10 Second Anime - Amanchu! - Episode 4

Futaba looks on as Hikari joins a dive tour. Katori and Hikari help Futaba get used to her dive equipment.

Episode 4 - "The Story of Excitement and the Despairing Heart"

Heh.

The main theme driving the episode was Diving's Buddy System. Diving is an inherently dangerous pastime, so having a companion check your equipment and help when you're in trouble is extremely important. This concept was applied to Futaba's reluctant nature and how she used to suffer her fears of trying something new all by herself. Well, she's got a "buddy" to push her and encourage in this new town and new activity.

Some may say this show is all about the muppet faces, but I think it's all about eyelashes. Aw, who am I kidding? It's about muppet faces. Even Grandma has a muppet version face.

Hikari had an awfully specific underwear pattern for her diving checklist. That factored later on.

I loved the continuity we saw this week. Futaba noticed Grandma was the woman who gave her some perspective when she first moved to the town. However, Grandma recognized her too and was not so surprised that she and her granddaughter were already friends.

The two other kids we see in the opening credits made their debut. They helped demonstrate the buddy system to Futaba too, but she thought it didn't look so "buddy-buddy" to her. Once Futaba learned what buddy meant, she seemed a little obsessed with seeing some friendship attached to it.

These funny hoods add some warmth to a dive suit and, apparently, some confusion for Hikari's specific dive underwear.

During the divers' time underwater, Futaba and Grandma shared a nice conversation about how the water around their town turns murky from Winter through Spring because of phytoplankton blooms. This gave Futaba some motivation to get trained up as a diver to join Hikari when the water clears up.

As a newbie, I appreciated how Futaba couldn't understand how people could have fun diving when they could only see about a meter in front of them. She hadn't yet felt the fun of just breathing and swimming underwater.

Hikari confirmed it was fun!

The big joke of the first half called back to Hikari's specific dive underwear and related it to the funny dive hoods the siblings wore.

Hikari's personality quirk of not exactly being able to express herself in words showed itself too. Having a dude around while trying to talk about underwear made it even tougher.

Hikari expressed herself well enough to keep the brown and pink thing, but the girl thought she just liked her money hood so much. The question is, what did happen to Hikari's underwear?

The second half of the episode followed Futaba learning how to breathe underwater with her full gear and deal with the usual problems of getting water in her mask and practicing air pressure regulation.

This part was all good slice of life sports procedural stuff. Gear is heavy, but it feels light underwater. Stuff like that.

Of course, showing these brand new experiences is a good way to focus on Futaba's personality and her emotional development as she fights her scaredy-cat nature.

The key to helping Futaba through her habit of giving up on new things that she's barely started was the buddy system. In diving, there will always be someone there to help and encourage you through the frustrating adjustments and unfamiliar experiences.

Ha! Hikari got to do her Great Stride in a proper context.

Advisor Cha helped in his own fashion.

Futaba almost gave up because she was getting frustrated and scared about not doing things right. I think it took more courage for Futaba to admit she was scared to someone else than just to muddle through. It was the buddy system put to good use!

And then it was all about enjoying the light and the water. This was a good prelude to enjoying the clear water in the ocean during the Summer.

Hikari was happy to see Futaba get the hang of breathing and clearing water from her mask. After getting those little mundane things down, it gets easier to appreciate the sights and sensations of the underwater world.

Futaba's inner dialogue gave the audience a nice overview of the Japanese onomatopoeia words for water sounds.

Futaba also got a nice lesson in how heavy things get while trying to get out of the water. If you've been in a pool for a long time, you know how heavy you feel when you're trying to get out. Now try it with about 20 extra pounds. Futaba needs to get some muscles!

We actually never got the names of those two siblings, but I suppose we'll see them really soon.