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If you've watched enough anime, you've surely noticed that some anime studios have their distinct in-house styles that transcend franchises or genres, and perhaps no studio does this as clearly as Shaft. Akiyuki Shinbou and his team made themselves known through critically acclaimed adaptations like the Monogatari series and original anime like Puella Magi Madoka Magica, as well as other popular anime series, through a signature visual surrealism, quick cuts, and a focus on the strange aspects of ordinary life. While 2010's Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru (SoreMachi) lacks the flashiness of Shaft's more successful adaptations, it provides one of the most immersive settings I've seen ... in a slice of life series, as well as a likeable cast and solid comedy.

The primary setting of SoreMachi is the Seaside Maid Cafe, which is neither by the seaside nor a proper maid cafe--the waitresses wear maid outfits, but in all other respects it looks and runs like a crappy diner in the middle of a sleepy shopping district. Hotori Arashiyama, an aspiring mystery novel author in her second year of high school, works there under the employ of an old widow who she's known since childhood. Despite Hotori's scatterbrain personality, she's portrayed in a remarkably grounded context, with the obligations and struggles faced by any other teenager: dealing with annoying younger siblings, taking remedial math courses with a teacher who can't stand her (and who she also has a crush on), and befriending the owner of an antique shop. Other characters receive focus as well, sometimes in one-off chapters (like one man's search for a mysterious cookie that somehow ends with time travel). While there is no chronology and each episode is self-contained, SoreMachi succeeds in creating its own interconnected world--a shopping district where everyone knows everyone, with Hotori (as the final episode shows) being the unifying force. Like Nichijou, it manages to provide a grounded, realistic feel in its setting, dabble in stories about aliens, time travel, and the afterlife, and tackle mature themes like death and the inevitability of failure in life. Not every chapter (there are generally 2 or 3 per episode) holds up, but the great ones really work.

With generally solid animation, the unique Shinbou visual presentation, and a solid soundtrack (including a great OP and an even better ED), SoreMachi also provides the same things that Shaft is generally liked for. Yet in its quirky yet grounded feel and its masterful handling of a mundane yet beautifully human setting, it offers a relaxing and unique atmosphere that I'd recommend to anyone who enjoys slice of life anime and manga.

[x-post, with minor tweaks, from a Reddit post I made]

Note: This review is intended to cover both seasons.

Shinichirou Watanabe is best known for directing two very popular highly-regarded original anime series--1998's Cowboy Bebop and 2004's Samurai Champloo, both of which feature an episodic format and a unique blend of genres and influences which make him even more popular in the West than in Japan. In 2014, Watanabe and Bones released Space Dandy. Like Bebop and Champloo, it was an anime original with clear Western influences and a purely episodic (well, not really--you'll see what I mean in the final episodes) format, about the adventures of a cocky but incompetent bounty hunter, his lazy alien ... sidekick Meow, and his AI vacuum cleaner assistant QT. Despite its goofy exterior, however, Space Dandy carries the same thematic depth and character development as a show Bebop wrapped in an incredibly creative visually delightful package, one which enlisted the talents of various directors animators to make each episode a unique experience.

While the first episodes of Space Dandy's first season aren't it's strongest, they serve perfectly in establishing both the main characters and the general tone of the series. At the end of the first episode, Dandy and his crew are killed, along with destroying the entire planet they had landed on, only to return alive and well the week after for another adventure, this time a quest to find the best ramen in the galaxy. But by the fifth episode, "A Merry Companion Is a Wagon in Space, Baby," Space Dandy has started to show its true colors. Dandy shows himself to be far more mature and selfless than his lifestyle and mannerisms would suggest. The first season also serves to develop Meow's background, including an episode focused on his family, as well QT's struggles with "irrational" biological emotions like romantic love--"Even a Vacuum Cleaner Can Love, Baby" tells a more compelling love inside 20 minutes than most anime romances do in 12 to 26 episodes.

Where Space Dandy becomes truly memorable, however, is in its second season, where it offers less in the way of wacky space adventures but several visually and tonally distinct episodes that make it feel simultaneously like an entirely different anime, yet still distinctly Dandy. Two particularly worth highlighting as masterpieces are the strangely calming "The Big Fish Is Huge, Baby", where Dandy hunts for a sea monster on a mud planet with the help of a strange, Ghibli-protagonist-esque little girl, and "A World Without Sadness, Baby", where Dandy travels alone through an even more gorgeous planet, overflowing with creative designs and beautiful backgrounds, while seeking to solve why he's there in the first place. The final two episodes, as I mentioned earlier, are where the anime ties its seemingly disparate storylines together, while serving as the culmination for Dandy's development as a character--still vain and hedonistic, yet courageous, self-sacrificial, and determined.

Neither season of Space Dandy is perfect--a few episodes are distinctly weaker, and its villains in the Gogol Empire, while charming, are no more compelling than the ones of your typical Saturday morning cartoon. But when Space Dandy is good, it's fantastic--funny, exciting, sometimes emotionally compelling, and always a treat. Its strange episodic format and eye-catching presentation offer something to fans of almost every genre, and I would recommend it to pretty much anyone, even if they weren't particularly into anime.

Also, Viva Namida is an absolute 10/10 OP.

Story 8/10
Art 10/10
Sound 8/10
Characters 9/10
Enjoyment 9/10
Overall 9/10