Considering I watched Ika before Ohayocon, I'm pretty sure I should have written this review awhile ago. Instead I kept putting it off (but there were other posts in there, so at least no one can yell at me) and finally decided I may as well write the darn thing. I would like to note that Yi also wrote a review of the series pretty recently. The Basics Episodes: 12 Genre: Comedy, Slice of Life Aired: October 5, 2010 to December 21, 2010 Directed by: Tsutomu Mizushima Producers: Diomedea Opening Theme: Shinryaku no Susume by Ultra-Prism Closing Theme: Metamerism by Kanae Itou Review The Story: I think everyone is pretty well-aware that humans have caused pollution all over the place, including in the oceans. Not exactly a surprise. This series starts with Ika Musume (Squid Girl), who is seriously a squid, coming up out of the ocean in order to enslave all of humanity as revenge for everything people have done to her home. Now, you can't really blame her, but the problem with her plan (I'm going to stick with one problem) is that because she's dense/a total idiot, she never realized quite how many humans there are. So what happens is she ends up breaking a wall at this beach restaurant and then is forced to work there in order to pay for the fixing.  She does so, and along the way learns more about humans (doesn't really get any less dense though) and sort of starts to become part of the family. Everything in this series revolves around her antics and general craziness, without much of an actual plot. The Characters: The primary stars of the show are Ika-chan and the family she is staying with/working for, consisting of sisters Eiko and Chizuru Aizawa, as well as the younger brother Takeru. Other characters frequently spotted include Sanae, a friend of the sisters who basically has a love-at-first-sight thing going on with Ika; Cyndi, an American researcher of aliens and her group of lab guys; and Nagisa, who is seriously afraid of Ika. Ika herself is definitely the best character all around, on the principle that she's the only character with more than one dimension, more than one purpose. Yes, her primary goal is to take over the world, but along the way you discover things about her other than all of the wacky things she can do with her tentacles (though those things are pretty awesome on their own), like she's a math genius. How she's a math genius I haven't a clue, but she is. Everyone else? Chizuru exists to be the scary sister, Takeru doesn't seem to have much purpose at all, Sanae is there to obsess over Ika and so is Cyndi, while Nagisa exists to be frightened of our little squid girl. The only other character who seems to do more than one thing is Eiko, and there's not much to her, either. Basically, don't come into Ika Musume looking for character depth. The Mini-sodes: While Ika Musume is a 12-episode series, it's really got more than that. Each episode contains different chunks, which make up what I like to call mini-sodes. Kinda like old kid's shows—it would run for half an hour, but you would get to see two different stories in that half hour. Every episode, and every mini-sode, is self-contained, 100% unrelated to the others besides taking place in the same setting with the same characters. Running the series like this, instead of just going straight through with what happens to her, allows for the showing of only the fun stuff—after all, even for a squid girl, not every day can be exciting when you're just working at a beach restaurant. The best mini-sode? Mini-Ika! I want one. Baka-Raptor doesn't.   Conclusion?: As I said, there is no plot to this series. The events are unrelated, nothing ever seems to affect anything else continuing into the future, and well...that's okay. Not every series needs to have a great plot. Or any plot at all. Sometimes they exist as pure crack, and as long as they aren't trying to be something they're not (coughSOULEATERcough) that's all fine and good. Granted, better characters can help out even the best of crack, but Ika Musume knew what it was doing, and well—that's what it did. Would I recommend this series? Sure. Now if you're a serious person who only watches serious anime while maintaining your serious eyebrows, no—you should go watch Death Note or something. But if you're looking for a laugh or two and wouldn't mind spending 12 episodes looking at a really adorable girl who is actually a squid, yeah. Go for it. My rating: 7/10. Okay humor, very cute, but...I've seen so much better on both fronts.
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