Uchouten Kazoku

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Name: The Eccentric Family 有頂天家族 Uchouten Kazoku

Status: Completed

Episode: 13

Released Date (for eng subs): -

Summary:

In Kyoto, there are three kinds of residents: humans, tanuki, and tengu. Shimogamo Yasaburou is the third son of the Shimogamo tanuki family. His father, Souichirou, had been the head of Kyoto tanuki community until he was eaten by the human members of "Friday Club." While taking care of an old tengu, fighting with other tanuki, and playing with a psychic human girl, Yasaburou approaches the truth of his father's death.

Personal Ratings: 3.5

Idea: 4 / 5

The story revolves around tengu, tanuki, and humans. They stay true to the story behind tengu and tanuki. This kind of idea were people of different species co-exist isn't something rarely seen, but for anime it's usually in the form of animals together with humans or yokai together with humans. I've never seen any anime that picked up such specific beings. 

Execution

Development: 4 / 5

Honestly I don't really know what score to give this anime, because I don't really know the whole motive of this anime. So this anime is basically telling us a story revolving around the 3 species, and ultimately solving the case behind their father's death. The development at first was actually really slow, especially when they were developing Benten's character, and when it reached the peak, the truth came out and everything made sense. You can say that this whole story happens after a big incident, which was slowly brought to light in the course of Yasaburo's (the main character) daily life. There were a lot of things which I didn't understand at the beginning of the anime, but was explained and slowly unravel in the anime.

The thing about Yajiro (the 2nd brother in the family), at first I really didn't understand about him being a frog and about why he didn't know how to turn back into a tanuki. But as the story develops, it was slowly explained about how his situation was closely tied to the incident where their dad got turned into a nabe.
Then of course there is that whole mystery behind their dad's death. It stirs up curiosity in people, because they keep telling us that he is a great and strong Tanuki, and throughout the whole anime, I was just wondering why would such a great and strong Tanuki get captured and turned into Nabe.
Then there is that thing about a guy in the Friday club who loves Tanuki, but still eats them. Until the end, i just can't really understand the meaning behind that.

Emotions: 2 / 5
This show isn't really an emotional kind of anime. It's more of those type of relaxing-type anime (kind of like Natsume Yuujinchou and Mushishi). I don't think that having a lack of emotions in the anime, brings the anime down, because these type of anime has it's own beauty. I didn't really like how the character don't seem to show any emotions whenever they bring up the topic about their dead dad (they seem to casually bring it up like it's nothing). But they did showcase some form of emotions near the end of the anime, because of the nature of the story line.

The last few episodes when they were trying to kill off every other member of the Shimogamo family, it did stir up a lot of anger within me. But in general, there wasn't really any strong emotions, not even panic because it's kind of obvious that ultimately the good guys would win, and everything about be all happy.

Planning: 4 / 5
I think that overall it was pretty well planned, when the story line unfolded itself, one thing led to another (kind of like a mystery deduction going on if you asked me), and everything made sense. But I did think that they could show more planning by showing some thing more in the beginning of the show, because it seemed like everything interesting was at the back of the anime.

You can see that it was well planned about Yajirou (the 2nd brother) and his frog issue. But I actually hoped that they had shown Souun Ebisugawa's feelings towards Mother Shimogamo somewhere in the middle, other than suddenly jumping at the viewers that he actually liked her all this time.

Main character development: 2 / 5

Ok so here, I'm only going to be talking about the character development for Yasuburou. I don't think there was any development for him. He was just kind of like the same at the start to the end, at the end of the first episode, you kind of get what type of a person he is, and there wasn't really any new information after that. But than, of course through little actions, they kind of establish who he really is (although his looks just kinda gave everything away).

When he visited his frog-tanuki brother in the well, even though everyone thought he was a disgrace, you can tell that he is doesn't really care about how others view him. And he uses little excuses to spend time with his brother in the well.
He is also a very trusting guy. That time when Ebisugawa told him that Yajirou (indirectly) killed their father, he didn't believe them at first. Even though he never believed Ebisugawa (he hates them), he trusts Kaisei (is fiance). He treats people as individual beings, without judging them from their family background.

Side character development: 5 / 5
This whole anime, they really bring all the characters together and develop each character as the story goes along. Most characters are seen from the beginning to the end, or from the time they were introduced to the end, and all of the characters have some sort of relationship with each other, so they have to develop them all at the same time. But seeing all the character development is really interesting, because they have that mystery side to all of them, so it's kind of like uncovering parts of the characters.

Seiyuu: 3 / 4

Honestly, Sakurai (he plays the main character) didn't really sound very natural in this role, but somehow that oddness kinda gave the anime that kind of refreshing feel. (kind of like KENN in Kyoukai no Kanata or the kids in Barakamon.) Other than that, I really liked the rest of the seiyuu. Really loved Suwabe Junichi and Yoshino Hiroyuki here, they totally sounded so natural and compelling. 

Others:
I thought that they should have given a more thorough explanation about the relationship between the 3 species. Some people who don't really understand the abilities that Tengu and Tanuki are thought to have may have a little hard time accepting.

The thing about Kaisei, I honestly thought that they would keep her face hidden forever, which would have annoyed me (and leave a bad after taste), but they chose the right timing to show us her face.

Art Ratings: 4

The simple art really matches along with the refreshing atmosphere of the anime. Smooth animation.

Similar Animes:
Honestly I don't have any similar animes here. The overall atmosphere of the anime maybe similar, but when you look at the specifics, I don't think their similar at all, so I'm not going to mention any. 

Recommended for:

Gender: Both

Age: 13 and above

My Ratings: PG-13