異世界おじさん

ISEKAI OJI-SAN

ANIME

STATUS
COMPLETE
EPISODES
13
RELEASE
March 8, 2023
LENGTH
24 min

DESCRIPTION

Seventeen years ago, Takafumi's uncle fell into a coma, but now he's back like a man risen from his grave. Soon, Takafumi discovers two bizarre things: His uncle treasures video games above all else, and, while comatose, he was actually transported to another world as some heroic guardian! Now, not only does Takafumi have to room with an uncle who is literally magical, he also has to catch the guy up on two decades of history—smartphones, high-speed internet, modern anime tropes…and the traumatic outcome of the '90s console war!

(Source: Yen Press)

CAST

Yousuke Shibazaki
Takehito Koyasu
Takafumi Takaoka
Jun Fukuyama
Suzailgiererzegalnelvzegilreagranzelga Elga
Haruka Tomatsu
Mabel Laybelle
Aoi Yuuki
Sumika Fujimiya
Mikako Komatsu
Alicia Edelcia
Aki Toyosaki
Sawae-san
Hisako Kanemoto
Raiga
Nobuhiko Okamoto
Edgar
Kenichi Suzumura
Chiaki Fujimiya
Wataru Takagi
Hagen Regfalgen
Kousuke Toriumi
Ricardo Markfield
Tomoaki Maeno
Grayler
Yumi Uchiyama
Doldoll Rexdol
Shouta Yamamoto
Karn Zernegan
Nobuo Tobita

EPISODES

Dubbed

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Not available on crunchyroll

RELATED TO ISEKAI OJI-SAN

MANGA ActionIsekai Oji-san

REVIEWS

Douzeries
80/100
F#ck isekai ! - Isekai Oji-san
Isekai Ojisan is too good and it's how you write an isekai ! ( Even though it's an unconventional one...)

It's the story of Ojisan, a past NEET who got isekai'd into another magical world and actually got back. He got back for a good reason : he did not enjoy it one bit.

I HATE ISEKAI

huge bait on this section title, it's to keep you hooked
I have a problem with isekai. To explain it I must first ask and answer two questions :
- What is the point of an isekai ?
  Escapism of course ! Forget about your trash boring life and embark on an amazing journey where you'll have everything you ever dreamed of : powers, 'em looks and even an harem ! Everything !
- Now, who is it aimed at ?
  Otakus, NEET and hikikomori of course ! (all of them in their objective pejorative initial sense). It's for people who close themsleves off from real world and live in their own delusions. They blame everything around them but themselves, they have to, how could they accept their conditions otherwise ?
From there, you might see my problem with the genre. It helps justifying delusions and the trope setting is similar to the aimed viewers' lives, putting them even more under the illusion, creating a nasty self insertion where the viewer gets all the things he'd like to have in real life without actively working fo it. It's very much like porn. It also creates a dangerous mindset, think about it, why would you have to change if the world changes for you, Isn't it better to assume that it's the world's fault and that you're just misunderstood ? Obviously, society isn't perfect but it doesn't mean that you should cut any ties with the outside world.

I'm not even saying isekai animanga are bad or absolute trash. Tensura is one of the anime I enjoyed the most watching despite it not contradicting anything I said and there's great isekai like Mushoku Tensei that completely defies what I said about the genre. Plus, it's not an isekai-only prolem, slice of life animanga also share the same problem as I disscussed in my Yuugami-kun doesn't have any friends review. And to relativize, ANY piece of fiction can provide bad escapism depending on who's reading it. If I target isekai in particular it's because practically every single one of them PURPOSELY use their viewers loneliness against them just to sell.

Isekai Ojisan does not do that and excels at subversing it.

One misconception that people have about "a second chance in life" (involving time travel, isekai etc) is that they think they would suddenly be complete different persons and by result their whole life would become far better. We live our WHOLE lives trying to be better, struggling hard with our flaws and bad habbits and sometimes they never even fade yet we have the audacity to think we'd just completly change just like that. If you've been a procrastinator your whole life, how would that change if you went back in time? If you went in another world? You can't change yourself in the present so how the f"ck are you gonna do that elsewhere? It's so easy to blame the circumstances but ultimately they always change and that don't necessarily make you become a better individual.

Ojisan's ugliness is metaphor for his game addiction and "rotted" mindset. He gets despised and he's being outcasted just like in his original world. His ugliness follows him and it's that ugliness that cause people to react.

He didn't enjoy the magical world for two things :

The perceptions others have on him didn't change. As said previously, they see him as ugly. It disgusts them and he becomes once again an outcast. Society wasn't softer on him. He isn't excused for being an outsider and this in itself makes it an anti-isekai.

His worldview hasn't changed : Ojisan never was that interested in "real world", he always prefered video games. What happend when he gets into another world ? He only thinks about video games and tries to get back to Earth only to play them. He never socialized, what happend when he gets into another world ? He has trouble understanding the feelings of his friends and he can't believe someone genuinely likes him.

He is human, he isn't a self-insert mc who never talked to someone but suddenly becomes a great nation leader overnight. His internal issues don't magically disappear along with the world he's into, they follow him everywhere and HE has to fix them

CONCLUSION

Ojisan doesn't care about societal cases or superficial things, he treats everyone the same. He knows who he is and embrace it. He lives in his own world yes but that doesn't restrain him to be nice and caring and he doesn't hurt others. He's happy and it shows, despite what anyone thinks. His "ugliness" is only how others perceive him at first, when they get to know him, it becomes irrevelant.

I initially thought the overall message was "F#ck isekai ! This is real life, even if the world changes, you don't. You can escape your responsibilities, your family, your life but the one thing you'll never be able to escape is yourself."

But along the episodes I think this message would be more appropriate " F#ck isekai ! I don't need a perfect utopian world to be happy. Just because I don't fit in your standards doesn't means I'm a degenerate. Wherever I am, I'll alaways be me and that's not a cage but an opportunity."

In either cases...

F#ck Isekai !

if you want to discuss this review you can leave a message on my profile I always appreciate feedback
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ElfChika
100/100
Enter Isekai Ojisan: The New Crowning Anti-Isekai series among Anti-Isekai
Finally, after nearly a year, AtelierPontdarc complete season one of the brilliant Uncle from Another World. This past year has evidently been a major struggle for the team as covid forced them to delay episodes for weeks and weeks until weeks turned into months, thus what started out as a July 2022 summer seasonal anime ended up being finished in early spring March 2023, nearly a year on from when the first episode dropped.

It was a saddening situation all round and my heart goes out to them. If Netflix – who owned streaming rights to Uncle from Another World (Otherwise known as Isekai Ojisan in Japan) – ever get around to releasing season 1 on DVD, I will be sure to splurge out on both the normal and Blu-ray editions. The team deserve all the revenue for this low-key hidden gem they dropped last year.

Isekai Ojisan – adapted from Hotondo Shindeiru’s humble web comic - stars 34-year-old Uncle returning from his 17-years of exhausting Isekai-adventure in another world, hence the title. Hotondo-sensei made the ingenious decision to open the initial chapter from Uncle’s nephew’s perspective and thankfully, this was faithfully adapted in the anime. The episode opens up with Takafumi – Uncle's nephew who was only a baby when he left Japan 17 years ago – walking over a pedestrian crossing as truck-kun whizzled on by, seemingly inches close from ploughing him into another world. ^^
If you have even passing knowledge of Isekai anime, you wouldn’t have missed the joke here. The opening instantly hooks you, letting you know you’re in for a wild parodied ride of the Isekai genre.

Takafumi then narrates, “2017, Fall.” Walking up a flight of stairs to Uncle’s hospital room. “My Uncle was struck by a truck when he was 17. After 17 years of being in a coma, he awoke.” If that’s not an intriguing premise by itself, I then don’t know what is. In an ordinary Isekai, this would be about Uncle’s adventure in the fantasy world and maybe everything going wrong for him like was the case in Konosuba; Or In an reverse Isekai you would have the fantasy habitants coming to our world like in The Devil is a Part-Timer, for instance.
Rarely do you see a protagonist returning to his own world after completing his journey, regaling his tales of how he basically fucked up his Isekai life in increasingly ridiculous and often hilarious ways. This is the anti-Isekai even dethroning the previous seated king of anti-Isekai in Konosuba in this young lady's humble opinion.

I particularly adore Takafumi’s believable reaction to reuniting with Uncle. If you had a comatose relative who awoke from one day out of the blue and started speaking in an unknown language you’ve never heard of, you’d think they’re crazy, too. Heck, episode one perfectly misleads you into thinking Uncle’s lost his mind telling the scene from Takafumi’s POV as he awkwardly watches his Uncle attempt a spell.
Then the punchline is delivered as Uncle adjusts to being back in Japan and floats a vase up, painting Takafumi’s stark realization in such wonderful comiedic detail, flashing screens of RPG games behind him as he slowly rips up the separation papers he brought to cut Uncle off. My words can't do the scene justice enough so here’s a peek preview. link

We even get a brief insight into Uncle’s wonderful personality (see: link above) when he excitably asks his nephew if his beloved “Sega wa” has won the console wars, getting absolutely crushed when Takafumi gives him the bad news that it pulled out the console business a long time ago and promptly erased the answer from his mind for the second time in the episode, jogging it down for reference. ^^ This prompts Takafumi to finally asks what Icuras cuora is and he promptly explained its purpose of erasing his mind whenever things get too dire for him.

This serves to emphasis Uncle’s adorable love of Sega, ensuring he has a personality unlike most generic, blank-state Isekai protagonists and foreshadows the tribulations he endured in the other world, made clear when Takafumi glanced into his notebook and immediately broke down in tears, swiftly asking for his mind to be erased.

Knowing he could use his Uncle’s powers to make a bit of money off YouTube, Takafumi takes him home once he’s discharged from the hospital, thus begins their new life together.
To say any more would be to rob you of the brilliance of Isekai Ojisan’s comedic genius, so let’s talk a bit about the characters, starting with the main man Uncle.

Uncle – Commonly referred to as oji-san by Takafumi and his childhood friend, Uncle is unconventionally “ugly,” poking fun at the conventionally pretty boy protagonists of the Isekai genre. He still resembled a 30-year-old young man rather than the teenager that he was when he arrived in the other world, having an exact identical body formed into existence upon his arrival. This tragically and hilariously lands him in all kinds of hot water with the conventionally good-looking habitants of the Isekai world.

They mistook him for some kind of mythical creature referred to as an orc and promptly beat him in slapstick fashion. Unable to speak the language Uncle begged for a way to communicate with his assailants, thus his first skill of translation is born. Unfortunately, that only worsened matters as they just thought he was a rare kind of orc that could speak their language and promptly sold him off for chump change, setting the tone for the rest of Uncle’s twisted Isekai life. He even accidentally collects a diverse harem of girls hilariously giving off the wrong signals for ultra-comedic effect.

Seeing Uncle try and adapt to the times is both incredibly, charmingly infectious and hilarious, being so out of touch he didn't account for a delivery fee when he adorably ordered an old-fashioned spin phone and would've ended up paying the rough equvalent of about twelve dollars if he couldn't fly and retrieve it himself. He doesn't realize he shouldn't snap back at his YouTube viewers with defensive replies when they assumed his magic is "CGI". He even has his pride as a YouTuber shattered when his viewer numbers shot up only after transforming into his beautiful elf friend of his Isekai harem. He was honestly a joy to watch.

Takafumi and Fujimiya – They’re essentially the audience surrogates. Their reactions to the absurdity Uncle brings is believable in the best ways possible. Fujimiya, a childhood friend of Takafumi that reconnected with him in the early episodes, initially couldn’t stand Uncle at first and thought he was just a jobless bum Takafumi needed to cut off. Hotondo-sensei uses her to hilariously flip the old childhood friend troupe. She saw their early friendship as something pure and sweet when the reality couldn’t be further from the sort as Uncle revealed using his magic.

Elf – Otherwise known as tsundere-san literally by Takafumi joins Uncle’s unconventional and unofficial harem first. Elf might be my favourite character, which says something because I don’t normally like tsunderes. A common mistake anime typically makes with tsundere characters is that it exaggerates the tsuntsun part of the tsundere’s personality and not enough on the deredere part resulting in them being really obnoxious. The bitch from the aforementioned The Devil is a Part-Timer is a perfect example of this. That isn’t the case with Elf as she has plenty of adorable deredere moments that are just so wholesome and precious. Elf's voice actress Tomatsu Haruka performed exquisitely, lending Elf an adorableness that was impossible not to love.

Uncle gave her a ring to pawn off, not realizing he was essentially proposing to her and even after the misunderstanding is cleared up and she sells the ring, she ends up buying it back after Uncle made the same mistake of giving another ring to another girl because she felt threatened. Her unwillingness to be true with her own feelings is always depicted so adorably.
The other two girls Uncle encounters and accidentally woos in the most “Uncle way” possible are also exceptionally written with their own distinct personalities (I particularly love Mabel’s hilarious ego and laziness) but Elf stands above them in my opinion. It really almost felt like she and Uncle had something special despite Uncle’s subpar looks. She fell for his personality, who he is as a person and I think that’s wonderful.

Animation and artstyle – I absolutely love that the team took inspiration from Mob’s Psycho 100’s brilliant cartoonish artstyle, painting the episodes with a dim sheen that fits the comedic dark nature of the series. Less detail in the art also paved the way for some truly expressive animations, really bringing the characters to life. It’s all around superb.

Score - Perfectly encapsulates the comedic tone of the scenes and even has it triumphant and heartstring moments, too.

In conclusion: Isekai Ojisan is a beautifully ridiculous series cleverly dunking on the Isekai genre in ways that never fail to leave a smile on my face. I can't recommend enough it. I really hope it gets awarded a second season.

Final score - 100/100
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MechaDragonX
80/100
A Unique and Interesting Concept Executed Super Well
Since it looks like I can post this publicly, this is a short review and the most analytical or anything. It's mainly there for me to be able to gather my thoughts after watching the show, but also so any of my friends can read this to see if they should watch the show in the future. Please keep that in mind while reading this review.

Uncle From Another World tells the story of a young man who's youth was taken away from him by Truck-kun...until he woke up from a coma several years later in the modern day, while speaking some whack-ass language. During the past 20 or so years he has been living in a fantasy world, and the show sees him tell the stories of his time in the isekai through magic video playback.

This show is split up between two sections primarily, direct retellings of Uncle's time in the isekai and the shenanigans he, his nephew, and later, his nephew's female childhood friend. To me, what makes this show fun are the Sega references (Uncle was a Sega kid who's first love was Sonic and Tails, but as Sega did not have a market at all in Japan, he had no friends; the disconnect Uncle feels since he's not used to the modern day, and the conflicts that arise from it; and couple aspects of the isekai sections.

There are two primary aspects of the comedy in the isekai sections in my opinion, Because Uncle is seemingly exceptionally ugly, he experienced insane prejudice with people trying to kill him constantly. The other aspect would be the harem he develops and how he is exceptionally clueless. Both of these tend also have the gag of him erasing his memory. These jokes don't always land, but they land the vast majority of the time. At certain points, it'll cut back to the current day and the nephew and friend will react and that also add to the humor.

Honestly, the only thing I didn't really like about the show is the final bathhouse and battle arc, but I watched this show for the slice of life and comedy elements. This final arc wasn't done poorly at all. The character moments were great.

All in all, this was maybe the most unique and fun isekai I've ever had the pleasure of watching, since it's not even focused on the isekai adventures, in my opinion. I'm pretty biased against fantasy and action shows, which is what isekais tend to be, and it's not like I have experience with such games or MMOs either to always get some of the humor and references their worlds and characters are built-on, but because of that, I can definitely say that this is an isekai that I whole-heartedly recommend. This does not disappoint!

Hopefully there'll be a season 2, but with the troubled release schedule and botched release by Netflix US, I highly doubt there's a market. Which is really sad.
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