Kumamiko - Girl meets Bear

Title:Kumamiko - Girl meets Bear
くまみこ
Overall:Avoid
Keywords: , , , , ,
Notables: HIOKA Natsumi
YASUMOTO Hiroki
Machi is a middle school student who also serves as the local Miko (shrine maiden). Her remote region of Japan has something distinctive to it: a longstanding truce between humans and talking bears. One of them, Natsu, serves as Machi's guardian and mentor.

12 episodes
OverallArtAnimationCharacter Design MusicSeries StoryEpisode StoryReviewer
Avoid 7 6 7 5 4 4 Ggultra2764 [series:3187#1552]
On the premise alone, Kuma Miko would seem like a typical slice-of-life comedy in how its premise would be set up. Probably mostly harmless, but nothing remarkable in the large sea of similar titles that have been released over the years with a shy shrine maiden learning to get out of her bubble through help with her bear companion and local villagers. But this anime adaptation is far from that imagined scenario as Kuma Miko seems to relish a bit too much in making its female lead Machi as miserable as possible in her social anxieties getting the better of her, including points where her clueless older cousin uses her as a promotional mascot of sorts to attract tourists to their small town while cluelessly insensitive to Machi's feelings in such situations. Adding more to the mess is the anime's choice of ending which makes nearly all relevant characters look scummy in their involvement with Machi, regresses Machi to the point where's she's literally mentally broken, and was apparently an original scenario thought up for this adaptation, something even the manga's creator had disapproved of. In short, I wouldn't waste your time watching this, unless you have some twisted sense of humor seeing the misery of someone experiencing social anxiety problems.

Last updated Wednesday, November 10 2021. Created Wednesday, November 10 2021.
Unevaluated Stretch [series:3187#628]
(Two episodes watched):

This show seems to be based on a 4-koma newspaper manga, but is a little funnier than most. In episode one, Machi declares her wish to move to a big city, which Natsu opposes and gives her a quiz to demonstrate how naïve she is about city life. In the second half (which gets a little racy), a local official explains to three children how the truce between humans and bears came about. Still, the first episode of Kumamiko struck me as being right on the borderline between worth watching and not worth watching, since my standards are pretty high. Episode two, however, disappointed me. This show is cute, has a silly premise and loveable characters--but it's just not all that funny. Episode one seems to have been better than the bulk of the show would be. I only remember laughing once during the second episode. I was tempted to quit the show and watch something else. I was reluctant to abandon Kumamiko altogether, since it has some definite strong points, but I had better uses for my time. If only the show were a little more funny (or the I-want-to-move-to-Tokyo plotline was more complex and interesting).

Last updated Saturday, February 04 2017. Created Friday, April 22 2016.

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