Kanamemo Episode 1 Impressions

My reaction to Kanamemo episode 1 can be summarized by the following screencap:

As I watched it, I could feel my brain writhing in my head and crying "Why??! Why are you putting me through this!!!??"

If you still feel like reading about this...thing, then by all means.

Kanamemo begins innocuously enough, with a typical anime scenario:

An orphan named Kana mourns the loss of her grandmother, who took her in after her parents died. (I swear, having a child in an anime is like a guaranteed death sentence.) When movers enter Kana's home to remove her grandmother's possessions, Kana runs away because she assumes that the movers will take her away too.

The scene switches to the Fuhshin Shinbun newspaper delivery office, where five color-coordinated stereotypes work. We have:

The obligatory precocious brat. (A.k.a. Saki, the Assistant Chief of the paper.)

Hinata, the money-grubbing ronin who has failed to get into college for two years in a row.

Yume, the genki girl who later reveals that she douses everything she cooks in sugar because she attends a patisserie academy. (I definitely see a successful career ahead of her!)

Yuuki, who...doesn't really do much of anything, except act as an appendage to her girlfriend Yume.

And last and certainly least, the "funny" alcoholic pedophile, Haruka.

Our moeblob heroine Kana wanders around town searching for a job to support herself. She comes across the newspaper delivery office just as Hinata, Yume, Yuuki, and Haruka are about to set out to deliver papers. (Aren't newspapers supposed to be delivered during the early morning...? Pffft. Silly me, worrying about logic like that.) Kana sees ZOMG, TWO GIRLS KISSING!!!! (I'll write some of her shock off to the fact that PDA is traditionally less acceptable/common in Japan than in the US.)

This was the nicest moment of the show.

And then poor Kana sees Haruka...being Haruka. :(

As the Fuhshin Shinbun employees deliver their (incredibly late) newspapers, Kana continues her job search elsewhere. But because she is in elementary- err, whoops, I mean middle school, nobody wants to hire her. As night begins to fall, Kana gets knocked unconscious when Yume crashes her bike into her while returning from her paper route. Kana wakes up in the Fuhshin Shinbun building and, long story short, the Fuhshin Shinbun employees decide to let her board with them for free, provided that she works without pay and cooks for them. After they retire to their respective rooms, Kana goes downstairs and asks Saki what their work actually is. Saki realizes that she didn't hire the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree, and tells Kana that they deliver newspapers.

This is hands-down the *vilest* series I have seen so far this year. The sole saving grace of Kanamemo appears to be Yume and Yuuki, who make a cute, surprisingly functional (setting aside the fact that they don't seem disgusted by Haruka), college-aged (!) couple. This episode was one looooong, painful string of unsuccessful attempts to be remotely funny or cute. (Scratch that, Yume and Yuuki were cute for the 10 or so seconds of exclusive screen time they had together.) As decent as Yume and Yuuki might be, their presence is negated by the raging pedophile whose nasty proclivities pop up time and time again as an endless source of "amusement" for the audience.

All I have to say to the people who enjoy "lolicon" humor/Haruka's lurking presence in this series is:
WHAT THE F*CK IS WRONG WITH YOU!!??

Art: C (Generic moe.)
Story: F+
Overall: F+

Kanamemo is based on a 4-koma manga by Shouko Iwami, the creative mind (ha!) behind Flower Flower, so I didn't watch it with very high expectations. This episode still deeply disappointed me. Azumanga Daioh it ain't.