Working Prime!! is a prime example of not knowing when to call it quits. Most of the characters are one trick ponies: Takanashi has his love of small things, Taneshima is short, Todoroki has a sword, Inami punches men, etc. These jokes were played out ad nauseum in the first season, and the second season continued this trend. These jokes were already stale. Now they don’t even merit a chuckle.
Now, the season still had a few good segments: namely, everything involving Yamada. She is the one character I wouldn’t mind seeing more of. The development of the romances between Satou and Todoroki, and Takanashi and Inami had some good points as well. But the problem is, you know it is never going to amount to anything, and we always get a reset ending.
I’m hoping we don’t get a third season and have an opportunity to watch something fresh instead.
- Plot / Script – D – Repetitive jokes.
- Characters – C – Likable, but in the end dominated by a single trait.
- Production – B – Looked fine.
- Overall – C-
Recommendations – Minami-ke, School Rumble, Ika Musume
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Oh Working!! How I love you so, but yeah I agree there are a lots of re-used jokes that get old after a while…but I am like you I watch for Yamada. She is always doing something random and 9 out of 10 times it is very hilarious, I want more of her!
Season three = less of the same old jokes and more progression on the “couples” or something like that, and more Yamada! Hell even the male Yamada was fun to watch.
If season three actually had some progression on the couples and more Yamada it could be ok. I really doubt that they will progress on the couples though. This show is the kind of thing that just goes on and on forever…
Why would you want progress on the relationships? Time and time again in western TV it has been shown that once you remove the tension in a relationship and make it more conventional it stops being funny. If Inami cures her androphobia and gets into a conventional relationship with Takanashi where would the jokes come from?
It is the same for the other relationships. How do you make conventional relationships between one note characters funny after you remove what makes them unique? This is a sitcom. It takes brilliant writing to change things significantly and not lose your audience or kill the show.
You have a point: if they got together, the conflict would end. Not that that would be a bad thing. What I meant by progression though is that their relationship would change at all, not that it would culminate. For example, one small thing that did change this season was that Yamada decided she wanted to be adopted by Otou-san. Things like that are nice: nothing earth shattering, but a marked change.
And this is precisely why I love anime but hate western TV, sitcoms particularly. In a sitcom, nothing ever happens. They go on and on and on for ten years and still, nothing ever happens. In anime, they generally (although not always, particularly with Naruto / Bleach / etc.) have a story to tell, they tell it, and stop, in the span of a season or two. After more than twelve episodes of nothing happening, sitcoms get old fast. And to be a cynic, none of them will ever compare to Seinfeld anyway.
Yuru Yuri is going to have a second season, and I’m afraid it’ll have the same problems…