Who Is Peta?
Null & Peta has been surprisingly enjoyable for a comedy short, but there have been glimpses of more emotional depth as Null is nagged by her robot sister. These glimpses come to the forefront in episode 5 as the jokes are swapped out for a clear instance of denial followed by a heart wrenching plea. Null is one incredibly lonely girl and the loss of her sister, even in robot form, isn’t a pill she’s able to swallow.
Admittedly, in the short time frame this one doesn’t pack quite the punch of some longer form anime that build up characters over many hours of viewing before pulling such a poignant moment, but for the time given Null & Peta is doing its best to take the viewer on a journey with Null. While most of the time this seems to be your standard anime hijinks with a super-powered robot trying to feed her sister purple fried rice and drag her to school, the underlying theme of feeling like she’s the odd one out and alone continues to surface adding just enough depth to keep this series interesting.
This week Null is confronted with the possibility that while she might be able to recharge Peta she’s unable to back-up her data. At first she dismisses this as unimportant and claims she’ll be happy that the new robot won’t nag her about school and the like, however it is very clear this is bravado and the facade crumbles pretty quickly.
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Ultimately though the situation resolves itself through a comedy of errors and we realise once again that while Null & Peta is willing to dip its toes into emotional depth, ultimately it is just a bit of fun. However, the conclusion here doesn’t cheapen the reality of Null’s emotional moment even a little bit.
I know some people don’t watch short anime, but so far this one has been a treat this season. Not to mention, it is a very small time investment to give it a go.
Thank-you for reading 100 Word Anime.
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Karandi James
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Images from: Null Peta. Dir. H Ogura. Shin-Ei Animation. 2019.