Hello, and welcome to our weep there yet and exploration and education and anime. I'm your anime idiot, patrick dugan.
I'm an anime expert, dana hollander.
And I'm brenda mccullough. Your anime podcast. Making an anime podcast about anime podcasts.
Whoa. So deep layers. So mad up.
Got to get into side this shit. Working from the way out.
Finally, a behind the scenes podcast about behind the scenes podcast about making a podcast.
It's mostly just a lot of sad people sitting around microphones.
That's true.
Yeah. So, yeah, today we have a special anime that we're watching about the making of anime.
Yeah, it's a cute girl anime about making cute girl anime.
So, yeah. Brendan, this was your pick. Do you want to introduce us to this show?
It's called shiro baco, and I don't honestly remember where I found it. I think it might have been on, like, a list or people just recommending stuff. And I was like, I'm bored and an unemployed student during the summer. Let me just fill my time with literally anything. And I ended up taking a shot on it and really enjoyed it. It's an anime about making a short form 13 episode anime. And it's over the course of 13 episodes.
So in depth.
Yeah, I really enjoyed it. And then looking back on it after some experience in the field, it's like, oh, boy, I relate too much to this now. So we'll see. I know we've all had our fair share of experiences. Yeah.
So, dana, do you have any experience with this show?
I don't. I've never seen it. I've never heard of it. But I'm excited.
Yeah. You and I are on a level playing field this week.
It wasn't, like, huge. It's not neuroto. But it seemed to be generally well received. And it got two seasons, and they actually just announced a movie recently. And then they did an ova, which they released, which was an actual episode of the show they're making in the show.
I like that.
Yeah. So if it's like, oh, I wonder how the show actually turns out. They released it as an ova, as an actual single episode.
Cute.
Yeah, it's real neat. I like it a lot.
Nice. So shall we hop into the making of this fine anime? Let's.
The absolute chaos of animated production.
All right, here we go. And we are watching the first three episodes.
Oh, yeah. And it's all stubbed because there is no dub yet. Have fun.
Hey, guys.
Both is that a fun anime?
I don't use this word casually or lightly, but I am triggered.
Yeah.
This fully and completely.
I will I will start by saying, because this is a negative reaction to come back from, I like this show. Holy shit. This is exactly what it's our experience.
It's incredible.
If you want to know what making TV is like, here you go. This show, I was legitimately stressed through most of this.
There's a moment later on where I just like, it's something that I've definitely heard before. And I leaned back in my chair and went, oh, no, and covered my face. I was like, oh, my God.
A very physical reaction.
Yeah.
I guess because I was always just an intern, I had much less responsibilities, so I had less flashbacks as you guys.
I mean, to be fair, I was in the client services department, so I didn't really have to deal with this stuff. But I was still there for it.
Oh, yeah.
And experiencing the stress of everyone else.
So yeah. To preface for people who don't have this experience, we all worked at the same dubbing studio. So we're working on basically a bunch of different dubs at the same time. And so we would have a small division of what's depicted in this show, but multiply it by the 20 projects that are all going on at the same time. And then you get to this level of stuff going on. And it didn't help that the main character basically had my job.
All right, well, let's get started. All right, so let's have some fun. Episode one, we start off with some cute high school girls, and they're in a club together. They're in an animation club. And they are swearing on Donuts that they're going to make an anime together.
Don't, don't. Donuts go nuts. They say it a lot.
Yes. They're catch free.
Yeah, I didn't care for that.
It gets said a lot. It's a bit more.
Yeah, but so we get like a montage of their work throughout the year on their anime leading up to their school festival. So we hear names and stuff. But I really didn't focus on their names.
I wrote down the main character's name and that's it.
Yeah. There are about, like, 40 characters in this show, so I could not tell you more than two of their names.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah. No, especially later on seeing the show art, like the COVID art for it. I was like, oh, there's like five girls in this show. That's going to be rough. Wow. I was wrong. And it's even harder.
Much more.
Yeah, but so in the beginning, I was calling them like red blonde pigtails.
Sonic short hair knuckles.
No, we won't do it again.
Also, we can't.
Once there was a group shot and I saw all their hair colors. I was like, oh, no. It begins again.
Circle life. Yeah.
We get like a montage, a cute little montage of the different seasons. One of my favorite moments is when one of them is trying to color something with a fill paint bucket on the computer and everything gets filled in and she has to zoom in real close. And there's that one pixel missing one single pixel. Because I used to do digital art every once in a while and boy, is that relatable. And then, oh, it's so cute. They're like, recording the dialogue for it. And they're all sharing one microphone, so they're like shuffling around, switching places. It's all very sweet.
It's the whole school project stuff.
Yeah, I was enjoying it a lot. And then they show it at their school festival and sadly we don't get to see it. Truly a tease.
I think they've also released that as it's like a standalone ova sort of thing. So you can it's not great though. It's it's still a high school fan.
Animation, so yeah, but I like that they did it.
They did it.
They got it done. And then as I put in my notes, Red, Blonde and pigtails graduated.
Yes.
And they had all been talking about eventually making their way to Tokyo to be able to work on a show together. What were you going to mention, Brendan?
I was just going to say they kind of are all broken up. We see later in the other episodes with the intro. They're kind of like specialized departments of animation. So the main character is kind of production. pigtails is an animator. The redhead is a voiceover actress. Short hair, blue hair is kind of like motion capture 3d animating. And then the long ponytail hair is like a writer. So they all kind of specialize in certain departments of animation. So that's the way I refer to him. I was like animator, friend, voice over friends and so on.
Yeah, that is the nice thing throughout the show is everyone gets a title as well. So beyond just, oh, whatever this guy does, you get to see their role in what they do.
Yeah.
Yeah. I actually couldn't really tell. Aside from Red, her name is zuka because she's the only one that directly mentions like there are so many people that want to be voice actors. So I like, knew she was a voice actress, but with everyone else I was kind of just like, what exactly do they do? So I'm glad that you said that.
Yeah. We only really see like two of them in these first three episodes. They're expanded on much later. In later episodes.
Yeah. So they've graduated. They do their little donut chant again. And then it's two and a half years later and blonde Girl, who is the main character, which I wasn't expecting, Ali, she is in a car in Tokyo listening to a radio station, talking about the newest anime for the season. And I thought at this point I was like, oh, did things not go quite right for them?
She's delivering pizzas.
Seemed dark and sad. Yeah. But then they started talking about an anime and she got really excited about it. So I was like, is she a fan? Is she involved with it? But she is involved with it. She is a PA now.
Yeah, a production assistant.
Shout out to dudes. She's like at a stop light. And then she's listening to this and she's in like the company car. It says the name of their studio on it, and another guy comes up to her, and it has a different company name on it. And he's, like, revving his engine like he wants to race.
Yeah.
And I was like, no, don't. At this point, I was like, Is she about to die? Because that's how this anime starts. She gets into a drag race, and she fucking dies.
Not every enemy is so intense with twists and crazy plot devices.
Well, yeah, but I wasn't expecting a legitimate race scene.
Oh, yeah.
This was off putting when it was like, yeah, cute high school girls doing anime, and now drag race through the.
Streets of Tokyo anytime they drive, just stresses me out.
I don't know. I had to do a lot of deliveries and a lot of runs as an intern. Yeah, some of these were like this.
But yeah, I had to do them even when I worked there.
Yeah, we kind of get a little more character villain with him in later episodes, but yeah, he's just kind of like another PA from a different studio, and they're just like, hey, we both got to do deliveries towards the same places or sometimes the same people, and you got to deliver. They want to get their project done before the other person, so they'll race like it. Yeah.
Got you. Because they did end up at the same place. And that's when I was like, oh, okay. But so she gets to this woman's apartment. I guess her name is segawa, and she is the animation supervisor on one of the episodes that ali's show is. That was a dumb sentence, but you get what I meant.
Yes. The show they're working on is exodus, and that's who the voice actresses on the radio were talking about.
Yeah. So she's picking up some of the work from her. And I have a note that says, sagawa has big titties because someone's got it.
Someone's got it.
It's completely irrelevant. But she's got them.
It's been five minutes, and they haven't pointed out anyone's boobs, so they had to check that box off.
Got to fill that quota.
Big titties. Who's got them, who wants them?
Can't kill off the parents. We got to fill some other trope.
Yeah, we don't know anything about these characters parents. We got to do something.
Got to do something.
But so she goes back to the studio with sagawa sprains, and no one's around because they are all in the same room. They're in, like, a little conference room, and they're about to watch the first episode of exodus, which is airing that evening. All very exciting. They're having snacks. I love the studio president. All he does is cook.
Oh, he's great.
He doesn't do anything else.
He's just like a tiny old mom. I thought you guys kids need some snacks, so I brought some taku taki cookies.
Yeah, he made some curry for this evening. And this is when we see every single person who works in the studio and exactly what they do. Even if it's for a split second, we still get to see it. And I was just like, oh, so this is just an anime that people decided to make to show how many people and how much work goes into making an anime. Cool.
Which I do appreciate because you do fall into the mindset of like, oh, this one person's show is bad, so I'm going to talk about this one person. It's like, no, a bunch of people put effort into this, so maybe relax on that message board.
There's like 40 people for one studio, and then there's a bunch of third party people that only did a small portion of it. And in the end, it's like 100 some people.
That's why credits are long.
Yes.
Yeah. It was at this point that I started having, like, flashbacks because of, like, wrap parties that I had to plan with jackie again, shouts out to Jackie and phoebe.
Oh, boy, the episode airs.
This one seemed a lot easier, much more casual.
Yeah, it was real relaxed.
Yeah, but so the only person who's not relaxed is the director, who is a very large man. And he's hanging out. He's sitting at the head of the table tapping his foot. He's so nervous. And then they watch the episode. And I think this is when we get, like, little clips of, like, throughout the whole show, what's going on, which was kind of cool because it's like, obviously, we can't show you the entire episode of this fake show that we're making while making this show. So here's a little bit of what's going on. Oh, we also find out that pigtails, her name is Emma. She is also there. She works as a key animator.
Yeah, she's a friend from high school back in the old days.
Got the gang back together. Part of the promises fulfilled. Several of them are making an anime together.
Yeah.
Love it. So they watched the episode. It was good. They talk about the social media response. And the director is like, don't tell me.
I don't need to know.
And does something happened between that and, like, the next day.
The mohawk guy, I just call him Mohawk once again, every anime needs a shit character. And this is him.
I hate him.
He goes to get more curry from the president, and then while he's going to get it, he's overhearing everyone else, talking about, like, oh, I wonder how, like, episode I think they're talking about episode three is going. And you see him just, like, tense up real quick, and he's like, on second thought, I don't want any curry. I have to go right now. And he just seems really stiff, and we're not sure why. And then yeah, then we get to.
Next day because he's an idiot. spoilers. taro is an idiot.
Yeah.
But so it's the next morning, and again, this is when I had some super intense flashbacks of they're, like, going around saying exactly what they're going to be doing that day. And then I forget what her position is. Who is she? The one with black hair and glasses?
Is she like a producer with glasses?
She stands next to the president.
Not positive. Off the top of my head.
There was the one woman with like a business suit and short black hair.
Yeah, that's what I'm talking about.
Oh, I didn't think she had glasses in that scene. She's like the general manager. So she's kind of like the facilities manager. And she does a lot of stuff for the company, not the show. So she's not in production.
So everybody goes around and says exactly what they're doing that day. And then she just goes, whoever is the last in the building, please turn the AC off. And there's expired food in the fridge. Get rid of it. And that's when I was like, oh, shit, it's me.
So relatable.
That's me. That's what I did. I told people to clean their shit.
They didn't.
And they fully didn't. So they kind of start going about their business. And then they're watching a preview of episode three, which is missing ten whole frames of animation.
Yeah. It's just storyboards.
Just storyboard. Which is not good.
Yeah.
Because it's also slippery, heavy, like pivotal part of the episode.
Yeah.
The characters are falling from a falling and they didn't want it to just be a static image of them falling for 10 seconds. So they're like, hey, taro. taro. taro. taro. taro. I know it's taro, but okay.
He doesn't respectfully called by his own name.
Yeah, we can call him. I'll be honest. I like to have, like zero of their name set because there are a million of them. It's a lot of people.
Yeah, I only got a few. taro being one of them. He's like he's the most intern EPA of the ones that are there. Hey, if that makes sense.
I was a good intern.
I was an intern also.
We all were all intern. Yeah.
But we all knew interns that weren't good. And he's one of them.
He's that one.
He's the bad stereotype of an intern.
Yeah. So he explains that they just didn't get animated. whoops uhoh, somehow and they're like, scrambling to find somebody who can do it. Like, they suggest everybody in the studio. They're like, oh, can Emma do it? And they're like, no, she's too new. And I thought this was going to be like her moment. No, but I guess no, they're just not going to do that yet.
Yeah.
She's too new. Too fresh.
Yeah. And it was at this point I was like, there's too much happening for me to actually take notes on every single thing that's happening. Because they're talking about so many different things. And so much is happening, which is exactly like working in a studio.
Yeah, there's a lot of show jargon and stuff that goes on of like, which cuts are to the inbetweeners and which keyframes do we have set? It's just a lot of that stuff that's not super duper interesting to pass along so we can speak in more general terms.
They decide to take the frames that need to be animated to segawa. And she receives them. And she's like, god, this is thick. When do you want this spy? And they're like, tomorrow. Tomorrow afternoon. And she's like, okay, are you kidding me? But okay, I'll do it. So she's doing it. In the meantime, there's some guy with a bowl cut who doesn't really care for her style of animation. And they like, vaguely mentioned something about him losing an argument to her. But we don't really know what his beef is.
Yeah, we get into that also later in the series. He's kind of like an old rival from art school with her. So it's kind of like, I don't want her picking up the slack of another thing.
It's already head to head. I don't want her to have the satisfaction of saving our ass.
Yeah, kind of like that. He doesn't hate her, but there's a bit of a rivalry. And then segal also says, I'll do this, but what about the show? I'm animated animation supervisor forward. What's going to happen with that? They're like, everything's going to be pushed back because of this, including your episode. Sorry. And she's like, fine, I'll do it as long as I don't have to fucking work with toru because he's a fucking idiot. And it's like, good.
He's like sitting there. He's there while she says that, which is great. What a power move.
He's like at the door, still on there in her living room because he can't be responsible and has to sit away.
He's not allowed.
He's an animal.
But so she agrees. And then there's just like this huge domino effect. And I think this is when owie kind of has to go to every single department and explain what's going on. And I was just like, wow, this is incredible. Because it's very real. Like, when one thing goes wrong, every single other thing goes wrong.
Once there's one delay. Backs everything up.
Yeah. And then I guess she heads home after this very stressful day at work. And she has these two dolls that she uses to talk about her feelings, which is weird.
Kind of you develop whatever coping methods you need.
That's fair. That's true. And she's like talking about wrecking tarot and minced meat. And I'm like, yeah.
It's also not heavily focused on, but she's just constantly drinking beer when she's off the clock. So that's also kind of another coping mechanism.
As I said, you developed my favorite brand.
She's not drinking, like, at Miss Kobiashi's level. She's still functional, but she got needs up to unwind after a long work day.
My favorite brand salty dog. But so, yeah, she's having a time. It's the next day, she goes back to work. She's very mad at taro. And the key frames that sagawa is working on were supposed to be done at one. They get finished at 130, which is incredible.
Yeah.
Thank you, Miss sagawa. Good job.
Push yourself real hard.
Yeah. So aui goes and picks them up, brings them back to the studio. All the things happen that need to happen. It's great, thank goodness. But it's still so stressful.
Yeah.
She wrote Everything happening.
One of the producers to like, the dubbing studio to record some of the lines. He's like, oh, have you ever seen them record? She's like, no. He's like, I should come up. She's like, I got a lot more work to do.
I can't afford to have the privilege of learning things. Busy doing stuff.
Yeah. So, I mean, everything gets done pretty much. And everything's fine. I think I yeah, I kept checking out of my notes because I was just like, I'm so stressed.
It's hard to follow.
Yeah, the second hand stress was too much. And then she goes and picks up some donuts because she's the one that absolutely loves doughnuts, goes nuts for dinner. And she takes them over to Ms. tagawa's apartment, but she doesn't answer the door. And then she goes inside and she's fainted. And that's the end of the episode. And we get the opening as the ending.
Yeah, it does that. Pretty standard opening catchy.
Yeah, that was cute.
I like the way they shoot cast. Like the massive cast they have, but otherwise pretty popular.
Yeah. That sketch of like, oh, they're doing the animation character designs, but it's all the cast. And it's part of the show. And I was like, oh, no. What's real? What's fake? What's the show? Are we going to pull out into these characters being drawn in the show production of this show? And I was very stressed at this point.
I kind of would have liked it if it became, like, very meta and showed a real live action shot of the actual animators drawing the characters. Drawing the characters.
That would be it looks like it was rotoscoped, though.
Like, the hands looked like they were like real hands that were drawn over real hands. They might have hands drawn over real hands.
Hands on hands on hands.
Hands on hands on hands. Show and a show and a show. But yeah, episode one ended with segawa fainting.
And that's right where episode two picks off. It's going to be confusing because I wrote Main Girl. All right. I can't say either of her names. So I'm just going to call her main character I forget her last name. Mayamori. Yeah. So main character washed up. Miamiyori picks up the sagawa. And it's like and we just see, like, a random flashback real quick. Also something that's going to come in later into the series, but at least first of the episodes, not much, but it's an old cartoon that she loved growing up called chucky the Mountain Hedgehog. And it's just another hedgehog going, chucky. So without knowing that, this is a really weird interjection.
Yeah, that did sign me off.
I was like, oh, is that another show that's being animated somewhere?
It's basically the show that pre production will be here soon. Get ready.
It's basically the show that inspired her to get into animation, and we see that more later. So it's a set up right now, but yeah, so she goes over, I got you the supervisor, and helped her into bed. It's like, you overworked yourself doing those Rush frames yesterday, and now you made yourself sick and we can't afford you to get like, super debilitating sick. So you just like, stay in bed, take care of yourself. Your animation supervisor on episode four will push that back a little bit so you can heal up and then get back to work because we can't risk it. And while she's taking care of the supervisor, her voice actor friend calls her and it's like, hey, I just wanted to check in. Are we still on for our monthly meet up of all the animation club friends? She's like, not a great time right now. She's like, oh, okay, not a great time.
My friend is dying.
My job is dying. So then now episode four, which is her episode that she's a production assistant on and like, taking control of, is also going to be late now. It's kind of pushed back because the supervisor is now sick who was leading that episode. So that's when they go back and beg the other supervisor like, hey, she helped us with episode three. Can you help us with episode four? Even though it wasn't Egoers originally, and he's just kind of like bookgrudging, he's like, yeah, I don't really want to take up other people, I guess. But if the show is not going to run otherwise, yeah, I'll do it.
Fine, I'll save the day again.
So then we get to another production meeting where everyone's standing up their desk and talking about the schedules. And they said they always want to have hold on. Oh, sorry, I skipped over something.
The words production meeting again, they just triggered something in me that made me feel upset and like, sick. As you can tell, involuntarily, like, clenched.
Up, I am writing the notes for this show in the notebook I used at production meetings and just writing stuff down, just tensing up. I think part of what stressed me out so much was just like the quick, like, hey, what's the schedule on this? Oh, this is delayed. And me writing down those notes in the same notebook was just throwing me back in the worst flashback.
As you can tell, we lost our time at the studio.
Yeah, it was a very healthy work environment.
Everything worked out perfectly for all of us anyway.
And that's why we say exactly what studio we work at.
We worked at her. So main character is at the production meeting and they're saying they want every episode finished two weeks prior to the airing. That way they're ahead of schedule and they have time in case anything goes wrong. And they're safe. They got a good buffer of time. And that's when I find out another character, another production assistant, I forget his name. He's not relevant in these first few months.
Tatsu yeah, I wrote it down because I was like, oh, I relate with this guy. He's saying, is he the big guy?
The red hair? Yeah.
Okay.
Episode one was two weeks that was finished two weeks before the air date. Episode two was one week before the air date. Episode three was three days before the air date. And he said, at this rate, we're not going to be hitting the deadlines with any of the other episodes. And everyone's tense stuff of like, oh, no, showing you when one thing goes wrong, it just filters down into the domino effect. We talked earlier and this is when we see the main character running out again, going on another delivery, like going to deliver frames to another animator and get other stuff. And we see her animator friend just like outside on the phone talking to their voice over friend to schedule their meetup and then make her just runs by and doesn't even see her and doesn't wave back to her because she stressed him just running around and got focused on other stuff right now. So even though they work together, they rarely interact or speak together too much or not nearly as much as they did in school. And her friends are just talking about how hard it is. And the voiceover friend is working at like a ramen bar right now. We see her cleaning up at table and stuff while she's on the phone. So she hasn't quite made it yet. Yeah, they plan to meet up. It's tough.
Yeah.
And then where do we go?
That's a rough industry to get into, believe me.
And then we see the director sitting at some sort of bench or something and he's trying to finish out the storyboards for the final episode. So even though they're working and episode one has already aired, he has even finished the storyboards for the last episode, which is only 13 episodes, so it's not a lot of time. So he's trying to really struggle to get those done. As when we see actors coming in and they're like, oh, you're working on the last episode.
Cool.
Like, what do you have planned? He's like, what do you think I should have planned? And they're just like, I don't know.
What's the finale?
It's basically like, oh, no, that's not reassuring at all. And we find out. He's. At the recording studio and they're there to record I believe it's the next episode. I don't know exactly which number it is.
I think it's episode four. I guess if episode three got finished.
In the last one, that's true. Yeah. Okay, so it was episode four. And so while they're in the recording studio, the recording director is kind of giving the actor some tips on how to take lines. Be more excited this way, be more emotional. Don't do this, don't do that. And it's during this time they read a line differently than how the director originally intended it and that it kind of sparked a new idea in his head of how to take that direction of that episode. And he's like, oh, if she records a line like that, then we can do this. And it'll have more impact, and then we can go back because the main character actually has a relationship with his other character and we can do this and do that. And he's just talking real quick. And the animation director kind of points out, like, wait, are you saying we have to change stuff? He's like, well, yeah, just we'll have to change the drawing. He's like, if we have to redraw this scene that's fucking everything up. We're too late. We can't do that.
Yeah, going in to record everything should be set to redraw. It means we need to start from scratch for this scene.
Yeah. He said, we're already recording the scene. Now it's done. And director is like, Well, I had a different idea of what these characters are, and if we can just tweak it a little bit. And they're like, no, that's like and they ask the main character, if we change stuff now, how much time do we have? And she's like, if we start working on the new stuff immediately after this tonight, we might just barely get it done in time. So they don't have any wiggle room at all.
But the director takes that as like a hell, yeah.
It's like, that's not a no.
I did not hear the word no. Here we go.
I like the scene because it's the director and the animation director of the whole series kind of, like, arguing, going back and forth. And you just see all the mixers and sound engineers in the booth with them just still working, not reacting at all, while these two high profile people are just arguing behind them. They're pseudo employers.
I love that.
It's just like, hey, I got work to do. And these people are just freaking out in my booth. And the director says, like, we can't do this. The last series you did, it can't be like, last time. Last time, it was a nightmare. And it's because you kept changing stuff all last minute and we can't do that. And he's kind of like so, like, really hinting at like, there's been an incident before with a different series.
It can't be like, jiggly again.
Yeah, you kind of get a hint of that. We find out the previous series was Jiggle jiggle Heaven, which sounds terrible. Oh, you know, it's that high class.
They also mentioned in this argument that that show was so bad that jiggly is now an Internet slang term for, like, a shitty anime.
Yeah. Oh, God damn.
That anime was jiggly.
So they freak out and it's kind of like, all right, we can get this done right now. Start right away. And that's when the main character kind of pipes up and is like, wait, I think we all have to really reevaluate what we think these characters are, because clearly there's a disagreement with what the animation director and the main director think of this character and this line in the scene. So he's like, let's have a meeting and talk about who we think these characters are and what we think of them. Like, we all have to have POW wow group talk. And then, oh, there was actually a scene earlier where mohawk and one of the executive producers are out to lunch, and the mohawk guys talk about like, oh, man, those actors are cool. Like, seeing all the recording stuff, they're so cool. And, like, the voice actresses are so pretty and all this stuff, and the sacred poop is just, like, burnt out. He's like, yeah, it's recording, I guess. I mean, it's just part of the job. They're just doing their job. And you really see the difference between a young, up and coming PA and someone who's been in the industry for a while and who's just like, it's just work, man. Fucking relax.
You are freaking out that everyone around you is drawing these beautiful things in, like, hours that will soon go in front of hundreds of thousands of people. But all right, go off on the voice actors, I guess.
Yeah. And you really just see, like, the different level of enthusiasm or the level of enthusiasm and the lack of enthusiasm.
Of someone who's I mean, I always just think it's funny whenever people are like, actors are incredible. They can just turn it on and off. It's amazing. And I'm just like, yeah, that's that.
Job what you do.
Yeah, but I mean, I guess I can see how people would think it's impressive, but as someone who's done acting, it's like, yeah, that's the point. That's the point. That's what it is.
Yeah, it's like any industry where it's like, wow, that guy can make a chair out of a tree and he's like, yeah, you just carve some wood. Yeah, that's what I do. I make 15 of these a day, pick up some tools, beach, try it sometime.
Cheat down that tree, eat it on down. So after the scene, they go back to the studio and they just kind of have a big meeting with not everyone, not the entire staff, but kind of, like, all the supervisors and the people who are in charge of a lot of the stuff. And it's kind of saying, we have to talk about these characters and reevaluate what we think they are. So everyone's kind of annoyed with the director because he's the only one who wants to do this. Everyone else is like, we're already behind on the deadline. We can't fucking change stuff up now. He's talking about like, no, I want this emotional scene. I want the main character to be ugly but cute. I want her to be so ugly. And it's cute and like, what the hell are you talking about? And he's like, oh, I'm bad at explaining stuff. And that's when one of the supervisor animators calls them out. And it's just like, oh, you're bad at communicating what you want. Is that why your wife divorced you? And she's like, Fucking yo, bitch. And he's like, what? How do you know that? She's like, you tell me about it every time you drink. You don't stop talking about it when you're drunk. She's like, It's knowing as shit. She's like, oh, God, it is why my wife left me. Just like, oh, no, there's clearly more going on.
What a weird backstory.
They hint at it. He's like, no, I was super nice. I even gave her a settlement payment. Like, I was so nice and divorced. It's still a divorce, though. It's not good. And the animation director is kind of like, well, if you can't tell us what you want to change, how are we supposed to change it? What are you expecting to get out of this? And that's kind of when we see the president sneaking in, given main character. I don't want the main character because now we're talking about the show main characters, so it's confusing.
Oui. oui. Her nickname is Oichan.
Oyan. The president kind of, like, slides it open through the door and gives her a bunch of snacks in a bowl.
A snack basket.
She's kind of like so many of those. And dana has to actually all three of us, we all have organized the.
Drawers for the snack basket.
And that's when oy chan thinks, like, oh, a good way to identify who a person is is what they love. So she's like she addresses everyone in the staff, and it's like, we know where she goes. Like, what the character's backstory is, all this stuff. But, like, what's her favorite food? What's her favorite candy? The director's like, oh, it's shabby shortcake. And they're like, oh, no, that's too cliche. It's like, no, it's actually perfect because she's trying to be, like, young and youthful because she plays an 18 year old in the show, but she's actually 29, like the character. So he's like, it's perfect for her character, and it doesn't that and the animation director is like, nah, the other character would be with hard alcohol. She wouldn't like sweet stuff. She would like the bitter wicking stuff. And he calls her like, Ayachin, which I looked up ayatine Ayachine, which is a cute way of saying Chan. So it kind of like slips that the animation director kind of has, like a wifi in the show. Like, he really likes this one character.
Yeah, these guys are so horny for they made an oc and they were like, I want to fuck it.
I want it. Well, he says, I'm rooting for her even though she's not the main character. So the animation director and the actual director just start weaving out real hard in the meeting. But it helps them express what they want these characters to be and kind of flushes out the characters more. And they go back to the original voice line that was recorded earlier that day. And they're basically saying, like, the voice acting is better than the animation. We have to match the animation up with that quality because the actor did better than the animator.
Because right now it's just a cutesy like, I knew you'd betray us. But they want to have, like, so much emotion and detail and pain.
Yeah, the way she's crying is too cute. Which is I actually saw a while ago, it was images from Disney movies of characters crying, but edited to make it look like they're actually crying. Because, like, in a lot a lot of cartoons, people just tear up and there's like a single tear falling down their face. But no, people's faces get scrunched up. They get red, they get gross.
Yeah, they want the ugly crying. Like it's an emotional scene. So they want that. And I forget exactly what it is. But there's actually a Term anime that's like for a scene that's just like the high budget, like a lot of attention and details put into this, like one scene, no spoilers, but there's a big hour long episode of Steven Universe.
That's what I was going to say.
There's one scene that you can tell was clearly put a lot more time and attention. And there's a very famous Disney animator named James baxter who is just a prolific animator. And he did that scene, and it stands out because it's much smoother and fluid than anything else in that special. They want a scene like that of the main character crying in the scene. They want that not high budget, but they want the high attention to detail for that scene after the actor gave them such a good read. And this is when everyone starts getting on board and the supervisor animator is like, yeah, I can do this. I think I know what you're wanting so we can get on board. And she does a quick, rough draft, and they're like, yeah, that's what we want. She's like, all right, if we work hard and through the night, I can maybe have it done by tomorrow afternoon. And that's when the director is like, all right, you. Or the animation director would be like, you and the gothic lolita would get it done for us. And it's kind of we were like, oh, wait a minute. There is just kind of like a gothic made in this staff meeting right now that no one really addressed it all. And it's like, yeah.
She'S a character designer. I like that. She like, she's a character aesthetic.
Yeah, so she's the character designer. And then, like, I forget the exact title she has, but she's like the heavy hitter animator. She's their secret weapon. So they're kind of like, we're relying on her. Like, she can get done, but she's only one person, so we need everyone else to help as well. And this is when the animator friend also gets some action because she's also going to be drawing as well, because they need everyone. And then I think that's kind of it. I think that's kind of where it leaves off when they're like, all right, we figure out what we want. We all agree on it. We think we can do this if we really dedicate ourselves and work through to the night break. Yeah.
And there's this fun, like, eureka moment where there's sort of like a projection of the characters that appear on the table. Sort of like, oh, we're all collectively finally seeing these characters for what they are and who they should be. Like, oh, we finally figured it out.
Yeah, I like the metaphor, but I wasn't into the actual moment.
It was a little off putting, but especially since everything's been so grounded and real.
Yeah, that's what it was.
Well, it turns out the president actually laced all those snacks with lsd, so they're all just tripping real hard.
No, he seems like a party animal.
Well, he actually comes back after they all figure out what they want to do, and he has just a huge plate of takiyaki. And he's like, oh, I got these for you guys, because he just cooks and motivates them and encourages them to do their best because he's just a sweet old man.
And then they talk about someone mentions that it was hot, and that's what happens in Mob psycho. Also, he eats the takoyaki and it's way too hot.
Yeah, everyone underestimates the heat of Takoyaki.
What? Tour grabs the plate and the whole plate's hot, and he throws it up in the air because he's a fucking idiot. And that's when the gothic Lolita character designer catches it gracefully and has all the takoyaki caught on the plate again and puts it down, and we're just like, oh, she's special.
It's takoyaki taco adventure Zone.
Okay. Takoyaki.
Takiyaki is fun, though.
Yeah. And yeah, that's kind of it. We get the outro, which is pretty by the books. It's maya Morris desk with her stuffed.
Bear and her I didn't like this either.
Weird little pirate doll just dancing around to the music. And that's about it. It's it's pretty standard.
So I wasn't even special.
Yeah.
And that's episode two for episode three. This is very, very jargon and detail heavy. So I'll sort of just skim through it because it's basically they're in crunch time to fix episode four.
They have four days to us delivered.
Yeah. So we have basically the same night as the meeting from that previous episode. We have everyone just hopping straight into business. And Ali is in charge of both episode four and episode nine, which is coming up. So sort of getting double duty working on both of them. So all of the projects are assigned to all the people who need to do them. There's the animator, kisa, who is sleeping in late. The other production assistant tells awey like, hey, he may say that he can do it in the time given, but he's let us down before, so don't believe his bullshit.
He's notorious in the industry for waiting until the last minute and then being late.
Yeah, so she calls him and he's still asleep and he's not answering. And she's freaking out a little bit. And the Honda, the production lead, is sort of checking in with her saying, okay, where's all these cuts? Who has what needs to go where, when? And starts to ask all this detailed information and starts to overwhelm her. And this is the most relatable shit I have ever seen in my goddamn life.
I'm sorry.
When they were showing her spreadsheets, I.
Was like, oh fuck, I've made these. It hurts. It hurts because it's true. So she's getting overwhelmed. Honda is like, what, you don't know this stuff off the top of your head. And the other assistant steps in and is like, hey, she's still new. Don't kill her, please. We need her. As long as everything is set and everything she does is good, will be set. So she is running about. Everyone is basically working overnight. The gothic Lolita is doing the animation stuff and Ali is sort of watching over her shoulder as she works and accidentally knocks stuff over. But she's so in the zone, she doesn't even notice. So that's why she's like the heavy hitter. She's just so into it and so focused. And we see that basically everyone's sleeping at the office. The director sets up a cot and everyone's giving them shit like, oh, you tell us all the time. Don't stay at work because it makes you less productive. But everyone's so stressed because they have such a short amount of time to do all this new stuff that he wanted. So basically they go through all the motions of getting everything set up. The guy in the black shirt who was like fighting with the director, what was his role again?
He's the animation director.
Yeah.
All right. Yeah. So the animation director, Ali is checking with with him and he's like, okay, I will work on it. I'll get started. Call me at 630 in the morning and don't let me go back to sleep. Force me to get up and come into work so I don't delay.
Yeah, and he mentions it really quickly in episode two. But I think his debut as an animation director was on jiggly jiggly Heaven with his director. So he's kind of like, I got a history. You kind of fucked me over last time. So I'm not letting you do all these crazy changes and not be getting accountable for them and stuff. So he's kind of like he's got a chip on his shoulder against the director for doing this thing before.
Yeah. He's gruff, he's skeptical, but he's a team player. So he goes along with it.
Yeah.
So Ali sort of keeps going through all the production timelines and all that stuff and ends up falling asleep at her desk and has a stress dream featuring the toys on her desk, the dahl and pirate thing.
She's like a goth lolly thing.
Yeah. And there's a bear.
And there's a bear.
So basically they're sort of being her stress dream. Also very goddamn relatable. Just being like, oh, will everything get set in time? Oh, this is like her first show. Everything's still fresh and new. nothing's going to be perfect. You're going to have to fuck up a bunch before you can actually do stuff. And then she wakes up and she's like, oh shit, I fell asleep at my desk. But at six in the morning. So she goes and gives the animation director a call. And she's like, hey, get your ass in here. It's time to work. And they keep on going.
I like the scene because she calls me. Give me an hour. She's like, no. He's like, give me 30 minutes. Like no. So give me ten minutes. She's like, well, if you don't come in, I'll just forge your signature on these keyframes for the approval and just have it done anyway. And he jumps up like, who the hell told you to tell me that? Scare him off.
He's like, fuck, where did you hear that for? Yeah, make it in this town, kid. You know how to get you done.
I threatened to forge your signature and I got you up.
Yeah, threatening people is what really does it.
It worked.
Hey, if you don't want to do it, I can make it happen with a bad job. So up to you. Yeah, so everything is still on track. They go to the character designer and she's like, hey, come check this out. And she takes the animations that were set and she draws like a single line along the jawline. This may not seem like a whole bunch, but check it. And then she flips through and it completely fixes what they're looking at. And she's like, yeah, it's not all heavy duty revamped. Sometimes sometimes it's just a little tweak.
And she kind of tells the animation friend of like it looks like all I did was this little thing. But it's from years of experience. I know what to do because I've done it so much. It's not effortless.
So basically, at this point, we get a montage of everything going on track. We have everyone handing things off, running to location to location, to location, to location, to location. Nothing off.
Snap out of a duke. Get out.
Just checking in, saying, hey, this is set. Do you need this to go here? Got it. I'll do it for you.
Okay.
All that fun stuff just moving at lightning speed between all the departments, getting everything handed off. And at this point, my heart was racing so fast because that's my default state in these scenarios.
I remember a specific incident for me is we had recording at 10:00 A.m. The next morning. So it's very early. It all done. Script changed last minute. Last night I was like, all right, cool. I ran out and got all the stuff and presented every version of the script. All right, it's a lot, but we got it and we're good. Cut to me getting in at 09:00 A.m. The next day, like, hey, they change the script again. I was like.
30 minutes.
I did it all.
Now I have half hour.
Yeah, it's like, do everything you did last night, but do it again in less time. It's like, yeah, a lot of stress.
It's great. It's all good stuff.
It's great. We do it. We die for our heart.
So everything is on track. They are going to make delivery. Everything is a okay. And then they go to upload the color designs and the ftp is failing. Their file sharing service between all the studios is down. And I was dying so much.
This is the part where I had relatable reaction.
I am hugging myself right now, just talking about it. Because this is some bullshit that would happen all the time of like, everything is set. Everything is good. What's that? You didn't get it? What's that? It didn't upload? What's that these, like, 900gb of stuff can't get to you in time. What's that?
It's out of everyone's control. No one can do anything to help.
Yeah, great. Everyone is scrambling. People are calling, like the server operators being like, hey, your thing is down.
What? Fix it.
Please. Please. They go to, like, other file sharing sites and they're like, it'll be 20 hours to upload this and get it to where it needs to be. So everyone's freaking out. And then they go and talk to the place where it's coming from, the other studio that they're working with, and they're like, hey, we can drive this hard drive down. We still have the backups. It'll take 2 hours for us to drive it over to you. And they're like, okay, that will save us 18 hours. So, yes, please do that.
Oh, God.
Shouts out to that general manager lady because she just stayed calm the whole time and was like, this is fine.
Everyone relaxed.
It was so great. It was so real, her being like, hey, let me step in to help. But everyone freezes. And they're like, but you're out of the game. But you have to put in overtime.
She's like, I'll do it just this once. Oh, God.
Yeah, it also, I guess, like, hints at her being, like, a bigger part of the company previously, like, more of the production side of stuff. Not general managers are not important. Sorry.
Yeah, because in order to have a position like that, you had to go through all of that garbage. Yeah, that's why it's a privilege.
But with her position, she's less involved with the actual production of the show and more of just the general, well.
Office of the company.
So she's still heavily involved with them. Just, she's not in the crunch time like everyone else seems to be. So that's why she's so calm and collected.
Also, before this point, I sort of skipped ahead in my notes. Ali is having sort of a freak out because she's so stressed and running at a million miles an hour. And the other production assistant that is helping her earlier takes her up to the roof and gives her, like, a protein bar. And she's like, hey, just breathe. Just eat this. Take 2 seconds. You're doing fine. Things are going to get fucked up. It's often out of your hands, but you got to keep on trucking. You're doing good. And sort of just gives her that second to breathe. And that's when we find out that the server goes down.
Yeah.
So, yeah, we see everyone scrambling. The president of the other studio drives the drive down, and there's this nice interaction between the two presidents of the studios, where this studio's president is like, oh, I made you a nice quiche for your trouble. Share it with the studio, because all I do is cook around here. I love him.
He's just the face. He's just the kind face. And motivator. And Chef.
And Chef.
So there's just a nice moment of like, you really saved our ass. We're all in this together. And they get that drive to where it needs to go. Everyone gets everything set. And then we see the preview of the finished episode, and the director is watching it. We see the newly animated scene that everyone was fighting over yesterday, and it goes off without a hitch. Everything is beautiful. She has this anguished scream and yell as she's like, you betrayed us. Which was, like, the pinnacle thing that he was looking for. And everyone is satisfied. So that delivery is set and everything is good. They're all that scrambling, and there's only ten episodes left.
Yeah, that's episode four.
So we show everyone celebrating at the office. owie goes around and tells everyone that, hey, this is set. Don't have to worry about it anymore. And everyone is relieved. And then the production head, Honda, goes over to her and is like, hey, I know things are chaotic. I used to do what you do. And it's all about teamwork. We're all a team. We're all in this together.
And as long as anime production is.
Teamwork yeah, as long as you rely on other people and trust us to get stuff done, well, we'll all get it set.
Not meanwhile, earlier, she finally gets the animation done from kisa, who only had to animate two frames and took all the time in the world to do it. And there's a quick scene of her getting them at, like, night, really late at night, picking them up from him. And it's just like, you did it, but you really took your fucking sweet time with it. It's just like, yeah, I fucking hate this guy.
That's the worst, just seeing everyone scramble. And then there's that one person that's like, oh, well, I have until 05:00, so we'll start it at 430. It's like, no, you could help us so much if you just got ahead of it, please.
There's a scene where he's like, I'm not in the mood. I'm not in the creative mood. I don't fucking care if you're in the mood. This is what makes it a job, not a passion project. Fucking get in the mood.
And he keeps waving her off, being like, I've done like, eight cuts in an hour and you need two and like four. So I'll be fine.
Earlier on in this episode, I forget who says it and I forget why, but someone says it's a weird job and they're such weird people. And I feel like that just sums up the general probably general studio experience.
Yeah.
You have to work with so many different types of people and so very.
Little time and also so many different fields that require so many different personalities. Because the producer who has to talk to everyone is going to be so much more, like, welcoming and able to, like, work with you rather than the, like, animators and people who are like, I lock myself in front of the computer. I don't need to interact with people. So coordinating isn't my thing. And just having all these different aspects of it that shouldn't gel together, but have to.
It's amazing.
It's animation.
That's what it is. And at the end of the episode, we get like a little thing. It's like they're like calling each other and being like, we're meeting up on Sunday. And I was like, I want to see them meet up.
It's good. Yeah, they finally coordinate the high school friends. Everyone's all together again.
Yeah.
Which is still relatable if you're friends with your high school friends. I don't know if you guys are.
But I mean, I just moved away from them all.
Yeah, it's more.
Like, hey, we'll meet up once a year maybe.
Oh, no. Yeah, that's how. It is for me and my friends.
Yeah.
Anyway.
But yeah, that's what it's like to be an adult in the production industry. I'm so sorry. I really like this show, and I did not realize it would be so stressful.
Forever triggering.
Yeah. Did you watch this before your internship, brenda?
I think so. Or maybe I honestly don't remember. I think I might want to work in that environment. That's for me. I want to do all that super stressful stuff.
I hate myself. This looks great.
I mean, it makes sense when you put it in that way. Well, I think I might have been watching it before I got the internship, so I didn't relate to it as hard as I did after it.
That makes sense.
I still really enjoy the series, though. I think it's very unique, and there's so many different enemies about so many different topics. But this is one that is very niche, so I enjoy it.
No, yeah, I'll give it it is good. Just the information and life going into it. All the baggage I brought to the show was hard to deal with.
Were you there yet?
I would continue watching this as a cathartic thing with other people just pointing at the screen and being like, that bullshit. Remember all that?
Remember that's you that's what you did.
Yeah, I kind of feel the same way. This is a weird thing that I haven't said in a really long time. I would love to be in, like, the dub of this.
It's not dubbed yet.
I know. Having the experience of working in a.
Studio, we need that stressed out anguish of a PA running around at the last second. It's like, oh, don't worry. I got it.
I'm on it.
I got that on live hat.
And there are so many people in it that maybe I could there's a lot of people.
The one where you accept Method acting.
Yeah, I hate Method, but I'm in it to win it for that emotional recall. Damn. I got it.
We need this. Stress fever dreams. I'm sorry. We're going to have to take a few takes because I kept fear vomiting during the initial take because I was.
Reliving those moments associated for the last ten takes. Were they good?
I blacked out for a while. What happened?
Yeah, it was good. It was fun.
Yeah. Enjoyable. Just way too relatable.
Yeah.
Well, like I said, there's two seasons and a movie coming out, so if you do enjoy it and want to keep watching, or if you didn't watch this with us, and this sounds like it'd be interesting. There's about 25 or so episodes, so you got a good amount of content to go through.
Or if you just want to know what our whole deal is.
Why we're.
Like this, we're bringing to this podcast. Watch this show. This is the context you need for us doing all this.
Oh, man, it's great. Though it does delve into the characters more. So if you do want to know the back stories and see the friendships of the high school friends, like two years after high school, you do get that it is rewarding in that front too as well. So it's not just all stress.
That's nice to know.
They really front loaded it then.
As production.
So, yeah, that's going to do it because I need to go lay down after this.
Yeah.
Dana, I believe you have the pick for next week, what you'll be watching.
I sure do. I'm very excited. So it's coming up on valentine's Day and I thought a good show to watch for valentine's Day would be my favorite anime of all time or on High School Host Club.
Ooh.
So we're watching episodes 115 and 16 and my good friend joss is going to be joining us because it is their favorite anime as well.
I hope it lives up to the childhood nostalgia.
I think it will. I'm worried about what you guys will say, but we'll find out.
We'll see you then.
We'll figure it out at the time. Thank you for joining us this week. If you have an anime that you would like us to watch on this show and talk about, you can send suggestions to us on our social media. Are we there yet? On Twitter and Instagram or our email@gmail.com?
Social media is hard.
Yeah, exhausting. You can find me on social media at Mr. Patrick dugan on Twitter and Instagram.
You can find me at queen. Period. Weebu on Instagram and Queen underscore Weebu on Twitter.
You can find me on Twitter at abts brendan. It stands for almost better than silence. Which is my other podcast? I do about video games sometimes.
Great.
Yes.
I blacked out for a second. I very much need to lay down. Thank you to kabil ruli for our artwork and thank you to Louis zong for our theme music stories off his album Beats. You can find all of Louis music at Louisong bandcamp.com. Thank you and we will hope you will join us next time as we learn to live with anime don't work.
In the production industry.
Wow.
Oh, boy.