Forum - View topic(The) Masterful Cat Is Depressed Again Today (TV).
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Hiroki not Takuya
 Posts: 2549 |
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I think characterizing Saku as "trash" is a little mean because she is working and not on government support and has apparent ability and talent for office work that Yukichi doesn't seem to relate to or know about. From his perspective, being useless around the house somewhat understandably equates to "useless" and unlike his Masterful self, she doesn't strive for mastery in all activities of life. But when her mom so pointedly calls her "trash" and is only interested in what she thinks is her daughter's cat over her, that seems unnecessarily mean to me. Isn't there supposed to be something called love a parent feels toward their child? There can be disappointment, but this seems to be going too far...
Que the melodic refrain of "Someone to watch over me"... |
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smurky turkey
Posts: 2099 |
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If I were to look at just the first 3 episodes of the show then I would agree with you that labeling Saku as trash is harsh. She can't cook, clean, organize etc to save her life, but she is a functioning adult with a job that she is good at. However, the most recent 3 episodes showed some other things too. It is clear that Saku is an alcoholic, one who does not have any plans to moderate her drinking and one who places herself and others in dangers sometimes. An example of this is her just sitting down in a bench late in the night while it is freezing. Even worse is her lazing about drunkenly while nearly starting a fire that would not have killed just her, but potentially others as well (not even speaking of the whole apartment complex going up in flames). Despite all that she is still chugging those beers like there is no tomorrow.
Honestly, I think her being an extremely slob is only a small part of why I consider her to be trash, the bigger issue is her drinking. |
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smurky turkey
Posts: 2099 |
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Yukichi keeps surprising the viewers every week. I especially liked seeing how the masterful cat would be a welcome addition to the Do It Yourself anime from a while back. Be it some repair work or using materials to make something new, Yukichi can do it all. The horror section was fun too.
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camseyeview140
Posts: 230 |
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however you want to judge this, This is GoHands' best show.
It's simple, to the point, and doesn't have as many eye gouging visual choices that bog down every other show they make. It's not great in the grand scheme of this year, but it is more watchable than most anime this season. If she wasn't just so pathetic, I would like this more, but it's a solid show. |
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Blood-
 Bargain Hunter Posts: 23888 |
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I like this show a lot and was disappointed last Friday when we did not get a new episode (along with no new The Gene of AI, either). Tsundere Cat is great. He doesn't fool me with his sneering comments about his "worthless" or "trash" human... the second he thinks she's in danger, he's out the door, frying pan in hand, in a panic. He WUVS her! Not that you could ever get him to admit that, under even pain of torture, of course.
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smurky turkey
Posts: 2099 |
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He will indeed, though whether Saku actually needs any help when she has some decent self defense skills is a different matter. Or rather, when it comes to office work and annoying men Saku has it covered, but anything else, especially running a household and it is a big no no. I went from being impressed by her to being disgusted in the span of 5 minutes or so. Anyway, it was another great episode, though I do question the need to have flashbacks to scenes that just happened a minute or two before.
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter Posts: 23888 |
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Episode 8 & 9
We got a rare instance of Saku being masterful and Yukichi being not in episode 8. Turns out that Saku is a martial artist whiz while Yukichi is a big ole fluffball when it comes to physical confrontation. Who knew? But I gotta say: he's anti-hang-over regimen is stellar. It was great to get to know some of Saku's female friends better. Ah, if they only knew the secret of her facade... |
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Hiroki not Takuya
Posts: 2549 |
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I think the definition of an alcoholic in Saku's case depends on the culture. A person who drinks to excess only after work during social occasions or on weekends and doesn't let the consequences affect relationships, personal responsibilities and care or work would not be an alcoholic in Japan or possibly Europe but would fit the official US one. If we look at her life before Yukichi, I agree she was skirting dangerously close to the Japanese definition and in Ep 9 here the most alarming quote from Saku is referring to herself as "someone who likes alcohol". Not to be argumentative, but despite this, I have a philosophical tenet based on scripture that no person is truly "garbage/trash" as they have intrinsic worth despite their flaws, failings and problems and are redeemable, but their behavior is not necessarily acceptable or redeemable. I assume the latter might be your basis for calling her "trash", but if not, I respect your view. I will say Saku has a problem, probably related to her relationship with her parents, and unfortunately (much as I hate to say) Yukichi is an "enabler". At least the show hasn't tried "laughing off" the problems, but I hope they may try to address or resolve them. |
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smurky turkey
Posts: 2099 |
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I suppose I view addiction as needing a certain substance and not being able to stop using said substance and it having a severe negative influence on your life. In the case of Saku there are the ''required'' bouts of drinking due to work obligations, you could say those are exempt (though she drinks a lot during them). The main issue is that Saku has made it clear that she likes alcohol and when given the change (thus not required) she partakes in it...in rather large amounts and sometimes it resulting in danger. As for it influencing her life, Yukichi is there to pick up the slack, we have seen how her life would still look without him being there. Which does make him an enabler. As for her being trash, I look at how she currently is as a person as a whole. She has her positive qualities, but the negative ones overshadow those and again, Yukichi being there is a safety net that keeps her life from being what it actually would be given how she lives. That is not to say that she can not be redeemed, though, I do wonder how likely that would be. In the end I should clarify that I find her to be trash due to how she currently behaves/lives and how her life would be without the masterful cat. As much as I like seeing the cat in action, I think Saku relies way more on Yakuchi to stay alive than the other way around. |
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Tony K.
 SubscriberModerator  Posts: 11315 Location: Frisco, TX |
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Dysfunctional characters/people (aka "those who don't have their shit together") are usually a big turn-off to me, with two exceptions: 1) If they have a good quality (or full-on redemption arc) that greatly makes up for the bad (i.e Dr. Gregory House or any other Sherlock Holmes-ian puzzle solver, Raymond Reddington from (The) Blacklist, or Tyrion Lannister from Game of Thrones). 2) If the dysfunction is 100% for comedic purposes (i.e. all the characters in Seinfeld, Arrested Development, or the American version of (The) Office). I'm gonna' make an educated guess that drug abuse (and alcoholism/excessive drinking counts, in my opinion) is probably something a good portion of dysfunctional people do to cope with their problems, stress, etc. But I'm slightly leaning on Saku as being more the comedic kind of dysfunction, and not the disreputable kind, like the guys in Trainspotting (1996). |
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter Posts: 23888 |
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I agree with Tony K. The show clearly rests on the comedic premise of: wow, without this amazing cat to look after her, this woman would be a disaster. Therefore I don't really attach too much significance to Saku's love of poundin' 'em back. It's kind of like the old example of a scene where somebody slips on a banana peel and doesn't get hurt. Conceptually speaking there is nothing funny about watching somebody slip on a banana peel because in real life they could really wrack themselves. But it's just treated like a humorous pratfall with no consequences (other than possible embarrassment), so it's okay.
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smurky turkey
Posts: 2099 |
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I agree that it works well in regards to the jokes. Heck, why homo sapiens is a classic that made me chuckle. What also helps is that the show does not focus on Saku being a hot mess for too long at a time. I imagine that if it did just that than it would make for something that would be a lot harder to chuckle at. Seeing Saku sleeping on cardboard on the floor surrounded by boxes/trash and roaches only works for a short time, after that it becomes worrying more than anything else. I suppose there is a fine line between being a mess in a HAHA comedic manner and one in a oh god manner.
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Hiroki not Takuya
Posts: 2549 |
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With all that out of they way, a burning question that has had me thinking for a while is "why has Yukichi grown so big?" Narrative convenience or something else? It occurred to me that the formal way Yukichi has narrated his adoption was reminiscent of traditional Japanese storytelling performance which ofttimes involve events of mythology. What if the anime is a veiled attempt at a modernized tale where the plight of the pitiable but ernest Saku catches the attention of a local god who tests her worth by putting a dying kitten in her path and as a reward for her compassion and selflessness causes said kitten to (slowly?) transform into a helper to relieve her condition? What say you guys?
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Tony K.
Subscriber Moderator Posts: 11315 Location: Frisco, TX |
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When I created the thread, I was doing some general research and saw this title had a "supernatural" genre descriptor, though I didn't look any further into as to avoid spoilers.
I'm still a couple episodes behind, right now, but haven't seen anything in particular, yet, to really indicate a supernatural element. However, the episode where Yukichi goes to the birthday party, and that old grandma was saying something to the degree of "oh, that's a very lucky cat you have, there," got me thinking maybe Yukichi is some kind of special spirit cat. But the show deals with it as more of an aside, and we're just supposed to accept his existence as a normal thing. I feel like if they delved too much into the "why" Yukichi is so big, it would detract from the overall comedic slice of life stuff it's already established so well. But I wouldn't mind a little something of a backstory. |
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smurky turkey
Posts: 2099 |
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Yukichi is big, but I am more interested in how intelligent he is and judging by the flashback of him meeting Saku, he has always been very intelligent. Going off that I can not agree with him being some kind of protector of the pitiable. Yukichi being a spirit cat or maybe some type of reincarnated god would make most sense to me.
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