Anime Pilgrimage RTT

Binchou-tan – episode 3

March 23, 2006 on 9:26 pm | In Binchou-tan | Comments Off on Binchou-tan – episode 3

“Bin’s ‘Bin’ Day”

It’s amazing how well Furuhashi Kazuhiro is building up a world with each episode. Binchou-tan’s appeal increases incalculably with the introduction of new characters and the presentation of the idea that the town features some kind of –tan school, for –tans.

Binchou-tan wakes up on her birthday and receives a package from a mysterious package from a man known as Ubamega. The “bus” into town is a different bird to the one that Binchou-tan is used to, and her landing is uneasy. Chiku-tan, a passing pharmacist –tan, sees Binchou-tan and offers her assistance; they then go into town and help each other get jobs for the day.
Meanwhile a rich –tan, kept in the lap of luxury, spies Binchou-tan in the skies and wonders just what kind of –tan she is.

I’ll start off by saying that I thought Binchou-tan sitting alone in her house, clapping and wishing herself a happy birthday, was a little sad. At many points in the series you get a strong sense of Binchou-tan’s solitude.

The show perks up something marvellous with the introduction of new –tans. Without the pesky narrator to explain anything, we’re left pondering the nature of the world that Binchou-tan lives in: a world with mail ducks and schools for the –tans who perform the household chores of the world.
Chiku-tan is a creative little pink haired dynamo; her ideas for inventions are quite banal as inventions go, but she brings such a relentless enthusiasm to proceedings that you can’t really hold anything against her. The scene with her grandfather and younger sister serve to emphasise Binchou-tan’s orphan status, but also that the people of this world are kind and generous enough to accept and accommodate others without question.

The rich –tan, as yet nameless, has a sort of loneliness of her own. You do not see her talking to anyone, and she is frequently alone, even when surrounded by maids. Perhaps she can go out into the world and make some friends of her own; friends with things in their hair, too!

Somehow with this episode Binchou-tan has become less of a whimsical adventure and more of a compelling study of a fictional society. I’m deadly serious, here; I’m not making up that stance.