10 Second Anime - Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou - Episode 12 [END]

Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou - Episode 12 [END]

More gags with Natsuno's editor. Drunk Natsuno becomes very lovey-dovey and very delusional. Still no 7th volume of her series.

Dog and Scissors seemed to have two episodes more than necessary. Last week was pure gag territory with no plot, and this week was more of the same, although we did get the editor explaining why a young lady such as Natsuno needed a mysterious pseudonym so her books would be received on their merits, instead of her going the pop idol route. But after that, the masochistic editor wasn't getting much attention from Natsuno, who was, you know, actually writing, that she decided to get her drunk. Well, it looks like the sadistic Natsuno is the act, and lovey-dovey ultra-nice Natsuno is the real one.

Anyway, a montage during the end credits showed all sorts of adventures from the manga, that we're apparently not going to see, and the anime took the meta way out, by Natsuno explaining to Kazuhito that was her idea for her next book, which was just the story of this anime. Kazuhito's reaction was, hey, that's nice and all, but where's the seventh volume of your Great Sins story? Scissors get thrown, little wiener dog runs around, the end.

Final Thoughts: After the first seven episodes, there seemed to be a little more to this gag anime, with its themes of death, moving on from loss, gratitude, family ties, and life ambitions. However, when the story arcs of explaining Kazuhito's death and his former club mate trying to finish her manuscript ended, the producers were reluctant to start new adventures. Perhaps the money dried up. And something never explained was Natsuno's developing feelings for Kazuhito. The young man saved her life, but she met him as a dog in which she could hear his thoughts (and somehow the editor could too). So the link of a life saved was something between them, but as for her attraction, or whatever it was, it was just suddenly there. Like wanting to be called "big sister" by his little sister. Or trying to follow some little pamphlet of dating tips during her trip to a hot springs hotel. Or fantasizing about a big wedding to a wiener dog while hilariously drunk. Where did it come from? Was some big meeting going to happen later, but won't be animated now? At the very least, it gave us some jealous feelings between the women in Kazuhito's life to animate the gags. Too bad. The show started strong, but finished weak.

10 Second Anime - Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou - Episode 11

Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou - Episode 11

Back to curry gags, shiny author gags, embarrassed maid gags, and author duel gags.

Natsuno is still acting as if she's Kazuhito's new fiancé, asking his little sister to call her Onee-san (big sister). Mm-kay, not really going over with the little sister that well.

So, um, what was the point of that episode? Was it merely to introduce the third of the three best selling authors? Now we know who the singing maid works for. If she wants to stop being embarrassed when caught singing and dancing, how about not doing that stuff in a public park?

And after buying up all the books of the other two writers (locally, of course), Maxi Akizuki challenges Natsuno to a different kind of author's duel. Just as they're about to get started, the head Man-In-Black comes by and basically says playtime is over. Not-so-shining after all.

Playtime isn't over for Kazuhito, though, because he promised to eat the notoriously dangerous curry made by his sister. Work hard, Kazuhito!

10 Second Anime: Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou Episode 10

Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou Episode 10

Kazuhito's classmate Hami challenges Natsuno to a writers' duel, so that she can become a real author. Eh, go with it.

Some episodes of Dog and Scissors really let you know it's a gag comedy anime. Like this one. Let's get the exposition out of the way first. Kazuhito's classmate Hami Osawa is the author of Celestial Romance, written in the style of the renowned Akiyama. She had written a manuscript while in high school, and Kazuhito had promised to read it when it was published, but he went and died. Hami became an author, using an anagram of his name as her pen name, but couldn't finish the manuscript after Kazuhito died. Even learning that he had come back as a book-buying wiener dog couldn't motivate her to finish the manuscript.

Here's where I'm screwed up with the timeline of events. Hami had become an author, which means she had become published. But she couldn't finish the manuscript that Kazuhito had promised to read, so she wrote the other book in the style of Akiyama, which is her only book, as far as the story goes. She thinks of herself as a fake author because she's too influenced by Akiyama's style, and she used her father's connections and techniques to write and publish the book. The techniques part will be relevant later. So to become a real author, in order to finish the manuscript and keep her promise to Kazuhito, she must defeat the author inside her, Akiyama. Yeah, she's crazy.

However, the motivation is screwed up in the sequence of events. Hami challenges Natsuno to a writers' duel, some bizarre made up thing (gag comedy), and uses underhanded Osawa writing techniques to distract or slow down Natsuno. But the last card she played was one she had used in the published book Celestial Romance: subliminal commands to kill the red-eyed girl wearing black and holding scissors. This is where all the hypnotized people trying to kill Natsuno came from in the last couple of episodes. So, here's where I'm confused: did she get this book published before she knew Kazuhito was a dog, or after? If it was after, then everything is cool, and she went crazy trying to kill Natsuno to become a real author so she could finish the manuscript and have Kazuhito read it. But if it was before, then...? I'll decide it was after, just to spare my crazy Western sensibilities of viewing time as a sequence of events instead of the Eastern flow of a river or splashing like a fountain.

Anyway, Natsuno wins the writers' duel, takes in Hami as an apprentice, and practices some Osawa subliminal techniques in her latest book, to make Kazuhito leave those books behind and give her some affection. When is she going to finish that last book in the 7 Deadly Sins series?

10 Second Anime - Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou - Episode 9

Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou - Episode 9

Natsuno catches the stalker, who wanted to accidentally give her his daughter's book. Somehow not related to hypnotized attackers, though. One mystery down, perhaps another pops up?

After missing out on that book at the hot springs inn, Celestial Romance, Natsuno and the dog purchase it at the local bookstore. Upon returning, book maniac that he is, Kazuhito notices an extra book in the apartment. Someone had broken in and planted the very book they bought. Mysterious. They decide to read the book to see if there are any clues as to why, and if this pseudonymous author is related. The only thing that happens is that the dog feels like a love potion hit him, which flatters Natsuno, and that the writing style seems very much like Natsuno's. That avenue for clues dries up, so Natsuno calls her agent to see if she knows anything about the author. After some convincing *cough*torture*cough* Suzuna tells them the author is the daughter of a famous historical fiction writer and gives them the address written down by the author.

The address happens to be in Kazuhito's old town, in the same neighborhood as his school. As they take a shortcut through an abandoned warehouse, they get attacked by another mob of hypnotized people. After Natsuno uses the dog-rocket-punch, the mysterious stalker appears, and it is the famous historical writer. His daughter tasked him with sending a copy of her book to Shinobu Akiyama, Natsuno's pen name, but he didn't want to do it, because he hates Akiyama's writing. Instead, he looked for opportunities for Natsuno to pick up the book by chance, like leaving it in the lobby of a hotel, or using the security company's key to place the book in her library, so he could fulfill his daughter's request without compromising his disrespect. Yeah, it's convoluted comedy, right? And, he's also not responsible for the hypnotized mob. Huh.

After all this, the address for the author is indeed Kazuhito's old school. And while looking for clues, the dog goes to his old book club room, pulls out an old manuscript, and his old club mate is there to meet him. She is the mysterious author and responsible for the mobs?

10 Second Anime: Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou Episode 8

Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou Episode 8

Somehow, traveling far away for a hot springs trip means all the cute girls the wiener dog knows end up there too.

It looks to me that the only reason Natsuno went on this onsen (hot springs) trip was to follow the girly tips for getting close to your man in some little pink book. But to treat the dog as the prospective man, and trying to get close to the sister of the dead man reincarnated inside the dog... eh. Well, it's always a mistake to overthink the premise of a gag anime, especially when the producers treat us to a fanservice episode. Some of the larger story gets hints thrown out though. Who is the maid with the polearm concealed in her broom working for? Why did this Celestial Romance book hypnotize the hotel staff into attacking Natsuno? Who is this old man looking on events from the shadows? Was this girly trip just for research to help complete the last book in Natsuno's series, Lust? And weren't almost all of these clues presented in the last episode too? Um, don't answer that last question. That leads to overthinking...

10 Second Anime - Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou - Episode 7

Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou - Episode 7

A missing bra, some bust size insecurity, an embarrassed singing maid, and the threat of torture. Sounds like your average week of hijinks in Dog and Scissors.

Besides the gag reactions, and a color scheme reference to Edvard Munch's The Scream (or even Garry Larson's The Howl; a wiener dog is the star of the show you know), I spent too much thinking about how the show's creator used the word 使い (tsukai) in the title. Is the dog (who is a reincarnated fan of the author character Natsuno) a familiar spirit and the pair of scissors a tool? Is the speaker of the title (presumably the Natsuno) proclaiming she uses both a dog and a pair of scissors like tools? Maybe both? Oh, Japan...