Definitely not Toy Story.
Episode 1
It’s a short comedy anime about a guy who buys a figure from his favourite anime who comes to life. So yeah, not exactly calling me to watch it. Then given how many minutes of the twelve minute episode here are devoted to him feeling up his ‘doll’ which leads to her top being removed and her going into self-defence mode and blasting holes in his couch, there isn’t a lot of promise here.
The one thing it does have going for it is by the end of the episode he’s decided to play along with her belief that she’s a visitor to the planet and he’s manipulated the situation through his understanding of the anime so that she thinks he’ll be useful. The premise of her ‘exploring’ earth with him is kind of intriguing, made more so by the hint that she’s actually probably telling the truth about being a visitor to the world. There’s definitely some potential in that premise.
Still, whether this one makes it through the whole season or not will really depend on how many times they want to play with the ‘doll’ and whether or not they actually want to focus on what could be the more interesting story. Even just exploring a growing a relationship between the figure and the human character could be quite interesting so let’s hope that they do something with this premise other than milk it for cheap laughs.
Visually, this one is a little rough around the edges but all and all there’s no problems. It works well enough and you don’t expect much from a short anime anyway. The sound is also just kind of fine without doing much.
I don’t have much in the way of expectations with this one but it is worth a second episode at least.
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Episode 2
Well, this is definitely going to be my trash show of the season. That said, for an anime about a guy who has a figure come to life they’ve been remarkably tame on the pervy content even when said figure take a bath. I’m not actually complaining given I probably wouldn’t stick around for that type of content but the problem is that Amazing Stranger seems to be a set up for that kind of content and doesn’t really have a whole lot else going on. So without it, there’s just not much happening here.
Even for a twelve minute episode, this felt pretty empty.
We get a very short sequence at the start of the figure and the main character going various places and taking photos before they return to his apartment. Then, it turns out there was another character in the packet that has also come to life who calls the nerd out on his lies. Meanwhile, Nona, the figure, overhears them and realises she’s actually an anime character.
The short existential crisis could have been interesting but instead it mostly gets swept under the rug and we move into a fairly unamusing sequence of Nona lying about and watching TV.
This one feels like it isn’t going to do very much at all with its premise and even less with its characters. I’m sticking with it for now but my low expectations are now down to pretty much no expectations of this being anything other than filler.
Thank-you for reading 100 Word Anime.
Join the discussion in the comments.
Karandi James
- Amazing Stranger Series Review
- Amazing Stranger Episodes 1 + 2
- Amazing Stranger Episodes 3 + 4
- Amazing Stranger Episodes 5 + 6
- Amazing Stranger Episode 7
- Amazing Stranger Episode 8
- Amazing Stranger Episodes 9 + 10
- Amazing Stranger Episode 11
- Amazing Stranger Episode 12
- Images from: Chou Kadou Girl 1/6: Amazing Stranger. Dir. K Motonaga. Studio A-Cat. 2019.
I didn’t make it through episode 1. Like you said, so much wasted potential.
I think only the shorter run time is keeping this one on my watch list but I’ve still got a couple of titles that I haven’t tried so I’m still not entirely convinced that this one won’t get a mid-season drop and replaced by something else.