Bananya: Around the World

It may seem silly to review the third season of an obscure shorts show like this, but a man has to hold certain things sacred in life and Bananya is one of those things. Bananya represents a revolution in the world of cute short anime. By combining cute cats with the bizarre idea of putting them in a banana peel, the show ended up standing out because of a dissonance of design that appealed both to the cute and the weird anime crowd. A cross-gender, cross-community appeal to a show that would otherwise be doomed to obscurity outside an extremely small niche. Bananya Around the ... World is the most ambitious and idea-driven season of Bananya, as well as the best animated. However it ended up underperforming in comparison to previous seasons when it came to making interesting episodes.

Bananya Around the World is about two bananyas traveling through different places, times and stereotypical movie locations. Each episodes involves them teleporting to a new location and disappearing after some antics. If you think this would lead to interesting and fun episodic stories, you’d be wrong, somehow. The episodes of S3 tend to lack structure and cohesion. They don’t really feel like episodic stories, more like vignettes, a pastiche of things happening in succession. A good example of this would be the haunted mansion episode. This episode, from the start to 1.5 minutes in, is just about the two bananyas running away from different monster themed bananyas. There is nothing interesting to this. No joke, no back and forth action, no special plans to get away or anything that would make the sequence worthwhile. Just running and screaming. Imagine a fight scene where the two opponents did the same move and block over and over for two minutes straight. You’d be confused why it’s even there. Then, after all of this the twist of the episode is revealed and the monsters turn out to be trick or treaters. This is the best part of the episode, but does not excuse the lacklustre first half.

Compare this to an episode of the original Bananya, episode 10. In this episode several bananyas are trying to bring down a helium balloon. They try a couple of times but fail until another bananya comes by and finds a trick to keep the balloon down by tying it to something heavy. This is by no means riveting storytelling, but there’s a back and forth, there’s a tension, there’s a small amount of variety in the actions performed. The episode then proceeds with the bananyas using the balloon as a trampoline until one of them pops it with his claws. This episode is by no means the best of the original series, but it feels so much nicer to watch because of its stronger episodic cohesion. The episode has a little story arc with ups and downs. Just like the episode of S3 it ends on a funny note, but it builds up to it better. The effort that the cats put towards getting the balloon down is decently fun in and of itself, but it also puts an emotional core behind the balloon’s eventual demise. This episode is a small but effective story, a masterpiece of minimalist storytelling. The S3 episode, however, is a sequence of stuff happening and most of it is uninteresting.

Without the strong episodic storytelling of previous seasons, be main appeal and best part of Bananya Around the World has to be its theming. Its genuinely lovely to see so many different bananya designs after previous seasons have been so sparing. The previously mentions haunted mansion episode has a whole sequence where tons of new bananya designs are revealed one after the other, so if you’re someone who would be entertained just by seeing all these designs pop up, this could easily be a great season for you. I however lament that the strong episodic theming of S3 is wasted, because it didn’t lead to strong episodic storytelling, with a couple of exceptions. In particular the whodunit murder mystery on a train had a strong story and feels like an example of what every episode should’ve been like.

Although S3 and S2 tried to tell an overall story, S1 was wholly episodic. It consisted of episodic episodes that served the main appeal of the show: its cute, whimsical and mysterious nature. It was focussed on the cuteness, strangeness and biological nature of bananyas, something that the later seasons take for granted. This season had moments where the main character bananya tried to befriend a mouse, but in the end gave in to its own instincts and started trying to catch it. The same season also saw the same bananya dreaming of becoming a chocolate covered banana, so it can be eaten and enjoyed. The first season felt like a nature documentary, following he mysterious creature bananya and uncovering both its catlike and its bananalike nature. Because S3 is so basic in the way it explores these places, slice of life focussed S1 ended up feeling more whimsical that this Season. There’s a real lack of creativity going into exploring the thematics that the episodes of S3 take on and that ends up ruining its potential.

The last important aspect of Bananya Around the World is the way it expands the world of Bananya. S2 already took Bananya out of the house and into their own world and little community. S3 expands on this with multiple Bananya universes and Bananya history. S3’s most most interesting new addition to Bananya world is the addition of banawan, a dog bananya. This lore drop alone could keep the Bananya theory community going for years. I forgot what discord server where they all propagated their ideas at, but if they’re still out there, god bless them.

Finally I would like to add that I’m not all doom and gloom about this season of Bananya. Note that it always requires more words to explain smaller issues than larger issues. The amount of time I end up speaking negatively about this season does not reflect how often I am not enjoying myself whilst watching the show. The show is still pretty alright. Most episodes are mediocre, some are quite good and tying the show up with a plot at the end was a nice touch. Even S1 of Bananya had some lesser episodes, although there good episodes were the rule, not the exception. Overall I still think this season is decently enjoyable, and it is short enough for me to still think it was worthwhile watching. I am merely sad that the show has lost its lustre, has declined in quality. It is still decent, it is still cute and it can still be fun.

Also, if you like Bananya, make sure to watch the old video “The Existential horror of Bananya” by the Pedantic Romantic. That is all.