Title: Salmon-chan (Shake-chan)
Genre: Comedy, Short
Developer: Nihon Kogakuin College Manga Animation Department (JP)
Director: Yumiko Toyoshima
I don’t know about you, but I’m guessing you have about 5 minutes of time to kill in a day. You should spend that time watching Salmon-chan, since that’s how long it lasts. Directed by Yumiko Toyoshima, this anime is part of Independent Anime Shorts, where graduating art and film school students post their creations over the internet. This work surfaced last year among a few other works by the Nihon Kogakuin College Manga Animation Department. And boy, after spending time watching this, I think I need to keep an eye out for more of these projects.
Salmon-Chan is a simple comedy. You won’t get a cohesive storyline or time to care about any of the characters. Instead, there are sharp and pleasing visuals and animation, the meeting of one of the most masochistic characters in anime in recent memory, and quick, timely comedy that should put a smile on your face. There are 8 fairly short skits in Salmon-chan, each of them designed to highlight the character this short is named for, who desires only one thing: to be eaten. But there’s a problem — she’s considered undesirable, and not a soul wants to even bother trying to eat her. I mean, would you want to eat Salmon-chan as well?
What pretty much sold me on this short was…well, ok two things sold me on it: one, it was a short, so no matter what, as long it didn’t bore me, it wasn’t going to be a harmful watch. The second thing was the well timed comedy in each skit. It ranges from Salmon-chan desiring to get eaten by a bear (but the bear just stares at her, shrugs, then ignores her, crushing her hopes) to a hot springs skit that doesn’t exactly end the way you think. Well, it does involve Salmon-chan getting in the hot springs. That’s about all I can say to that.
I really like the visuals here. Usually you’d expect maybe a skimp on details for something so short, but it’s pretty gorgeous. It definitely has some good designs, and it’s pretty effortless to watch. The music didn’t exactly stand out to me aside from one skit, but really, why focus on something that doesn’t last all that long anyways? Simply put, Salmon-chan is just great fun. You know you’ll have time to watch something that’s only 5 minutes long (it’s six, but the skits don’t take that long), so don’t wait, go do it!
Credit to Sandra and her review for letting me know of this series.
