Have you ever wondered what life would be like if you couldn’t crack a dirty joke or where any notion of lewdness is outlawed? Well, Shimoneta: A Boring World Where the Concept of Dirty Jokes Doesn’t Exist shows us what that reality would consist of. Thankfully, there’s an erotic terrorist group led by Blue Snow, known as SOX, ready to share a little lewd cheer with the world. You can partake in this cheer courtesy of Funimation who bring the series to both Blu-ray and DVD.
Getting caught up in proceedings is Tanukichi Okuma a transfer student who is trying his best to toe the morality and wholesomeness line regardless of his father’s current status as an imprisoned ero-terrorist. His reason for strict wholesomeness is, of course, a girl by the name of Anna Nishikinomiya and the student council president of one of Japan’s more moral schools. Enter Blue Snow and her ero-terrorist group to shake up Tanukichi’s life and his future romantic relations.
In all honesty, I was expecting a mindless fan service filled train wreck of a series based on the title and promotional material but there’s actually a pretty interesting setup to the series. The first episode was so ridiculous and over the top that it had me laughing along the whole way. I then knew this series was going to be a fun journey even if still a little mindless and filled with fan service. The setting for Shimoneta may be one of the more ridiculous settings in anime but oddly believable based on history and how some countries operate.
The creative use of innuendo and word replacement is a sight to behold in this series. The world setting has really forced the dialogue to become very creative in how to approach the subject matter. Of course, a lot of it is still nothing more than toilet humour but with strict rules in place over what words cannot be said, there has certainly been a lot of thought put into the words that replace them. There’s also a fair amount of vulgar language used and some lines that will have you throwing up your eyebrows in surprise. “Your cookies have my love nectar mixed right into the dough” is possibly one of the more innocent lines used throughout the series so it’s definitely not for those that are faint of heart.
If I have to praise Shimoneta, for one thing, is that it really delivers and then some when it comes to the fan service. While fan service in anime is somewhat of a major bane for me when a series does go out of its way to provide it at 110% (perhaps 200% in this case) I can’t help but feel impressed by the effort. I can only imagine how heavily censored this series must have been when it originally aired in Japan. This home video release, however, is far from censored, well apart from the use of censorship for comedic effect. The obliviousness to sexual thoughts or acts from the entire student body in the series also serves as a great source of comedy throughout.
With J.C.Staff handling this adaptation you’d be safe to expect good visuals and the series itself does not disappoint. Characters have good designs and the overall animation quality is of a very high standard. I also really appreciated the soundtrack in Shimoneta and its tendency to pay homage to classic soundtracks and sound effects of yesteryear. The use of classic mecha themes, or a close riff on them, are a particular favourite and fans of Getter Robo will definitely get a kick out of this series. There’s a whole host of tracks to pick out in the series and it was definitely fun having my nostalgia tickled as I watched masked panty terrorists in action.
On-disc extras include Episode Commentaries, ‘Moms Watch Shimoneta’ featurette, Promotional Videos, Web Previews, and as standard Textless Opening and Closing songs. Again, the textless opening and closing songs are not actually textless but feature Japanese and English translated karaoke. This would appear to be Funimation’s definition of textless which is fine just not something we normally see. I would highly recommend watching the ‘Moms Watch Shimoneta’ featurette as it’s highly amusing in its own right but I’d do so after watching the series because of spoilers.