Otaku Elf

Episode 10

By Otaku Elf's usual standards, this is a rather unconventional episode, in a way that ironically makes it more conventional to the broader slice-of-life genre. That is, this one embraces that nominal descriptor wholeheartedly, letting us visit all the established elves and their miko in their daily lives, effectively faffing about and having pleasant little conversations apart from much of the historical edutainment or deeper lore and emotional evocation that's driven so much of the show up to now. As a one-off diversion, it turns out perfectly fine, though it also definitely reinforces how glad I am that the overall series went in the direction it did.

They make a unique structure out of it all, anyway. We start with a fully five-minute long cold open detailing a day in the life of Elda, with the ending theme rolling in comparatively early in the episode so we can watch a post-credits scene showing the same day from Koito's point of view. It's a nice little gimmick framing what turns out to be an otherwise earnestly pedestrian episode. And the comparative elements in these paired sequences set up some cute little payoffs. Also, I certainly don't feel called out at all in how Elda's lax daily routine resembles my own, absolutely not.

These sequences highlight the closest thing to theming this episode presents, depicting the relationships between elves and miko in plain, pleasant terms. There's no acknowledgment of the aging issues or history between the roles as has been addressed to great effect in other episodes. It's just the simple pleasures of sharing food they know the other wants, or chatting about how cute cats are. On some level it's appreciable in how it works because all that heavier legwork making these relationships feel earnest was performed by those earlier episodes, so having something like this ten weeks in hardly comes off as wholly frivolous. It compliments that prior material, but in doing so, also comes across akin to an animated adaptation of some bonus chapters rather than anything crucial to the overall work.

And it feels somewhat harsh to criticize a series for being too low-key when it's technically been a simple story of the daily life of a deity since the beginning, but you all have been watching the show with me, so I'd hope you do get where I'm coming from. Last week's episode of Otaku Elf was exceptionally rich, paying off the ideas of past recollections and long-term caring relationships in ways that weren't just amusing, but affecting as well. Perhaps an episode like this one is thus meant to be a somewhat lighter come-down from the heavier emotions touched on in that previous one, but it can almost feel like it's pulling back too much a lot of the time, barely referencing our appreciation for how well we've gotten to know the characters of people like Elda and Koito apart from presuming that we simply enjoy spending time with them. Which, yes, is the entire often effectively-articulated point of Otaku Elf, but that doesn't mean it should be content to coast on that.

That's not to say I didn't have any fun with this episode. It's nice to have an excuse to round back to the other elves and miko, especially uncoupled from needing to be defined by how they interact with our main characters. Yolde in particular comes off much more entertaining here than she did in her debut episode, defining her sweet, sometimes trying relationship with Himawari in her own way. And the bit where she utterly fails to split a roll in half is a gag that got a good laugh out of me. If the other parts of their stretch perhaps leaned a little too hard on Kansai regional riffs, well, at least they acted aware of it.

Seeing Haira and Isuzu over in Ishikawa is similarly perfectly fine. It's nice to get a little bit more of a look into the multitudes Isuzu contains, clearly smitten with some odd admiration for Haira, yet still able to be firm and take her to task during her more intrusive impulses. It also plays off the established bits for these characters from the one episode they had prior, in Haira's rundown of the edible plants she grows, which we immediately clock as a side-effect of her eternally gambling-depleted cash flow. It's not as deep as all the stuff we've gotten for Elda and Koito, but it demonstrates how Otaku Elf's commitment to making characters feel three-dimensional persists even when the actual content is at its most cute-deities-doing-cute-things.

On pure precedent, I have to rate this episode lower than its predecessors. I am grateful that it feels like I know Otaku Elf well enough to figure out that this won't become the norm for it going forward. As an isolated gimmick, it's perfectly acceptable, entertaining and a decent way to squeeze in additional appearances by the other guest stars. But it's also useful in demonstrating how lucky we are that Otaku Elf opted for the richer approach it's had otherwise since this look into an alternate path where it was a much more standard slice-of-life anime shows that it could have wound up far more underwhelming.

Rating:

Otaku Elf is currently streaming on HIDIVE.

Chris is keeping busy keeping up with the new anime season and is excited to have you along. You can also find him writing about other stuff over on his blog, as well as spamming fanart retweets on his Twitter, for however much longer that lasts.