Mazenchu anime reveals opening movie before 7 October debut
Kansai TV's short anime about a high-schooler made of sushi rice has published its opening movie, narrated by First Summer Uika, a week before it starts.
Mazenchu has published its opening movie, giving Kansai TV's short anime its best look yet a week before transmission. The show begins on 7 October and runs weekly inside the Wednesday edition of the station's afternoon programme Yo~i Don!, and the opening film is narrated by First Summer Uika. The series was announced in September; the opening movie is the new material.
What the show is
The premise is a school for food. The programme's own site welcomes visitors to Mazenchu High, where the protagonist is Sume, a high-schooler made of sushi rice who dreams of one day becoming a good piece of sushi. Around Sume are classmates such as Akami, a tuna, and Abo, an avocado, and the show follows them as they mix with each other, collect friendships and rivalries and grow up a little at a time. The tagline reads, roughly, that being different is interesting.
Who makes it
The original work is credited to Ebi, with Yusuke Takase directing and writing. Studio Nanahoshi is handling animation, Liberty Animation Studio made the opening animation, Dugout is on sound production and BONJIN edits. TORCH produces the show alongside the Mazenchu production committee. The voice cast includes Kokoro Kikuchi among the sushi-topping characters who share the school with Sume.
Where it can be watched
The broadcast home is a segment inside Yo~i Don! rather than a standalone late-night berth, which is how short-form anime is usually placed on Japanese commercial television, and the show's own account has said episodes are also planned for TVer and YouTube. That arrangement should let viewers outside the Kansai region follow the series without a television.
Our opinion
A short anime living inside a daytime programme survives or dies on whether its premise works in the gaps between other segments, and a high school of personified sushi toppings is a good bet for that: the joke lands immediately and never needs an arc to prop it up. Casting a comedian and actor as the narrator is the more revealing decision, because it points the show at the adult watching alongside a child rather than at late-night fandom. The worry is that the food puns are the entire idea, and the promise of friendship, romance and rivalry suggests a familiar school-life formula underneath the novelty. A weekly slot is a forgiving one, and on the evidence of the opening film this has earned a look.