English Dub Review: Housing Complex C “Mismatched Buttons”

Overview:

Kimi is shocked after the inexplicable disappearance of Hideo, though this fails to shake her innocent worldview. She notices that the new and existing residents continue to bicker and fight with one another, so she proposes a shaved ice party to help ease everyone’s tensions. Meanwhile, the complex’s older residents are on the hunt for a hooligan that’s dumping fish everywhere, and they immediately suspect Kan, the big foreigner with a Russian accent.

Our Take:

Since all of the show’s characters and rules are introduced now, this should permit the second episode to go full steam ahead with the horror or at the very least pick up the pace a bit, but “Mismatched Buttons” is still another slow burn of an episode. The tempo is pretty similar to the first, it’s still largely the cute antics of Kimi and Yuri with the horror elements largely relegated to the background, though supernatural stuff is finally beginning to take a more active role in the series.

Episode 1 ended with Kimi seeing Hideo, seemingly transformed into a hideous beast. I thought this would lead to some kind of horrific chase sequence. Maybe it would be a nightmare, perhaps it wouldn’t, but that’s not the angle they chose to pursue. I was initially caught off guard by it, but I kind of like that they did choose something more bizarre here. It’s definitely more interesting than I expected.

Kimi’s cute antics continue to be the star of the show, her infectious optimism and bubbly energy are always exciting to watch. The part I liked the most is her diving into a song about the history of Kurosaki, but it’s complete word salad gibberish, and then we get an info dump from one of the older residents explaining what it actually means. It’s a lot of interesting lore delivered via crayon drawings, just like something Kimi would really draw, another good piece of visual flair.

Kan takes a lot of screen time in this episode, he’s heavily involved in the main plot as well because he makes the sauce for the shaved ice party. Kan as a character is something I’m fairly mixed on. On one hand, I like the “Scary man that’s more wholesome than he looks” trope. But on the other hand, his voice acting is pretty mid, with wooden delivery and a thick Russian accent that doesn’t really seem to fit a rural Japanese setting.

The ending of the episode is definitely dramatic and gets things swinging into motion, but I can’t help but feel that episode two’s ending should be how the first episode ended. This show is half over, but it feels like it’s only just getting started. I hope they know what they’re doing, and we won’t get a rushed ending or a show that ends on a blatant cliffhanger. The world and rural Japanese horror premise show a lot of promise, and I’m excited yet nervous to see what comes next.