Sara Talks Anime

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Fishing. The most experience I have with it is in video games, one of many activities that can be done. Animal Crossing? You bet your butt I know how to fish there. Sonic Adventure? Big the freaking Cat. Stardew Valley? …I think I know how to fish there.

So, you may be asking why I watch Negative Positive Angler when I have no clue how to fish in real life. Shouldn’t you ask that question to the people who watch sports anime and have no experience playing the sport in real life? I jest, I jest. The synopsis sounded interesting to me, so I decided to pick it up.

So, what is Negative Positive Angler even about? Before we begin: trigger warning for descriptions of attempted suicide. If Crunchyroll warns about the fact that the series touches upon suicide with its age rating, I’m also warning about it. I’ll even give you a few seconds to leave if that’s enough to turn you off regarding this post.

…

Now that’s out of the way, the episode begins with Hiro, our main character, trying to hang himself. He fails, of course, because this isn’t an isekai anime. And let me say, the contrast from having watched Acro Trip the previous day was real; I went from “anime that makes you go lol” to “anime that makes you ask if you have depression.”

Anyway, Hiro does what any ordinary human would do after failing to kill themselves…play pachinko! …what, you mean you don’t just say “let’s go gambling” after trying and failing to kill yourself?

Seriously, when I saw the pachinko scene, that was the first thing that jumped to mind. Unfortunately for Hiro, he’s in debt, and the people loaning him money found him! So, of course, he has to run. He goes off a bridge and ends up in the water.

I forgot when it was revealed in the first episode, but since I think it might be important later in the story, I’ll bring it up now: he’s been diagnosed with a sickness that gives him only two years left in his life if nothing is done. Which…yeah, shit’s getting serious.

As a reminder that this isn’t an isekai anime, Hiro still doesn’t die. Instead, he gets fished up by some folks on a dock floating in the sea. I forgot what it’s called, but I don’t think it’s all that important. Hiro stays on there long enough to learn how to do lure fishing and evade his loan sharks yet again! Yippie!

…okay, but in all seriousness, if you borrow money, repay it. I do not condone loan evasion, tax evasion, or crimes in general. You should’ve expected this when I said I don’t support piracy in the Acro Trip preliminary opinion video.

Oh, yeah, the place where he stays also got demolished, meaning Bro has no money (vine boom), no house address (vine boom), and no job (triple vine boom). Well, the job issue gets solved in the next episode, as he gets hired at the supermarket the others work at, as he was under the impression that claiming he hates fishing wouldn’t land him a job.

And after an awkward run-in with some people he knows from college, Hiro RUNS away! Because, of course, he does! And we find out that he placed all of his bets to make it rich in the stock market or whatever Japan calls it because he’s a bit of an idiot!

However, by the end of the third episode, he may have gotten to enjoy fishing…or, at the very least, began enjoying it enough to be willing to fish if there’s a big enough bounty connected to the fish.

Now, as Negative Positive Angler isn’t as big of an interest of mine as some of the other shows I’m watching, I’m not going to do character introductions, however, I feel like they’re nice. I suspect that over the course of the series, we’ll learn more about the others apart from “I like fishing, I work at a supermarket, and I react differently to situations compared to my friends”. However, I suspect Hiro suffers from depression, or at the very least is in a depressive episode, due to how he reacts. And while there’s, like, barely any evidence to support this, I headcanon Hiro to be bisexual.

Look, there are too many things that come off as “romance flags” to me with Hiro and the pink-haired guy, but Hiro also seemed to show some interest in a female member of the group outside of platonicness; I’m thus headcanoning him as bisexual.

The opening and ending have only been used in two episodes, and I already like the ending a lot more than the opening. For me, the opening had too much…either autotune or voice filters, I can’t tell, as well as sampled sound effects that sounded so out of place. Now, I’m not saying you can’t sample sound effects in songs. Bling-Bang-Bang-Born, the opening theme from the second season of Mashle: Magic and Muscles, sampled a sound effect, and it’s still a very good song because the sampled sound feels like an instrument instead of just being randomly thrown in.

I’m being unbiased when I say this. If you sample something like a sound effect, somehow make it flow in with the instrumental. When I first listened to Bling-Bang-Bang-Born, I didn’t even think that the sampled sound effect was a sampled sound effect!

…I’m getting off track.

Does Negative Positive Angler have my seal of approval? Not yet. However, that doesn’t mean this is a bad anime. This is probably a series that I need to watch all of before I decide whether or not to give it my seal of approval. However, even if it doesn’t get my seal of approval once I give this its anime spotlight, if the plot interests you, that doesn’t mean you don’t have to watch it.

Me not giving it a seal of approval doesn’t mean it’s terrible, and me giving it a seal of approval doesn’t mean it’s good. It’s just helping me narrow down my ‘cup of tea’.

Regarding streaming in North America, Negative Positive Angler is on Crunchyroll, with episodes being made available to free users a week after being available to premium users. Friendly reminder to research where it streams in your territory if you don’t live in North America! Thankfully, I don’t need to give the “don’t commit piracy” talk again.