the show tries to push doesn’t work with shit like that. The worst is when they try to make you sad like « oh no, Papika is dead » and then, BAM, the show sexualize Cocona (who is 13 by the way) the next shot...
The dialogues is also completely abysmal, with characters being stuck in repeating the same three-four lines each episodes. So any attempt at being funny or poignant fails right away. Really, it's very rare to witness such poor dialogues.
And the action ? Bland because not only I’m not interested in the characters living them but also because they are just copying others better anime that I could be watching instead. Why watch a bland recreation of Dragon Ball Z when I can watch the original, who is infinitely much better ?
But what about the art ? Every reviews talk about how wonderful and pretty and beautiful and creative this anime is ! Surely it’s his saving grace right ? Not really. I mean, while the animation is decent and it’s clear that they worked on the D.A, it’s just decent/kinda good. It’s nothing mindblowing and there is nothing to make you care about it, unlike actual good anime. And it's funny to see that everytime there is a scene with Coco's Grandma, the budget drops by 60%.
In the end, Flip Flappers is an epic failure. I can't recommand it, especially since there is so much better anime you could be watching instead, ones that are actually fun, poignant and filled with great characters, like Little Witch Academia for example !
Also, the op and ending are quite good, which is kinda sad when you realize they are better than the actual show.
