Ramen Akaneko

If you love cats or gourmet anime, or both cats AND Food, look no further than Ramen Akaneko, an anime I feel was specifically made to appeal to people like me who love cats and food!

Our protagonist Tamako is recommended to apply for work at Ramen Akaneko, a Ramen joint run by cats. Cats that can talk. And cook. And serve customers. Like some kind of fever dream come true. Her job - to take care of the cats, by brushing them (!!!) And they decide to hire her because she isn't a cat lover who will be unprofessional and fawn on them (!!!)

Soon ... she gets to know all the cats, and like any cat lover will tell you, they all have different personalities. Seriously though the characters (cats specifically) are the best thing about this anime. Apologies in advance but I'm going to describe them using terms familiar to the cat lover types.
* Bunzou - the orange "ginger" kitty, instead of being the feisty one orange brain cell, is the semi gruff, professional chef
* Sabu - the black "void" Kitty is the sous chef, with a hobby most will be surprised to learn about
* Hana - the white "cloud?" kitty is so dang adorable she's in charge of customer service
* Sasaki - the bicolor silver and white tabby is the moneybags Boss of the operation, and
* Krishna - the "muscle" tiger is the shy, sweet, ramen maker!

Watching each character's story get revealed while they live their daily life is mostly comforting. This is a slice of life, that happens to have a found family of felines plus one human worker who regains her confidence after working for a different kind of business, one that is kinder to their employees than her previous place of work.

Initially I thought this had an Iyashikei slice of life with lots of comedy BUT some of the stories are a bit too hard hitting for that, involving bullying, workplace drama, internet fame, consent, legal issues and death. This anime just happens to use the vehicle of cute cats to try and take some of the sting out of what would otherwise be seriously traumatic issues. After the credits there are short vignettes of behind the scenes type footage, most are comedic in nature.

The biggest downside of this anime is the animation is inconsistency between the 3D and 2D styles. The main cats look great, but sometimes the tiger's anatomy seems a bit wonky, the humans too. Thankfully all the food looks good so there's that check mark for the gourmet watcher in me, but ... the food doesn't look mouthwatering delicious like some of the better gourmet anime I've watched.

Overall, this would be a good show to introduce the older, younger or food or cat lovers to anime since it's PG with none of the fan service cringe stuff that will turn some viewers off. Personally I enjoyed watching this every week, with one of my cats on my lap getting treats while I went Aww and pet the kitty, all the while WISHING a place like this existed because as a former Persian caretaker I am eminently qualified and I want that job!

Red Cat Ramen - Cats running a restaurant? Interesting.

It's insane to know that there are all kinds of works featuring anthropomorphic animals, but when it comes to actual anime representation, they're far and few in-between. But let's cut to the chase, from  the absurdly weird Egumi Legacy to the fantasy-laden Bye Bye, Earth, only one show in this Summer 2024 season, will I tempt to request you to take a second chance to watch: mangaka Angyaman's Ramen Akaneko a.k.a Red Cat Ramen, which has an interesting tale of how it got from the books to the small screen.

Created by mangaka Angyaman, his first foray being ... the short-lived 2-volume series Yoru wo Higashi ni a.k.a East, Into The Night, as a Shueisha Shonen Jump+ title, it was intriguing, but nothing much more from that. Then came the breakthrough that would be Ramen Akaneko, which got its start on Jump Rookie, attracting a fanfare attention of a record 400k views within 3 days, enough for the manga to be serialized as an indie series, and then promoted to regular serialization, all within the space of less than a year from November 2021 to October 2022. And mind you, this side project for Indie series in Jump+ was brand new at the time of its inception in April 2021, and this manga alongside mangaka You Chiba's Yochien Wars a.k.a Kindergarten Wars, are the only 2 series that achieved this unpredecented record. This leaves the manga (as of this review) at 9 volumes and counting, which is a testament that Shonen Jump+ titles like mangaka Masaoki Shindo's massively popular RuriDragon have a spot at achieving big things whilst getting attention like the heavy hitters out there. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

If you have to define a slice-of-life series, Ramen Akaneko would be it, and it embraces the genre to its full potential. The titular establishment of a ramen shop that's run by talking cats, it has always been the bread and butter of operations, until a human comes around seeking a job at said restaurant. This human would turn out to be a young woman by the name of Tamako Yashiro, who quit her job at an advertising design company, citing its toxic environment. The admission of Tamako being that she's more of a dog person than a cat person, she soon takes responsbility of upholding the restaurant's unique morales and values, led by the orange tabby cat of head chef Bunzo and the grey tuxedo cat of restaurant owner Pudding Sasaki. Alongside its other unique characters, the black cat of sous-chef Sabu, the white cat of customer service manager Hana, as well as the Siberian/Bengal-offspring tiger of in-house noodle maker Krishna, a day in Ramen Akaneko always has unexpected surprises in store for Tamako and the cats.

Despite being a series full of episodic vignettes, the strength of Ramen Akaneko lies in its characters, who're all quite the unique animals they are, as much as Tamako is relegated to kitten-brushing duty for the cats who're constantly shedding their fur, and that would not be good if it got in the way of the delicious and sumptuous ramen that the restaurant makes and serves to its loyal  customers who come back time and time again for some unique ramen served by animals instead of humans. Take Krishna for example: despite being voiced by (surprise, surprise) Saori Hayami of Spy x Family's Yor Forger fame, the tiger, despite her big size, sharply contrasts her shy and kindhearted nature so much so that she's always at the back of house making ramen noodles, never to be seen at the restaurant only until everyone is gone, or if she needs to be involved to resolve conflicts. Most certainly, a day in Ramen Akaneko will bring comfort and wholesomeness, no matter what will happen.

The animation is serviceable enough but is notable since this is legendary director Park Sunghoo and his new studio of E&H Production at the helm. Even though the Korean director has received an amount of flack given the atrocity that was Winter's Ninja Kamui, this show may not showcase great production values, but it's not the aspect of what you came here for in the first place. The unusual art style actually compliments the show enough to make it look like a 2.5D anime, and I have to say that it works to good effect.

The music is rather fine, though Wednesday Campanella did put out a decent OP, as well as Rikon Densetsu with its ED. The OST is rather lacking, and considerably little more effort to this would've helped elevate the show even by a shot. Not the best, however.

In the end, what you came for for Ramen Akaneko a.k.a Red Cat Ramen, is its comforting atmosphere and subtlety that less is more, simplicity beats complexity, and happiness is all you need to rest for a show that can make you feel like a couch potato to sit, watch, and just relax in all of its goodness.

It's an easy show to pass up, but please don't skip because of its ugliness and unrefined animation, but come to a warm-hearted, fuzzy feeling that you're home, just sipping on some ramen and having a solitude with anthropomorphic cats. And within the cusp of the progressive life, slowing down will help you regain your senses to savour a hearty meal, which sometimes, is all you need.

Ramen Akaneko is about the slice of life of our main character, Tamako working in a ramen shop operated by cats. Is it particularly comedy oriented despite the silly premise? Surprisingly, not really. It's just a serious slice of life story about a part timer with cats substituting people working in a ramen shop. Naturally, they have their feline propensities, such as grooming themselves, being...cats, etc.

If you find that fun, that's good. To me--well--it's basically just a generic slice of life show. There's some workplace melodrama, sometimes there's some character development, but to be honest, the cat stuff is so surface-level that you could ... potentially rewrite this entire story with humans replacing them and it would functionally be the same show.

The anime is very cheap looking because it is. There's blending of CGI and 2D, both are well below average and sub-par. I kind of found it funny to look at in the first few episodes before figuring out they were just blending low poly CGI models, and to blend them together, they use similarly low quality 2D renders of the characters so the blend isn't obvious.