[Fish Sandwich]

Faiz 5-6:

I don't think I have a whole lot to mention about these ones, even though I quite enjoyed them. My main takeaway was that I'm impressed to find out Keitarou is a way better character than I remember. Watching the show again, it's blowing my mind a little how much it actually isn't treating him like a joke the way I always remembered it. There have been several notable instances just in the four episodes he's been in so far where he genuinely gets through to Takumi, and managing that even once would be no small feat.

Speaking of good ol' Takkun, I'm still really, really in love with the dynamic he and Mari have. They're both huge jerks, and somewhat distressingly unscrupulous, and you couldn't ask for a better display of both than the scene in 6 where Takumi lays out his plan to mug Yuuji for an ID badge to get into Smart Brain, singling him out as a target because he "looks weak", followed by Mari eagerly agreeing with Takumi's assessment, much to his surprise. They're trying to break into his car in their next scene, of course.

I mean... wow. Look, I don't know how clearly I can describe this, because it's sort of a complex feeling, but, uh, how do I put it? I like Takkun and Mari, and I like that they're jerks, but I don't like them because they're jerks? Does that get it across at all? If this was how they behaved 24/7 this show would be unbearable, but they've both got layers beyond that, and the show keeps them sympathetic by being sure to also constantly demonstrate, in ways both subtle and obvious, that they're actually pretty good-natured people in spite of all this. Again, it's complex.

Besides, they needed that ID card! It's right in the theme song! The end justifaid the means, people!

Also, these subs are just miserable. I try not to bang on about this stuff too much, but the name Agony is turning out to be appropriate considering how heartbreaking it is to still see so many mistakes left in, and then this gem, where a series-critical scene of Takumi opening up about his biggest fear has him contradicting himself a couple lines apart in a way so obvious simply from context you shouldn't need to know Japanese to figure out what's wrong:





What's important to note is that TV-Nihon actually didn't mess that first line up, so I'm baffled how this could've even happened. I feel like I'm going insane. I'm trying to keep track of all these errors, which are piling up at an alarming rate, going back and forth between two different sub groups, and there's just no hope in sight. I'm not even sure what I'm trying to prove here. I don't want to oversell it and say Faiz is secretly some superbly written work of genius underneath all this, but I swear, it's not this dumb.

W 5-6:

Thankfully, a little Double is more than enough to brighten my mood back up. I don't have a lot to say about this set of episodes, either, though. It's good, but after the last arc was firing on all cylinders the way it was, this one can't help but feel slightly less entertaining. Of course, this is Double, so "less entertaining" still means "hugely entertaining".

One general observation I have is that I like the way Shoutarou gets to use the Memory Gadgets to do cool detective stuff. Giving him those opportunities to earn some action hero street cred without transforming helps sell the genre tone the show is going for. Any fictional private investigator worth their salt needs to be able to get out of some tight spots, and Shoutarou proves he can do that without reaching for his belt right away.