GINTAMA - Mr. Ginpachi's Zany Class

Episode 6

I'll admit I was a little worried that last week's return to form might have been something of a fluke, after how rough some of the earlier episodes were, but it seems like the show is back at the top of its game…mostly. Whereas the last episode served as a pretty strong example of how good Gintama's humor can be when it has room to breathe, this one is an example of Gintama's ability to mix comedy with melodrama, as it indulges in yet another of the most standard of school related plots: the threat of being forced to move away from all your friends. The results are a bit more inconsistent on the comedy compared to last week's highs, but where this episode occasionally lacks in its gags, it makes up for it in sincerity.

As Shinpachi walks to school one day, he learns from Otae that the two of them will have to transfer schools to live with a distant relative. He gets pretty bummed about this and is only more depressed when the reaction from his classmates seems to be total apathy. While he gets a few nice words and presents from the teachers, everyone else goes about their business with a couple of exceptions. One is the cafeteria lady, who is mostly just happy he enjoys her cooking, and the other is Tama, whose sorrow over Shinpachi leaving is quickly made hilarious when she points out this is literally the only time the two of them have talked to each other all season.

As mean-spirited as Gintama can be, it can wear its heart on its sleeve when it wants to. When Shinpachi's final day at school ends with zero fanfare, everyone decides to start over and throw him a farewell party (though not before literally threatening to start the entire episode over from the opening credits, which really got me with how abrupt the joke was). This is also where the episode unleashes the bulk of its comedy, and most of the gags here work. Watching a slideshow where every picture of Shinpachi is just his glasses is a bit that never gets old, and I got an extra good kick out of Kondo making one last play at asking out Otae, only to get literally eviscerated when she can't even bother to remember his name. I was a lot less sold on gags like Okita offering Shinpachi some hooks to torture people with, or Katsura's terrible attempt at rapping, which largely came off as obnoxious, but that may have been the point. All of these silly shenanigans push Shinpachi to his breaking point, only for him to learn that having him do some comebacks one last time was their way of giving him an emotional send-off.

It was so surprisingly heartwarming that I was bracing for the inevitable punchline of some outside force stopping him from moving and Otae, but while that does happen, it plays out in a much sweeter way than I could have anticipated. It turns out that the relative they were going to move in with was actually the cafeteria lady, and she's busy getting ready for her honeymoon after Shinpachi's praises of her cooking apparently gave her the courage to marry her boyfriend. With how much Gintama loves to have fun at Shinpachi's expense, I was expecting a much meaner punchline than this one, but I'll happily take an ending on the sweeter side. It caps off what's a pretty good example of how lovable Gintama's cast of goofballs can be when they aren't busy being despicable, and that balance is one of the things that keeps me coming back to this franchise.

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GINTAMA - Mr. Ginpachi's Zany Class is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.