Back to my normal reviews again, though this show is anything but normal. And yes, I’m aware I’m talking about an anime which are known to get very weird. But here’s the thing on that, most weird anime still have their own set rules and so often to their own universe that weirdness makes sense. Dragonball,  despite it being so crazy did seem to make sense, but managed the odd subversion here or there even late on like with Majin Buu’s reveal. But this, this show never lets me stay comfortable in knowing what is going to happen.

Sasaki and Peeps starts out as a very relatable show. It stars a middle-aged salaryman Sasaki, overhearing some co-workers talk about how cute their pets are and he decided to get a pet of his own to fill that empty void in his life. Finding dogs or cats too expensive he picks a starry-eyed bird he names Peeps and takes it home, at which point it introduces itself as a great sage from another world. At this point I thought, ah it’s a pseudo Isekai and will have him traveling to the magical world Peeps is from using his knowledge as a salesmen and goods from our world to make a name for himself. And indeed that’s what happens… for a few minutes until while back on earth he gets caught up in a battle between psychics.. And they naturally assume he’s a psychic and force him to join their organization. I foolishly thought THAT was going to be nature of the show, he has to work with a secret organization on Earth while hiding his involvement with another world… and then episode 2 ended with the reveal of magical girls… at this point I stop trying to assume I’d ever know the whole story and wait for Kaiju to eventually be revealed.

Yes this is a story of how a chance purchase caused a middle age salaryman’s life to get increasingly weirder, and I love it!

This all surprisingly means that the episodes that focus on the magical world Peeps is from to be somewhat more stable since that’s just a world with magic and maybe 200 to 400 years behind us technologically so you have political machinations involving rival nobles and less prone to suddenly introduce some new element we didn’t expect as the teaser at the end of an episode. Though most problems there can be resolved on how OP Peeps is magically.

The show does suffer from the standard issue of a light novel adaptation in that as it ends there’s clearly so much more going on and to go on with many story elements being laid for future stories, however a second season has been announced so the main ones of those should start to be addressed in that.

Still the show was an enjoyable watch helped by it being dubbed meaning I can watch it more relaxed than a sub where my attention is often forcibly drawn to read the text to work out what’s going on. Both systems have their pros and cons and we must accept both are viable. As we delve more into the fantasy world or find new levels of madness in the modern world we are introduced to new characters but thankfully they are all fairly distinct and don’t seem to be bleeding into one another though the character of Hoshizaki does become less prominent as the series goes on and Futari Shizuka seems to take her place as Sasaki’s main associate with the psychics.

There were a few fun shows last season and some I’ve still to finish but this was definitely an enjoyable one.

Rating: 🐦🐦🐦🐦