Its been close to 6 years since I stopped watching animes, the last one was Ergo Proxy, and even that took me a few months to complete. In the interim, I’ve moved on to lots of the other series, mostly American drama and sitcoms. But I’ve always wanted to come back to anime, time permitting.
So six years, some reminiscing about Fullmetal Alchemist and Black Lagoon, i started reading about new anime series. It seemed that the scene has changed a bit since my last visit, with better and more matured series.
Anyway, i started with Tatami Galaxy, partly because it was only 12 episodes, and easy starter back into the scene.
<img src=”https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/2a/Tatami_Galaxy_cover.png”>
The series is a slice of life comedy drama about a college student dreaming about his rose coloured life on campus. The first 9 episodes are the retelling of the same scenario, sort of like a parallel universe version of his life. The story is always somewhat the same, the protagonist has an optimistic view upon entering college, joins a club to meet his dream girl, gets disappointed and alienated. In the process of the repeated scenarios, we are introduced to the supporting cast – a zen like master, a troubling making best friend, aloof girl classmate, hot dental assistant, etc.
Although in retrospect, the first 9 episode, though repetitive, tell a overarching storyline, sitting through it started to get tedious for me from the 3rd episodeonwards. Only from the 10th episode onwards did the plot start coming together and moving forward. I think the 12th and final episode is the strongest (the 11th is too surreal) and really shows its maturity in narrative.
On the whole, i liked that it tried to take a different approach in the anime medium. I would recommend it for a quick watch, just persevere through the monotony of first half of the series.