© Kafka Asagiri / Neko Kanai / Sango Harukawa / KADOKAWA / Bungo Stray Dogs Wan! Production committee
“THE REAL RETURNS / Atsushi’s Sweet Recipe / Relativistic Dazai”
What They Say:
“Bungo Stray Dogs: an action battle epic set in the bustling, fictional city of Yokohama, where the port winds howl as “gifteds” whose powers take after the giants of literature. Could you believe that those characters of the Armed Detective Agency and the Port Mafia, whose battles bring them to the edge of death, would come looking so adorable and minimalistic, just to jest and jive?!”
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
The Bungo Stray Dogs property is one that I like, but I haven’t seen anything since the second season I think. I reviewed the first season of this shorts series back in 2021, and it was enjoyable in a basic kind of way because of its physical comedy, but depending on how far removed you are from the characters and their dynamic, this may be like that show in that you’ll miss a lot of the gags and in-jokes from it. Shorts like this can be fun even if you’re not familiar with it, but it’s definitely one where the more you know, the more you get out of it. As a lapsed casual fan, I can’t help but to dig in since they’re just about twelve minutes an episode, and are often broken up into a few stories.
Partially, I was curious to see if it would do any kind of real re-introduction, since it’s been six years between series, but just getting the main cast as dogs running around the city in their costumes, using their powers and the like, is worth enough of a chuckle as it really captures some 80s style animation and perspectives for me. The initial story mostly just serves to re-introduce the characters amid a chase with their names, but I’m admittedly so far past my last real viewing that it’s fairly meaningless for me. It hits some cute jokes along the way, and the visuals make it appealing enough as a weird pseudo-dog comedy.
The second story has Atsushi making crepes with Kyouka using his special recipe. It’s fairly straightforward with a fun bit of how to make it and all the ingredients, and Atsushi certainly has a lot of pride in what he does and enjoys showing how it’s done with some fun flourishes. It’s cute and simple, especially with the wrapper. The final story focuses on Dazai, where nobody knows where he is, but all of them imagine doing a whole host of very different things – including dying. This has them coming up with more ideas, while the general idea is that he’s probably just lazing about and doing nothing. Atsushi is the one who comes across him on the street later, and going to a shop that makes absolutely no sense beyond some kind of obscure occult place. It’s fun to watch how Atsushi panics, and as others come across him in different ways as well, and it just reinforces how all over the map he is.
In Summary:
Coming back into this series some five years later is certainly amusing, but it still largely works the same. You can enjoy the basic comedy that you get with this and some of its sweeter moments, such as the making crepes piece, but you can also just get the general weirdness without knowing much about the characters, such as the Dazai story. It certainly helps the more you know, but revisiting the main series isn’t in the cards for me at this point even with fond vague memories of it. The shows feel a bit more polished and animated than before, but it’s just good light fluff to enjoy, which is what i want out of it.
Grade: C+
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Apple TV via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.
Chris Beveridge
http://www.fandompost.com
Chris has been writing about anime, manga, movies and comics for well on twenty years now. He began AnimeOnDVD.com back in 1998 and has covered nearly every anime release that’s come out in the US ever since.
He likes to write a lot, as you can see.
