English Dub Review: Akiba’s Trip “Only a Liar Says Something Is Too Hard”

Is this series getting any better at the half-way point?

Spoilers Below

The episode begins with Tomatsu dicking around with a vintage camera and its ability to zoom & out pointing it at some “magical girl” style figurine only to knock it over and break it by accident and it’s only made worse when that same figurine turns out to be Nikawa’s.

Tomatsu offers to find an exact replica at an auction site since parts of the figure look too crumble up to be fixed again but then gets distracted and Nikawa leaves in disappoint and is further admonished by Mayonaka & Arisa until Tomatsu says he purposely annoyed her so he couldn’t tell her the truth that the prices in the auction site that’s selling that same figure are ridiculously high.

Given that he’s out of “part-time work money” he has to keep the cost to something manageable so when he places a bid, he’s quickly outbid by some random Arabic dude so he goes to the Temp Agency where Kuga (the fingerless gloved girl) works. Tomatsu is offered a “short-term job by Kuga which turns out to be an upper-class “maid & butler”-style service.

As Tomatsu enters the interview, there’s a random & ridiculous sign in the background that says, “We can survive on eating Thank You’s” (WTF?) Tomatsu gives his application during the interview and the man who hires him has a creepy Joker-smile with a Steven Seagal ponytail. As the camera cuts to a different angle there’s a sign behind the interviewer saying “Those who come are welcomed, those who leave are regretted”. The interviewer then starts off becoming increasingly creepy, first by grabbing Tomatsu’s shoulder then going into a monolouge about extreme devotion and out of nowhere straight-up hires him.

Already the scenery of his new working enviornment raises red flags with random signs in the background that say random shit like “Thank you again for overtime” Seriously, that’s like thanking the DMV for waisting your time when they could be getting your shit done alot faster! Tomatsu then meets his boss named “Jiro Nishi” who explains the hearts on their nametags are part of a “rank system” where having 3 hearts on your tag is considered the highest in terms of status.

During orientation, they’re taught to repeat “five phrases” which all consist of the word “Master” at the end of each sentence these include :

1)Welcome home Master!

2) My apologies, Master!

3) One moment please, Master!

4) Thank you for waiting, Master!

and finally 5) Have a safe trip, Master!

Tomatsu understandably feels nervous & awkward at everything he’s witnessing and instantly gets berated by Jiro for not paying attention but the ponytailed interviewer, who turns out to be the manager, shows up telling Jiro to show some leniency which creeps out the entire staff and that creepiness is further elevated when the ponytailed man screams out what their goal is for the day.

By the time his shift is over, it’s late night and Mayonaka for once expresses concern and tells him not to let it affect their Patrol’s against Bugged ones and thinks Tomatsu is trying to come up with a bad excuse to get out of his obligations combating them Mayonaka, of course, reminds Tomatsu to make it up to Nikawa.

During Tomatsu’s new job, things start going well for him and it gains him a small level of popularity that it instantly earn him a “2-heart” ranking but the camera seems to show that something is really off about these people, especially when you see a juxtaposition between Tomatsu being happy & energetic at work to him back at home more exhausted than ever with his body becoming drained & sickly.

Of course, Mayonaka is annoyed by him sleeping in again but one day while working, Tomatsu learns about another strange work-policy called “thanks pay” where employees get paid more depending on how many people thank them. At first, Tomatsu thinks he’s getting cash in an envelope, but instead of cash, it’s blank white pieces of paper with the words “thank you” written on it. All of this sounds like a substantial dick-move, but the staff proceeds to try and change the subject by giving Tomatsu praise for his efforts.

We cut to Mayonaka & Nikawa who realizes she may have been too harsh on him and we see a small flashback explaining how close their bond is as siblings. We then come back to Tomatsu who is letting his new job cause physical harm as displayed increasingly frail & ghostly complexion.

Tomatsu’s devotion to this job starts affecting the people around him to the point that he’s at the workplace 90% of the time with everyone expressing legit concern with Arisa showing them a magazine of his frail anorexic appearance and it’s even worse when they find him in a maid’s uniform with bulging anime hamster eyes.

We eventually find out the Ponytailed bastard is a “Bugged One” whose evil scheme was to “cut labor costs, provide cheap food, and rule the town from its stomach!” When they go up against the working staff, they realize they’re just brainwashed people and not bugged ones so Arisa proceeds to kick their asses with her kung-fu skills but not kill them. Of course the bugged manager takes Nikawa as a hostage and puts them in a situation where they can’t fight back which is just an excuse to see Arisa & Mayonaka forcibly stripped by the Kurobug Imps.

But Tomatsu in his sheer force of will strips the bugged one and saves Nikawa and everyone else and the girls leave with maid outfits seeing as it’s the only clothing that wasn’t damaged by the Imps.

Nikawa apologizes for her previous behavior but Tomatsu reveals that he didn’t forget about his sister as he shows her a new figure from his backpack and when his sister thanks him, the episode comedically ends when Tomatsu is now traumatized by the phrase “Thank you” after the rabid overworking he was subjected to.

Overview

Tomatsu’s attempt to make it up to his sister by getting a job seemed well intentioned, but his motivation got lost in the rabid work environment he was sucked into and it literally drained him in the process. I think that situation was the closest thing to a relatable scenario because realistically having a job or a career can sometimes get in the way of personal obligations you have outside of it. And if doing this unchecked without some kinda game plan in advance can potentially hurt the people in your life when you lose sight on what really matters.

During Tomatsu’s job interview, it reveals all sorts of minor details written in his job application including his birth-date which is “October 10th 1998”. In other words, at the year of this episode, he’s supposedly 18 years old.

While it was intended to be played for laughs, the episode’s title is a reference to a controversial pub in Japan called “Watami” where the CEO stated in a TV interview with a similar line saying “Impossible is a word used by liars”. The restaurant’s controversy came from an incident in 2008 where the bosses in the pub subjected their own employees to harsh working conditions to the point that one of their employees, named Mina Mori committed suicide. The extreme yet detrimental devotion of the co-workers and the way Tomatsu was being aggressively overworked is eerily similar to stories like this.

Part of me liked the moment when Nikawa knocked some sense into Tomatsu. She has no skills or abilities and is limited to begin with yet it felt like overkill with the baseball bat to her brother’s face, but I’m letting it slide this time since it isn’t done in a gratuitous fashion like the previous episodes have been guilty of.

Sadly, no amount of intelligence in the world could ever help me comprehend why people still watch this obnoxious mess of a show being given this crap as follow up. FOR SIX FUCKING EPISODES. We know there’s a main villain but is it actually going to lead anywhere? Do they fight a main villain in the last episode? We know it’s that lady with the weird hat and black cloak from episode 2 but we don’t know shit about her motivations or why she’s evil.

I sarcastically love how this show attempts to teach a life lesson, then suddenly throws it out the damn window complete with ripping everyone’s clothes off in reckless abandon.

You can’t have it both ways Akiba’s Trip.