asobi ni ikuyo (bombshells from the sky)

I make no bones of the fact that I enjoy fan-service. Indeed, it's a big part of the reason I watch anime.

I use that term in its broadest sense. By fan-service I mean everything from gratuitous gun-play, through giant mechs and on down to the flashing of female flesh. Generally speaking, though, the term fan-service is most normally trotted out as a criticism aimed at the amount of gratuitous nudity in a show.

As I say, I've no problem with it myself, but I will happily acknowledge that this kind of thing has gotten quite extreme in recent years. Indeed, nowadays, fan-service in regular shows has started to blur the line between soft-core pornography and mild titillation.

The reason for this escalation is to ensure sales to the Japanese Otaku. Piracy has been having a big impact over there too and one of the ways to help sales has been to push the level of fan-service that little bit further.

Why do I mention all this?

Well, it's because the increase in nudy bits has led to a bit of a problem with TV broadcasts. There's a lot of misunderstanding about how the anime market works in Japan. One of the things that most people don't know is that most anime is shown very late night on TV and that the producers often pay the TV companies to air it, which is backwards for most telly.

They do this because, in effect, the TV screening is a gigantic advert to get the otaku to buy the DVDs and Blu-Rays (well, plus all the figurines, bath-towels, hug pillows and other merchandising that's produced as well). So you've got a situation where they're screening it on TV, but they need to ramp up the fan-service to such a degree that it's not really broadcastable.

The answer is to censor the broadcast version. However, there's a tendency for this censoring to be extremely ham-fisted. Sun-rays, steam or even little "stickers" will be slapped over the naughty bits, but in such a way it's obvious they're artificial additions (I'm not sure if this obviousness is part of the approach, or just a hallmark of a low budget or what). You can therefore get the otaku interested and sell them uncensored DVDs, but still show it on TV.

It's probably still not clear why I mention all this - the reason is because there is no uncensored version of Asobi Ni Ikuyo, but it still has the ham-fisted censorship. So why?

Well, this cuts to the heart of my problem with the show.

See, I think it's meant to be something like a parody. It's meant to be taking the piss out of shows that do that. But where it becomes a problem is it appears to be trying to have its cake and eat it too. It's trying to give you that fan-service for the same reason, but also criticise it.

And it does this throughout - you get what sometimes appear to be parody elements, but often presented with a kind of affection too. I found it horribly confusing and more than a little annoying.

The only real saving grace is the ending, which resolves in a much more satisfying and definite way than is usual for harem shows.