Common Name: WWW.Working!!
Alternative Names: WWW.Wagnaria!!
Score: 7/10, 5/5
Length: 13 Episodes
Genre: Comedy, Romance, Slice of Life
Summary: It's a pretty standard romantic origin stories these days. Two people meet each other while working together. They spend time together, grow closer, face adversity together, and eventually love blossoms forth. It's either that or you meet the person who will be the death of you. For the workers of the Wagnaria family restaurant, it's hard to tell which version of the story will unfold, but it'll be a fun ride either way.
Review: Since I was a fan of the original Working!! series, I was...skeptical about this show for a number of reasons. For starters, it's a spin-off series. Second, it was originally developed as a webcomic that got irregularly updated while the author was working on the main series. So, naturally, red flags and alarm bells went off in my head thinking I'd be subjecting myself to an inferior story with copy-pasted character. Worst than that though, I feared that I might be in for the long haul again. Keep in mind, the original Working!! series took five years to complete, and there was some legitimate worry that it might turn into another one of those incomplete necro-series. To reiterate, I didn't exactly come into this title with high hopes. So, imagine my surprise when I learn that this series actually does pretty well for itself. It's nothing flashy and isn't something to write home about, but it actually manages to pull off a fun, funny, and engaging storyline that actually better than the original series in some aspects.
Allow me to explain. The Working!! series spends the majority of it's time observing the workers of a family restaurant chain (think Denny's), turning their daily lives into a gag comedy with romantic overtones. In the original series, we got a bunch of strange and bizzare relationships that clearly needed time to develop due in no small part to the cast needing time to recover from their injuries, but the romance was essentially inevitable. With this story we're given something...a little different.
Well said, single mother who turns her child into one of the show's secondary mascot.
Rather than playing games of cat and mouse like a standard romantic gag comedy, the romantic groupings of this series play the game "date or die." The main couple of the series, Miyakoshi Hana and Higashida Daisuke, does this primarily through a kind back and forth about "taking responsibility" that originates from Miyakoshi's inability to make chocolate that doesn't being the person to death's door. To save his fellow coworkers from the death chocolate, Higashida takes the proverbial bullet again and again.
Luckily,instead of actually dying, he just dies a little more on the inside with each bite.
However, it's pretty reasonable to assume that facing death's door on the regular might change a person. To elaborate, Miyakoshi's death chocolate turns him from a young man with a bright future into an critical and jaded ass. So, to make up for this, they start dating even though neither of them loves the other. You can imagine how well that goes.
Next comes the romance of Muranushi Sayuri and Adachi Masahiro, which is strangely the most straightforward one in this show. As the daughter of two exorcists, Muranushi is...shall we say...predisposed to the supernatural and supposedly has a smile that will send the observer to an early grave. So, it's like his fate is sealed when Adachi causes her to smile since he can't tell if he she's adorable or terrifying.
Little of column A, little of column B.
Last but not least, is probably the most unsettling romance this show has to offer between Kamakura Shiho and Shindou Yuuta. While there is something like love between these two, based of the fact that they were childhood friends, there are two significant barriers to their relationship. The first is the debt Shindou's family owes to Shiho's father. The second is the fact that Yuuta turned down a relationship with Shiho that would wipe away the debt, and she's held a rather...dominatrix-y grudge against him ever since.
You can say that again, especially when Yuuta eventually snaps.
So, like I said, things are a bit different this time, but in a strangely good kind of way. While I don't want to say the relationships in this show are true to life, they're definitely a far cry from the vanilla romance seen in the original series, but are no less enjoyable. The best part of this show, I think, is that it never overstays it's welcome. It told it's story in a single season, elicited several laughs and quite a few quiet chuckles from me, and then ended on a note that I was wholly satisfied with. The art was standard for series, but felt a little more solid this time around. The music wasn't particularly great, but it wasn't an obstruction to the enjoyment. As for the plot, I can't recall any hick-ups or pauses in the plot and pacing that are worth discussing aside from a few repetitive segments here and there. Like I said, it's definitely something to write home about, but it was a fun and enjoyable series. I just hope it's actually over now.