Common Name: Hataraku Onii-san!
Alternative Names: Working Buddies!
Score: 6/10, 5/5
Length: 12 Episodes
Genre: Slice of Life, Comedy, Short-form
Summary: Chatarozawa Tapio and Roshihara Kuehiko are two young men who end up working a variety of odd part-time jobs together while they try to make ends meet. Tapio, being the more spunky and energetic of the two, tends to get into a lot of trouble but has the enthusiasm to get through most problems. Kuehiko, as the mild and stoic character, struggles to keep up with the trials of customer service but finds a way to enjoy the experience regardless. Together, they showcase the positives and negative of every part-time job typically available to the average teenager in urban Japan.
Review: Considering how little thought or reason usually gets put into short-form anime, it's a nice change of pace to see one that follows the usual, quirky methods of the genre while also offering a legitimately worthwhile premise. Now, sure, I'll never end up using any of the information this show has to offer since I am far from being your average teen in urban Japan, both in a literal and metaphorical sense. Yet I still found myself buying what Hataraku Onii-san had to sell.
And what it's selling is a cute/funny slice of life comedy with some weirdly dark undertones.
On its surface layer, there is a decent amount of fun to have with this general premise of watching a couple of teen boys working a new job every week. On the one hand, watching Tapio and Kuehiko learn the ins and outs of a number of different industries ends up being just as funny as it is informative. Alongside them, we get to see a number of industry professionals that range from being passionate and driven about what they do to those who are discomfortingly quirky or just plain lazy. Then, of course, the quirky and punny nature of the show is ratcheted up due to the simple fact that the show's cast is made up entirely of anthropomorphic animals. So, on top of all the weird little in-jokes of Japan's customer industries getting their day in the sun, there are a good number of laughs that are earned simply because a particular animal is working in a humorously fitting or contrasting occupation. For example, I'm a big fan of the subtle humor of a sheep running a clothing store since wool is a common material in clothing. Similarly, the humor of a turtle running an aquarium where the customers think he's one of the attractions is worth a sensible chuckle or two. Once you start poking at that kind of self-aware comedy, though, things start to get weird.
Weird like a family of anthropomorphic Russian Blue cats owning a normal-ass calico cat that is, incidentally, the same kind of cat as Kuehiko's anthropomorphic cat friend.
Long before the show even touches on that brand of subtle comedy and weirdly self-aware comedy, though, the main reason this show thrived as much as it did for me was simply because it occasionally comes out of left field with some trippy, wtf-brand comedy. Using a character named "That Animal That Shall Not be Named" (it's a koala), the show drops a lot of weird truth bombs toward the end of each episode with varying levels of applicability to the working world. Even when they have no bearing on the show, though, the koala's little moments of truth brought a lot of character to what was likely a show I would have shrugged off with every other show I dropped this season. So, in a weird kind of way, this show's brand of weird comedy is ultimately what saved it for me. From there, it ended up growing on me more and more. From the puppetry OP to the rap song ED and the self-aware comedy, things grew on me until I reached a point where I was able to enjoy the show for what it was--a beginner's guide to working in the real world, quirks and all. So, while the product as a whole might not be all that interesting or impressive by any means, I was able to find a heart of gold to this quirky little short-form anime. Would I recommend it? Not necessarily, but this is a cute little treasure if you can find the same meaning in it that I did.
