Sakugan

Episode 4

With our main duo's dynamic and quest firmly established, it's time now for Sakugan to start introducing the supporting cast. Memempu and Gagumber are great on their own, but an adventure story is nothing if they don't make some curious companions and visit vibrant new places along the way. This week we do a little of both, as Gagumber trips over his own dick and falls face-first into a beef with the Underground Mafia in subterranean Italy.

Fittingly, we start out with our leads in prison – or rather a holding cell where they're detained by the smarmy-looking bureaucrat Merooro for all the ruckus they caused near the gates of Jolly-Jolly. At least, that's the excuse he gives – I suspect there's a lot more to his actions than he's letting on. The guy's face just screams “secretly the bad guy” y'know? But his presence and the pair's sightseeing across Jolly-Jolly do a lot to further establish the setting our heroes inhabit. Details like everyone having tracking implants provide a lot of implications about the society and government of the various colonies, while the strange and incongruous elements of the pseudo-Italian colony raise an entire catacomb of questions. Like hey, how is the Roman coliseum just...there? Was it always there, and if so, does that mean the Earth's surface was entirely entombed in stone somehow? If not, how the hell did they get an entire coliseum underground? There's a lot we still don't know about this seemingly straightforward setting, and I'm glad we're still seeding these kinds of questions.

But those are details for future episodes; in the here and now Gagumber and Memempu each have more pressing concerns. Memempu wants to enjoy her newfound freedom to visit as many new places as possible, while her dad wants to get his beak wet. Unfortunately for Gagumber, he's about as smooth as extra-chunky peanut butter, and the ladies of Jolly-Jolly are definitely not into his dad bod. The only woman who does respond is Zackletu, who is quite obviously playing him like a fiddle from the word go.

That could be a problem, if Zackeltu herself wasn't so much fun. She's brought to life by a very fun and conniving performance by Kana Hanazawa, and even while playing a part to get Gagumber in her pocket, she gets her fair share of fun expressions and lines. The fact that she basically engineered this whole thing to scam a briefly relevant celebrity – along with filching some of the mob's valuables – makes her a delightful presence and gives us a good idea of how she operates. And I like that by the end of all this she hasn't actually come around to liking our heroes – she just wants the money they owe her. It makes her a fun wild card in future adventures, and I hope to see more of her.

Sadly this episode does have some downsides. The overall animation quality is a lot less impressive compared to previous ones – which is pretty standard for a fourth episode, but a bummer nonetheless. Nothing's falling apart, and there's still some exuberant – if modest – flourishes across the episode, but it's a noticeable step down from what came before. The script and voice acting remain sharp though, and are able to carry the energy whenever the animation is lagging behind. Some strong and motivated editing also helps keep things moving smoothly – this isn't doomsaying for the production, just acknowledging the realities of a TV production needing crests and valleys in visuals.

The real unforced error here comes with our bad guy of the episode. It'd be one thing if the mafia boss who threatens Gagumber was just campy and queer-coded, but the show makes the eye-rolling decision to turn Gagumber's earlier pick-up line into a joke about said don being bisexual and punishing underlings by shoving things up their butts. You could maybe argue it's just a fumbled bit of juvenile humor getting tripped up by the episode's sort-of pet theme, but then they include a close-up of an actual, real-life torture device called the Pear of Anguish and the whole joke feels like a tone-deaf and mean-spirited act that really didn't need to be here. Sakugan has established it can be super funny without any of this baggage, and I'm really hoping we leave all this in the dust moving forward.

This all makes for a mixed pit stop for our story, with the upside being that the parts I liked look to be the parts actually sticking around past this week's end credits. I'm looking forward to learning more about this world, seeing new sights, and possibly seeing more Zackletu in the coming episodes, so here's hoping this can all be chalked up to a poorly-maintained rest stop on our journey.

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Sakugan is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.