If you don’t think this is the cutest thing you’ve ever seen, then get out of my face.
Welcome to Osmosis Jones: The Anime!
Yeah like that joke isn't being made by FREAKING EVERYONE!
In Hataraku Saibou, Cells at Work, we get to look inside a biological world designed to mimic the human body.
The main cast of characters for this show include a newly created
red blood cell, lovingly represented by this anthropomorphized plucky and ditzy girl.
RBC’s job in this rando person’s body is to transport O2 and
nutrients from wherever it is to wherever it needs to go, mirroring the actual biological function of her namesake.
What I enjoy about this particular pitch as far as the setting goes is that it is equal
parts entertainment and education.
In the first episode alone, we get to watch RBC as she bumbles around the body trying
to figure out where her oxygen needs to go, only
to find out she’s been transporting a nasty germ for the
majority of that time.
But it’s okay though, as the show’s second main character is this Yakuza-looking mofo
that represents a body’s white blood cells.
His job is fairly simple: find and eradicate all germs.
And it’s a job he takes great pleasure in.
In the episodes we’ve seen thus far, the show takes these anthropomorphized characters
and shows us quite literally how cells work, how these cells do their jobs.
Including these little guys!
Representing the body’s platelets are these little elementary schoolers that are just trying so hard
doing their best.
And their best is so heartwarming to watch.
They really are one of the best reasons to watch this show currently.
But if in future they graphically reveal the fact that Platelets only live for
about a week, then I will have to burn this show to the ground.
They’ve already done an unintentional Made in Abyss references with these little guys,
and my heart can only take so much more!
The only real problem I have with the show is the lack of individuality…sort of.
We can easily identify our two main protagonists visually, but in the
sea of red and white blood cells we haven’t even yet been
given some sort of name to easily distinguish them from the others of their
kind.
Or rather they have numbers printed on their clothing,
but we haven’t seen anyone refer to them as such and
honestly I don’t want to have to pause the show mid episode just to find out a character’s name
cause I need to read it off of a little tag.
Thankfully as of yet, we’ve only really spent time with one other Red Blood Cell,
but like our protagonist we can just refer to her as Senpai and call
it a day.
What’s worse is that as much fun as I’ve been having here at the start of the series,
the lack of attachment I have with the characters will
make it hard for me to get invested as the weeks roll on.
There’s little to the story of the show itself, instead relying on the educational
aspect of informing the audience how these cells actually function
in a variety of situations.
While this in and of itself is not necessarily a bad thing, it could get tiring
by the end of the show’s run.
To bring up an outside example, as much as I was one of the few people who
loved the economics talk in Spice and Wolf,
that was not the main reason I kept watching the show.
So with luck we’ll see a bit more development with Red and White as we go.
For what it is at the moment, it’s a fun and educational monster of the week affair,
with cute platelets and entertaining antagonists, and wonderful
designs by the good people over at David Production.
Having said that though, don’t expect the same sort of charm out of this series that
you would with David’s other work, specifically JoJo.
Cells at Work is not JOJO, Like I know there is this one episode where there is a character and he
basically becomes JoJo....
Buuuuuuuutttt
It has thus far been it's own unique
foray and that I’ve been enjoying.
For this season, after several episodes, I would give Cells at Work a tentative seal of approval.
I may not make it through till the end of the season
but I think you should check out the series if you have the
time. It's in my top, and it's something that for the last couple of weeks I have been recommending to people
a lot and currently it’s available for legal streaming over on Crunchyroll and the original manga
for the series is available from our good friends
over at Bookwalker!
I’ll put the necessary links and coupon codes into the description for your convenience.
Thank you for joining me on this First Reaction.
Let me know down in the comments what you have
been following this season. Maybe we'll get to it, maybe we won't we'll have to see
And thank you to my patrons, who make these videos possible.
Until next time, WATCH MORE ANIME!
And stay frosty.
Later.