After a week off, we’re back to the special brand of shenanigans only Popuko and Pipimi can provide. “Rising Hell ~The Hellshake Arrow~” was an episode that was so off the wall different from what we normally get from Pop Team Epic, and so well put together, it was hard not giving an exceptional review for it. That’s going to be a hard act to follow, for sure.
“Battle Royale” starts out with the namesake sketch, and the creepy old pervert from the “POPUTAN” sketch made an appearance, and brought the player count to 99 before the players even launched. This is our prerequisite Warzone sketch for Pop Team Epic, and it plays out just like a normal game. People hop in, trying to have some fun, and some nutless chickenshit hacks the lobby. However, the chickenshit gets his brains blown out outside of the game by Pipimi with a 9mm to the dome.
The next sketch of interest is “Bob Epic Team,” and this is just as weirdly drawn as normal. Popuko finally charged her Overwatch ultimate, which is just a bunch of visual vomit all over the screen. The teacher seems self aware enough to not know what the hell is going on.
Throughout the rest of the episode, the sketches littered throughout were:
A sketch were Pipimi has her legs crossed for her whole life. Pipimi does the Don Chiki dance. There’s a Short Pop Team Cooking skit. Popuko is a lyre, and Pipimi refuses to play because she wants the real Popuko. Next, there was a sketch where Pipimi and Popuko are a nurse and comptroller, saying they can be anything they want, except for a comptroller. A quick skit where the duo kidnap an anime boi for ASMR And then there’s Mushroom / bamboo shoot sketch, that culminates with popuko hitting the guy with the mushroom with scallion Old lady Pipimi talks about the glitched out Popuko while talking about old video games. And in normal fashion, Pipimi gets freaked out when her jack in the box pops.
There’s a shiny new outro song, and I dig it. The song and accompanying video have a very 70’s feel. The animation behind it looks awesome with the 70’s aesthetic. Pop Team Epic excels when there was more originality. Last episode was phenomenal, because it was out of the box. “Battle Royale” was great because it was PTE’s take on Warzone. Pop Team Epic excels when they do different.
The second half of the episode was not very different from what we got in the first half. “Battle Royale” is more of a representation of what Warzone is in real life, complete with shit-talking to the top degree.
“Battle Royal” is a status quo episode. There was not a whole lot going on, but the sketch “Battle Royale” was entertaining. I’m just not feeling this week. The amount of small sketches thrown around the episode just didn’t add to the enjoyment. It didn’t detract from the enjoyment, but it was rather dull. Hopefully next week, we get back to the formula.