02.06
Episode 1: 3D Girls Have Cooties
The story begins with our hero’s latest in a long line of romantic conquests. Of course, immediately after a riveting montage of saccharine high-school dating moments, it is revealed that his relationship is nothing but a charade; one confined to the circuit boards of his portable game console, the PFP.
Your S&M dungeon, probably.
Meet Keima Katsuragi. He’s really good at dating sims and only likes 2D girls. Yeah, Keima’s one badass motherfucker. So badass that Hell’s demons decide he’d be the perfect guy to romance a few unsuspecting victims “Loose Souls” in need of some lovin’ from a modern day Casanova. After unwittingly accepting this task from one of the demons, he gets a rejected device from Saw strapped to his neck and a helper in the form of an obnoxious retard named Elucia (whom the fandom has apparently dubbed “LC”). If he doesn’t do the demon’s bidding, the collar will sever his head, thus ending his shameful life (I pray that this happens sooner rather than later). His first assignment is to make a girl named Ayumi fall in love with him, which will undoubtedly lead to lots of wacky shenanigans because of his “I hate 3D girls” shtick and ineptitude at talking to real women. Great. I can feel my brain cells dying already.
Right from the start, this plot line is dreadfully painful to endure. He refuses to even try going after her because she doesn’t look like the track team girls from his dating sims, a concept that’s probably supposed to be funny but is far too stupid to actually bring about any laughs. After she successfully ties her hair up (which looks exceedingly awful, I might add) and LC uses magic to make her wear… er… “bloomers,” he decides to give it a go. And does a very poor job of it.
This guy really knows how to get the bitches wet.
Keima’s plan is to get Ayumi to hate him by placing embarrassing signs around the track while she’s practicing. This way, they can have a sweet, sweet makeup session once he does… something to make her like him. Because that’s how it works in dating sims! Look, I know this is supposed to be a comedy, but so far TWGOK really is too fucking stupid to be funny. It feels like the writers are actively trying to test my patience and resolve with every shitty joke they throw at me. I’m aware that Keima is supposed to be really bad at this kind of thing, but we’re getting dangerously close to entering Bucky Larson territory here. Anyway, it’s not long before he discovers that Ayumi is on the receiving end of some bullying by the upperclass(wo)men on her track team. Hoo boy. Cut from her being sad about the bullying to a shot of a water droplet falling into a body of the stuff. Where have I seen that before?
LC continues to be an ignoramus by claiming that Ayumi will have no choice but to fall for Keima if she wins after his constant “cheering.” Unfortunately, Ayumi trips over a hurdle and sprains her ankle. BUT WAIT! She didn’t actually sprain her ankle! Keima knows this because she didn’t tie her hair up before running. Genius writing on display here, folks. After she throws a piece of food at him, — because that’s considered comedy in anime — she cries because he has discovered her secret: she doesn’t want to go to the track meet because the bullies have got her down. He comforts her with all of three sentences, she swoons, they kiss, and LC captures the Loose Soul. Ayumi wins the gold medal and “loses all memory of the conquest.”
“It’s probably easier for me this way,” Keima says. And it’s no doubt easier for the writers, as well. Because of this, they don’t have to worry about including proper character development or overarching conflict within the series at all. Brilliant.
In a worse outcome than I imagined possible, LC introduces herself to the class as Keima’s brother at the end of the episode, implying that she’ll become an even more integral part of the main cast in future episodes. Somebody please kill me.
Originally posted on December 16, 2011