Iwa ni Hana

This has to be the funniest series I came across since Usavich – only the comedy is obviously a camouflage for a deeper message about life at large and a prelude to a bittersweet ending.

I think I made a new year wish some years ago that Director Shinbo Akiyuki (新房昭之) would make a come-back artistically and quit wasting his tremendous talent on mindless projects. I am pleased to see that Arakawa Under the Bridge is the challenge he undertook and passed with flying colours. I liked the story so much that after watching all 13 episodes of the first season, I also checked out up to Vol. 10 of the manga by Nakamura Hikaru (中村光), and below are some desultory comments with spoilers.

Arakawa Under the Bridge (荒川アンダー ザ ブリッジ)

1) At the very beginning, the story struck me as being a clever mix of:

• Little Mermaid - Nino rescued Kou’s from drowning in the river and asked him to make her fall in love.
• Kaguya-hime / tennyo tales – Nino has bad memory and may forget Kou if they are parted only for a day. This may foreshadow that Nino will likewise forget Kou when she departs from earth – as tennyo are traditionally said to forget about their earthly life the moment they regain their robe of feathers.
• Tannhäuser - A knight spent a year in a subterranean realm called Venusberg, where he worshiped the goddess Venus. He left it behind to return to God, before eventually returning to Venusberg again. (By the way, Neil Gaiman also created a TV series called Neverwhere inspired by the Tannhäuser legend, and the story is similarly about an underworld of weird individuals.)

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