Sunday, May 27, 2007

Sexy Voice and Robo eps 1-6

She kinda looks like Sawajiri Erika in this shot....

Sexy Voice tells the story of a middle school girl and a robot otaku who team up together to solve cases. Sexy Voice has super hearing and can mimic anyone's voice and Robo uuuhh like robots and has a car license. Oh great, not another stereotype otaku character! Someone need to tell Japanese stations that Densha Otoko was funny IN SPITE of Densha being irritating due to the supporting characters, not because of his lame otaku act while was interesting as a novelty but quickly overstayed its welcome when he didn't grow any balls, ie character development.

You'd expect a shot of all the otakus shocked at a chugakosei in the store....

Right off, this show really reminds me of Trick. Two different individuals come together reluctantly solve crimes. However, in Trick the interesting part of the show was that both Ueda and Yamada were very flawed characters with their own strengths and weaknesses and when they acted together the became the perfect investigator. That's the basis of any buddy cop film. Contrasting characters who need each other.


Unfortunately, Robo is too much of a fucking useless character. The only skill he brings is driving Sexy Voice around, making stupid robot sounds and generally being unfunny. And the sad part is that the comedy of the show falls squarely on his shoulders.I don't care how good he was as L in Death Note. The actor needs to tone down his otaku act. Only few actors and overact and be funny and he is not one of them.

Hhmm, the sis is not bad. Why does the mom have to be hideous....

Ohgo Suzuka aka Niko/Sexy Voice meanwhile is truly the star of the show. I have to say, if I were 13 years younger, I'd be going crazy over her. She reminds me of Sawajiri Erika, being able to command your attention when she's on screen. The fact that Sexy Voice is very well written helps as well. Basically she's your mature shoujo who questions the ways of the world and every episode this ties in with the cases that she has to solve. This however makes the show very preachy.


What they should have done was give Robo some brains. It just seems like the role of adult and child are reversed. Show that underneath the otaku maniac is a detective who has chosen to withdraw from society into his robot world. Play up Niko ignorance of worldly knowledge. (not to the point of Toda Erika in Liar Game) Make Robo the reluctant brain and Sexy Voice the heart of the group. Show them as two characters finding their way who help each other cause from what I've seen so far, Sexy Voice could have solved everything herself.

I'm getting a Kago Ai vibe from this shot. Why Kago?? Why????!!!!

Which brings me to ep 6, which I must admit is pretty good, except for the shoot out part. FFS, if you outnumber your enemy 6 to 1, you don't just stand at a distance and fire random shots while their are bunkering behind obstacles. You spread out and surround while 2 ppl cover fire. Writers should not write gun battles unless the can play CS.

Finally in ep 6, Robo gains a useful (maybe) skill - the ability to impersonate Kang-sama, a play on the dude from winter sonata. All the Kang-sama scenes were truly hilarious and had me in stitches, which ties into my main point. For a series based on episodic cases, they can be hit or miss. And generally most of the 6 eps have been a miss. Even for Trick, some of them are excellent and some are run of the mill. What they need to keep viewers watching is chemistry between the lead characters and until ep 6, I didn't give a fuck about Robo because of his uselessness and overacting.

If I were the PM of Japan, I'd banned all men from teaching...

What I remember most from from Trick is not the cases, (except for Slit Makiko) but the catchphrases like 'Donto Koi' and 'Why don't you try your best'. Ueda and Yamada bickering. Yamada always running out of money and Yamada always pretending to be a genius. But when push comes to shove, Yamada was the brains and Ueda was the brawn to solve the cases.

Unfortunately the same can't be said of Sexy Voice. Still, Ohgo Suzuka is good enough to check this show out. :)

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