3-nen D-gumi Glass no Kamen

Look, I don't know what to tell you. This is a parody of a manga that has been running for more than forty years. If you have seen Glass Mask or read the manga, then you will laugh at this send up. If you have no familiarity with either, go forth and watch and read, because they are perfect encapsulations of classic shoujo. There are send ups of almost every repeated character tick in the show- the white eyes when someone realizes something, Tsukikage-sensei's shocked cane drop, Maya literally eating something to learn how to act like it, etc etc. Be prepared for some bait andswitch humor too- the show will pretend to be an episode about say, studying for exams and then it will show how characters from the 70s react to the concept of a all-you-can-drink restaurant. Once you realize that nothing serious will ever get addressed, you'll be happier. For the people complaining, it's like you pointed to something on the menu you didn't read with a cow next to it and you are mad it turned out to be a milkshake instead of steak.

DISCLAIMER: If you somehow didn't read the description on this very page, this is a PARODY of famous shoujo manga Glass Mask. If you haven't seen it, you won't get the jokes. If you HAVE seen it, it's kinda funny. ACTUAL REVIEW AND CONTEXT: What it says on the tin. It's a low-budget gag anime that pokes fun at recurring events from the manga. Without that context I can see why someone would find this "bad", but why would you watch it without knowing what it's parodying? It would be like watching DD Hokuto no Ken without knowing even the "You're already dead" line. For example, Mayawill often "become" things in order to "understand" the role she's supposed to play when acting, such as "acting like the wind" to understand how to perform as "someone feeling the wind blowing on their face". This is one of the most important parts of the manga and what sets her apart from the other actresses she performs with. So as a gag, one of the episodes here has her act as a cellphone in order to "understand how to deliver a text message". Is it funny on its own? Not really. It's funny because you know what it's referring to, and because that's something you could actually see her doing. And that's the structure for most of the jokes here. THE JOKES "What if [event from the manga] happened in modern society as opposed to 1980?" "How would these 1980 characters deal with these modern problems?" "The overly sentimental character would probably have an emo blog nowadays" "What if they made the 80s shoujo reaction face to everything?" (admittedly the funniest episode for me) Do all the jokes land? Not really, some are very dull. But most are definitely entertaining, provided you know what they're referencing. I might've not bust a gut laughing, but I definitely had a dumb grin on my face throughout the whole thing, especially with the more absurd episodes. THE ART Not much to say. They're low budget 3D chibis that move (more like wiggle) like bowling screen/karaoke avatars. They're pretty cute, mostly because of how cheap it is. OVERALL If you've read Glass no Kamen or even watched the show, you'll get the jokes and have a good time with how absurd this is. If you haven't, you won't. That's not hard to understand. That said, I wish they'd have used other characters from the manga as well, especially during the episodes where they simply didn't have a joke and just spammed one-liners. Including the theater troupe, the directors, even Masumi's secretary or hell, Masumi himself who barely appears in the actual episodes, would've made it better. It's still pretty funny though, and since the episodes are only 4min, one of them not landing doesn't waste your time that much.

Overall, this anime does some things right for a specific audience, but a general audience will likely not find enjoyment in this anime. It is a short, slice of life anime so nearly all the problems are 'solved' (that is if they ever do get solved) almost as soon as they are written. This s personally not to my taste, especially as most of the problems are frivolous.The overarching plot comes out of nowhere, has no buildup and is solved as fast as any other problem after being introduced and felt extremely forced just in order to have something that they can call a finale.Its comedy doesn't have much going for it (not a great selling point for a comedy anime) and there aren't any jokes I found that made me really think. I didn't find any of the jokes funny and I feel that any audience above 15 would be able to laugh at any of them. The art uses a 3D style to no avail. The art is similar to Berserk 2016 in a few ways, just replacing the dark color palette with a color palette extracted straight from a rainbow and the edgy, sharp style with more smooth, curvy design. Overall, it doesn't work for me and I feel the 3D style was just used to save time and money. . The music isn't offensive, but mediocre. Still, that seemed like the best thing from the anime. Overall, I think the comedy is to childish for a teen or above audience and the themes are too teen centered for anyone under that age to really understand, but a very specific group may find this enjoyable.

I'm making this review because I feel like many people don't appreciate this anime enough or just don't give it a try. So, I'm writing this short review in order to make you reconsider and give this anime a try, I mean it's very short and you can easily watch this in a hour. I mean, the animation is far from good and the story was nothing to do with the original, but to be honest, I found very funny and kinda enjoyable. I feel like many people didn't like it because they didn't watch the original, so if if you're a fan of theoriginal, I think you'll find this so dumb to the point that it's hilarious.

Merchandise

Links may contain affiliate references

Studio

Themes