Assemble Insert

Well, this was an amusing hour's worth of anime, but I don't know if I'll be watching it again any time soon. I thought the first of the two episodes was distinctly superior, and made me wonder why I hadn't heard of this show earlier. The dialogue between Hattori and his men was the source of a lot of laughs. I had read that Assemble Insert was supposed to contain all sorts of in-jokes about circa-1989 anime, Japanese pop culture, the entertainment industry, etc, but if so they must have been so extremely "in" that I didn't even know they were taking place. my impression was that there were enough jokes that were readily understandable by anyone who has attained a little familiarity with anime to make the show enjoyable. There was a live action commercial parody which was amusing but was over too quickly to be a major factor (It ran twice, so why did they bother to include it as an "extra" as well?). Character designs were simple, undetailed, even verging on SD mode (some people seemed to completely lack noses!). Music seemed about average. The way Doctor Kyozaburo Demon ran his criminal organization was funny ("When money is spent foolishly, it truly shines"). I noticed a lull in quality early in the second episode. I'm still confused about why the Professor aided Demon Seed. The scene in which Maron is forced to choose between fame and aiding Hattori and the men who trained her seemed almost touching, but not quite. The episode ended suddenly without an exciting action scene--such a scene wasn't really necessary, and I even felt kind of relieved to see that it had been skipped, but the show could have used a better wrap-up in it's place. Fortunately, this was the sort of show that is clearly absurd, and can't be expected to be particularly logical, which is one of the reasons I liked it. One last complaint--the English language credits only listed the VAs from the dubbed version, and I had been watching the subbed one.

My favorite line: "I was drunk when I submitted the proposal and it was approved!" --Hattori