WARNING: The following article contains SPOILERS for Denki-Gai Episode 3. If you don’t want to be spoiled, please stop reading. You have been warned.
Well, good news everyone, episode 2 of Denki-Gai was not a fluke. Episode 3 was outright hilarious. If asked whether or not I found this funnier than the previous episode, it would actually be hard to answer. While I probably found episode 2 funnier just due to its sheer absurdity (I still cannot get over “pantsu eating race”), I will admit that this episode did not rely as much on innuendos (hence why this commentary is actually SFW this time) and comes across as a bit more mature. Granted that is not saying much seeing as how this is still Denki-Gai after all, but at least this episode wouldn’t be mistaken for a hentai from the outside looking in.
To start things out, it just now occurred to me how great the opening theme song for this series is. The way it starts out with a slow piano melody and slowly builds up to something great. Despite me not even knowing the lyrics, this song still feels like something that really fits with Denki-Gai rather than a generic J-pop song playing over footage of the show.
The main story of this episode is basically about the Denki-Gai cast having a Christmas party. After all, if stores and advertising chains in real life are under the impression that Christmas season starts in October, then why shouldn’t it be the case here? I should probably reiterate that Denki-Gai is not really about story and is just an excuse to shoehorn in a bunch of wacky antics and moe. As usual, it is quite hilarious how it accomplishes such.
I knew this was going to be a good episode when it opened up with Hiotan objecting to how it is unfitting to be advertising an eroge on Christmas Eve. Tsumorin’s rebuttal is that this release, being the sequel to a popular game, means that several people will be reuniting with their “girlfriends” after a year, and that response actually gets Hiotan to regret that she ever doubted him. That bit of absurdity right there is part of why this show is so enjoyable to watch. This show plays up the absurdity of otaku culture yet it never goes as far as to mock or insult it, unlike some other recent anime series.
The second half of the episode has a few different subplots focusing on each character. Hiotan decides that she does not want to leave Tsunmorin’s house after the party and is finding excuses not to go home. Afterwards we have a dramatization of a sale that causes people to swarm into the store at dangerously high rates, which ended up making me think of South Park’s Black Friday trilogy episodes. Also Sensei invites Umio to her “New Year’s ritual.”
All in all, I am worried I am going to run out of things to say about this series. There are only so many ways you can rephrase, “this episode was hilarious” every week. Yeah I could nitpick to find minor problems but that would be a bit pointless. Really though, I think this speaks quite a bit to this show that it manages to maintain a consistent level of quality, and it has gotten to the point where I am easily looking forward to seeing this show more and more. I have not watched television in years and it has long since been passed the days where I looked forward to a new episode of a show I liked. With me starting these commentaries, however, I feel as though this feeling is starting to return.
Denki-Gai is available to watch on Crunchyroll with new episodes coming out on Thursdays at 10:30AM EDT/7:30AM PDT. Non-premium users will be able to watch episodes for free one week after it first airs.
