Witch Watch

Episode 21

After two back-to-back episodes of romantic drama, this one pulls the show back into its usual brand of comedy as it sheds some more spotlight on Miharu. This time, we get a glimpse of how he's trying to handle a regular middle school life, as well as his interactions with his school's Student Council President, who turns out to be connected to a magical bloodline of his own. Both of these are ideas that seem like they should make for some funny or heartwarming escapades, but while the episode isn't completely lacking in those areas, none of that material lands quite as well as it should. That's okay, though, because sandwiched right in between these Miharu segments is one of the show's funniest sketches to date, and while it doesn't totally redeem the rest of the episode, it does at least further prove that you can never truly tell where this show is going.

As far as the Miharu-centered segments go, we first discover that on the surface, he's seemingly doing well for himself in middle school. While he's kept his vampire bloodline a secret, being a pale-skinned pretty boy has still earned him a bunch of attention from the girls in his class, and playing up the part of a cool-headed noble has only served to make him even more popular. This is funny enough on its own, though not quite as funny as discovering that Miharu finds the whole thing exhausting, but has long passed the point where he can break the act, so he's been stuck without any actual friends. This persona hasn't stopped him from getting into trouble, and after chasing off some bullies, he ends up gaining the attention of his school's student council president, Fujiki, who's known for being very straight-laced and serious. However, when stories start spreading around the school about a kid in a black mask damaging school property, Miharu discovers that the two are one person, as well as Fujiki's secret. He, too, is descended from a monster of legend, but rather than ancient creatures like ogres or vampires, he's actually descended from Jekyll of the story, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, which occasionally manifests in him having violent outbursts. Much as I love Witch Watch's approach to remaining monsters from old myths and tales, this is a really strange one to pull from. While Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a very old story by modern standards, it doesn't have the same level of mystique as say mermaids or werewolves, and the show pointing that out doesn't make the inclusion any less bizarre. I do think the idea of having the Hyde aspect of this bloodline be limited to violent tendencies rather than a split personality is an interesting concept, but the episode doesn't spend a lot of time going into it, and it otherwise just feels like a footnote. Fujiki himself also doesn't come off as all that interesting outside of this particular revelation, so while it's nice that Miharu makes a friend whom he can confide in about his vampire heritage, I don't think this was a particularly strong introduction to a new cast member.

Those weak first impressions certainly weren't helped by the show's last segment, which sees Fujiki interact with the show's weakest batch of characters, the Student Council. Specifically, he runs into them after mistaking them for the other members of the Otogi household, and it's about as unfunny as you'd expect from this group. As always, the Student Council members are limited to their one gimmick and since there isn't much else going on here but a case of mistaken identity, there aren't any real jokes here beyond Fujiki assuming that Miharu's roommates are a bunch of insane weirdos (which is technically true but they don't deserve to be compared to these guys). Before long, Miharu arrives with Tenryu to clear up the misunderstanding, and we learn that the council was trying to throw Tenryu's birthday party, which is cute, I guess, but not enough to save this segment from feeling dull. I do appreciate the punchline of how outwardly normal Morihito and the gang feel comparatively once Fujiki actually meets them, but aside from that, Fujiki's introduction didn't do much for me.

On the bright side, this at least didn't take up the entire episode, and the part that moved attention away from Fujiki and Miharu was easily its strongest. In an attempt to help boost views on his streaming channel, Nico uses her magic to turn Keigo into a girl, and she gets sold to viewers as a new character. Now you might be tempted to read that and assume the show would use this for cheap fan service, or transgressive jokes about gender swapping, but that's thinking too small-minded. This show is far more big-brained than that. While “Keiko” here seems like a terrible marketing strategy at first because she can't maintain her poser routine, she turns out to be a hit with male viewers, and before long, we start getting gender swaps of the other boys. Kanshi is reimagined as a sporty girl called Kanna, while Miharu becomes an ethereal princess called Miharun. Although these two do next to nothing to change their actual personalities, they end up raking in tons of views while Morhito channels his inner producer to milk them for all their worth. Even our resident straight man isn't immune to the will of the masses, as when viewers start demanding the girl version of Morihito, we're given Mori: a stern older sister with a ponytail and glasses. It's so spot on for Morihito that it manages to be both genius and hysterical simultaneously, and I respect the effort put into the design. Thus, this all scientifically proves something that anime producers have been banking on for years: you truly can sell any personality type, no matter how weird or terrible, so long as you put a cute girl in front of it, and as out of pocket as this joke might be on Shinohara's part, I can't say it isn't good.

What ends up driving this scheme off the rails is when we end up getting a girl version of Wolf (who maintains the same haircut and is the actual bravest design choice of the bunch) who puts on a show by flashing all their male viewers and gets their stream taken down as they're forced to put out another apology video. It's the perfect way to wrap up another one of these streamer-themed shorts, and it continues to be funny just how good Shinohara is at taking jabs at content creation culture. I do wish the two segments surrounding this one were a bit stronger, but one out of three isn't bad when the one is something this incredible, and I love how far the series is willing to go with its setups. I hope that next week's episode strikes a better balance.

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Witch Watch is currently streaming on Crunchyroll on Sundays.