dangermousie | Full Metal Panic: Adorably Clueless

Opinionated Opinion of the Day: The most snobbish word in the English language is "oenophile." Not only is the use of "oe" reserved exclusively to Nineteenth Century Oxbridge Dons, but that's an awful lot of letters added so as just not to say 'vino.'

Anyway, work has been crazy, but I have found a perfect cure: Full Metal Panic. I can't remember who recommended FMP (and thus am inclined to assume it was my standard anime go-to person, a.k.a.

crumpeteer), but whoever it was? Thank YOU.

Take on very tired, very stressed person and add in a few episodes of FMP and you get total relaxation and total bliss. This is unbelievably funny, and even better, unbelievably fun.

It's an anime (of course, what else would it be with me lately). For any Bollyholics on my flist, think Main Hoon Na, only with teens and mechas.

Plot: FMP is set in an AU, post-modern world, where the Cold War has never ended, and various secret agencies still play their fun games. The protagonist of the story is Sagara Sousuke, who is a veteran with a mysterious mercenary outfit known as "Mithril" (they get points on JRRT homage alone) which is on the side of the angels. He is also in his late teens, so he is the ideal candidate for Mithril's latest mission: to protect Chidori Kaname, a high schooler who is also a number 1 kidnapping target for the nefarious 'Whispering' project (they haven't explained what this yet). Why is he the ideal candidate? Because Mithril can blend him in as a transfer student, and no one, not even Kaname, will know of Sousuke's true identity. But will Sousuke survive to even complete his mission, or will Kaname murder him first, as she finds the bizarre new student stalking her and protecting her from such dangerous enemies as art projects, fellow schoolgirls and a suitcase containing anime memorabilia?

Part of the true fun of the show comes from the delightful 'fish out of water' premise. Sousuke is intelligent, focused, and disciplined. He is also completely unfamiliar with the 'normal' life of an average teenager and his attempts to blend in are to die for (The series is worth getting for Sousuke's introduction to his new class alone, as he introduces himself as Sergeant and tells everyone to forget it immediately, and when asked about hobbies, lists every military mag on the planet and, in a little delightful detail, you see one of the classmen who has been reading just such a mag, gaze at Sousuke in awed adoration). Sousuke himself is rather cool: he is a too-serious perfectionist (

crumpeteer told me that the author of FMP is a Hornblower fan and I can see a bit of Horatio in Sousuke), but of course the reason for all the comical situations is that he is a heavy combat fighter and thus all his reactions are premised on that, and are huge overkill for normal life. And I adore Kaname, who is one of the rare anime heroines who I would love to hang out with: she is confident and cheerful and a bit of Hermione Granger in her bossy, anal-retentive way. I have no idea if Sousuke and Kaname will hook up, but I hope so, because the vibes would be delicious.

The fun is doubled when you add in other characters, like Kurz and Melissa, fellow mercenaries helping out with the operation, and tripled when you look at Sousuke's dead-pan delivery. At one point he shows up with his hands handcuffed behind a chair and when Melissa asks him why, he tells her, completely dead-pan: "She handcuffed me to a chair. It made buying a train ticket rather difficult."

I love the S/K interactions, my favorite being the scene where they sit on a train platform, after she got off at a random station because she saw Sousuke following her and after she asked why, he said "coincidence" and he jumped and rolled off a moving train to not leave her behind. (When she runs to him with "are you OK?" he tells her he just felt like getting off. Heeee.) Sousuke is rather adorably serious and a bit clueless (and you can tell he likes Kaname even if he doesn't realize it), and Kaname is this mix of annoyance (is he a perv or a creep or what, with the following?) and concern (as he fell off the train), and gratitude (he did recently save her from a speeding truck), and even a bit of lust (he is cute after all). It's adorable.

The funniest scene so far? When due to a really too-delicious-to-ruin chain of circumstances, Sousuke ended up sitting on Kaname's balcony in full gear, having an enthusiastic discussion about weaponry with an underclassman who climbed on Kaname's balcony to steal some of her underwear as a dare by older classmen. Yes.

Of course, now on episode four, the plot really kicked into gear (and I am always surprised how smoothly and suddenly anime can switch from hilarious to deadly serious) as Kaname did get kidnapped (and the whole plane hijacked with her), and the only one who can help her is Sousuke as Mithril thought they already took care of the problem and terminated the protection order, thus Sousuke has no support (he was only on the trip because 'we already paid the fees' heeee). And it's remarkable how comfortable and in his element he seems all of a sudden. Navigating normal adolescence may be hard, but not so with high-risk missions. This is, after all, something he knows intensely.

I am such a sucker for 'uber-competent guy protects girl, who is no slacker herself' scenario.

Poster: