English Dub Review: Bungo Stray Dogs WAN Episode 1



OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

The Armed Detective Agency faces new comedic perils.


OUR TAKE

Bungo Stray Dogs continues its journey through adaptation, this time in the form of a comedy show. It’s almost a rite of passage for a long running shonen show to have one of these, where the more dramatic aspects of the series can be pushed aside in favor of making fun of all the characters equally. This makes me partially wish that I had gone back and watched the first two seasons prior to watching this season because, much like back when Star Trek: Lower Decks first aired, I am almost certain there are going to be jokes here that I am not going to understand based on my lack of familiarity with the material. Then again, that’s to be expected, as these types of shows are made for fans who have been religiously watching the show and reading the manga, and so the subtler in jokes are more likely to connect with that audience than newcomers. Though to be fair, they did start this series with a more general joke that’s made for most people who are even remotely aware of the material, that being having the characters act like literal stray dogs and adding dog puns to all of their attacks, as well as the logical conclusions they would have since some of their powers wouldn’t really work for dogs.

I’ve probably mentioned this before, but judging a series that is only meant to be a comedic take on more serious story is a little bit difficult. Even pure original comedies have things going on with their characters that I could latch onto and analyze, but based on what I can tell from this season so far, it is pretty much just going to be referential humor to the series and its characters. And I suppose I’m just going to need to pull from what knowledge I do have in order to tackle reviewing it as best as I can. It also helps that these are half the length of regular episodes, so watching them and rewatching shouldn’t be very difficult. And at the very least I can try and compare and contrast this series with other parody versions of existing action shows. I know Naruto and Black Clover have parody shows like this, or at least have comedic segments at the end of their regular episodes, and I definitely have thoughts to share about those in comparison to this. So, let’s see how this does for the next eleven weeks!