Bob's Birthday Review: To Be Heroine (2018)

As the World doesn't quite seem to make sense right now, this seems like the perfect thing to talk about.

For Bob's Birthday, I'm covering a strange little Anime called To Be Heroine.  It is *technically* the Sequel Series to one called To Be Hero, but you can pretty much read a simple summary and get the whole thing.  It only connects to like 3 Characters, so no big loss.  The Story of this Show is weird.  I wish I could end right there, but I guess I'll keep going.  The Plot involves the typical Isekai Story- a normal person transported to another World- and our Heroine.  She has to team up with a strange baby man in a world full of them and, on top of that, your clothes turn into Summoned Creatures to battle for you.  It's Anime!  However, there is more to this 7-Part Series than that.  To find out how crazy this actually gets, read on...

Our Heroine- Futaba- is facing her Final Exams and issues with her one friend not taking things seriously enough.  Life is good?

She ends up in another World and ends up in a turf war between two talking babies.  I wish I was kidding.

As it turns out, her clothes can be turned into summoned creatures like Ninjas, Policemen and Electric Cat Monsters.  Rhyme and reason- who needs that stuff?!?

What's confusing at first when watching the Show is that the Intro seems to focus on these kids playing around...that aren't the current age of our Heroine and her friends.

Well, things start to get weird for a different reason as it becomes clear that they actually live in China (meaning i'm watching a Show with Double Subtitles) and it all relates to...an industrial accident?

After the first 3 Episodes, the Isekai stuff is toned down and/or completely removed.  In its place is a tale of corporate espionage, betrayal and a conspiracy right out of a Michael Crichton Novel.

Remember when this Show was about weird baby men?

Futaba remembers...and has no words for this strange tale now.

The connection to To Be Hero comes in the form of this guy, who is possessed by the baby man spirit from the other World...and is also the Father of one of the friends.

Some 'fun jokes' about a creepy old men professing his love to teenage girls- why not, Japan?

Can they uncover the conspiracy and save their Town?  Will the other World stuff pay off?  Will this confusing-ass Show be treated as 'emotional' by User Reviews?

To find out, stream this Show on Crunchyroll.  Just pay for Premium if you don't want to see 42 Ads for a company that makes miniatures for Shows you've never heard of.

 What a bizarre u-turn.  Which Show do you want to be?  Do you want to be the wacky Isekai Adventure of a girl dealing with baby men and summoning creatures?  Do you want to be a slice of life Show about some Teenagers?  Do you want to be a Drama about uncovering a corporate conspiracy?  Do you want to be a Drama about a Character or Characters dealing with Amnesia/Lost Memories?  If you answered 'yes' every time, you're the people behind this Show.  You also don't get how this thing works!  The disparate parts of the Show are interesting and/or fun in their own right.  My problem is that they don't really work well together or make that much sense.  This is the kind of Show that wants you to go 'Oh, that's clever' as you make it through.  "See- we showed the Soda as a gag in the Intro and now it's a Plot Point- praise us!"  No thanks.  The separate aspects of the Show just make for a confusing thing that tries to be silly in one moment, weepy in another and serious in yet another.  In one Episode, a baby man summons a ninja from a cloth.  In another Episode, a woman silently mourns the loss of a child in secret.  How are you the same Show?!?  To be fair, it all ties together at the end...but it still just doesn't work for me.  I'm reminded of a Match I reviewed for Let's Go to the Ring (cheap plug) from a 1999 Show.  It was made up of two very different parts- chaotic brawl and then a tag match- that I didn't like that much.  It was just so much worse when it couldn't just be a 10 minute brawl or a 10 minute Tag Match- it was 5 minutes of each.  On the plus side, this did manage to one-up my own family's motto...

The Show starts out as a weird, whimsical Anime...but turns into Erin Brokovich.  If this Tale was personal to its Author, good for them...I guess.