The girl is Melty, apparently a witch. Her ears are pointed, but not as much as the elves. The little black guy is Sorbet, her familiar. And these two are a huge gift to otaku, because of the voices. Melty is Rie Kugimiya, very recognizably. Sorbet is Tomoko Kaneda, and she's hamming it up shamelessly. Which works because it's that kind of character.

This is the first major role I've heard Kaneda in in several years. (I think the last time I heard her in anything, was when she did one of the "Delusion Eu's" in the first season of Zombie. And that was just a couple of lines.) I was afraid she'd retired from the business. It was wonderful to hear her again. She does a great job in this part.

As seems to be usual in this series, it's a gentle story, about making people happy. Melty is engaged in a quest to make the perfect ice cream. To help her, Sorbet visits the bakery and asks them for sweet breads. Over the course of several days, Sorbet shows up just at closing, and the girls eventually follow him (?) home to Melty's mansion, which is on the other side of a graveyard. That they walk through on a cold, foggy night.

Anyway, Melty loves their bread and wonders how they make it so delicious. So Melty and Sorbet don disguises (i.e. Melty puts on dark glasses) and watch Rick and the Girls doing their work. And in the end she learns their secret, which she tells them about at the end. Happy Endo.

By the way, the music in this episode was notably excellent. And it continues the basic "healing" feeling that this show has had from the very beginning.

The next ep teaser shows Rick in his uniform, practicing with his sword. And there's a catgirl ninja maid. Looks very violent, but I'm sure it won't really be.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste in System at 12:02 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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1 It's not really going to get violent.  They don't have the production budget for that.

This is still one of the weirdest series I've watched in a long time.  It's really just about making bread and making people happy.  Pretty much all of the characters you'd like to spend an afternoon talking to.  It's pleasant.

I still think this is Purgatory-type story.  I'd love to spend time on this island.  Seems like a great place.

Aside from some mecha-girl randomly nuking your boat....

Posted by: sqa at May 11, 2012 12:48 PM (olIc+)

2 I do think it is deliberately part of the iyashikei genre. And I'm really enjoying it.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at May 11, 2012 02:09 PM (+rSRq)

3

By the way, I haven't really seen anything that suggests to me that this show is particularly low-budget. Animation shortcuts -- but you always get those now. This show isn't really any more like that than any other.

If they really were trying to save money, they wouldn't have made the girls' costumes so complicated to draw.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at May 11, 2012 03:17 PM (+rSRq)

4  
Low budget shows don't have art like this.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at May 11, 2012 03:43 PM (+rSRq)

5 But they'd have to scrimp on clothing details to afford the action scenes as well.  They know where the BluRay sales are at.

It's not a terribly low budget show, but it's also not got a huge budget, either.  Though I expect we'll get a fight scene next episode.  They'll just be kind of uncommon.  I expect this series to be "Peace through superior Bread-making skills"

Posted by: sqa at May 11, 2012 06:18 PM (olIc+)

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