DESCRIPTION

CAST

REVIEWS

• 

  bernkacel

  100/100
  "You have to take note of the voices of all the canaries around you."

  Welcome to Irabu's Office is extremely surreal 11 episode psychological comedy about a psychiatrist called Ichirou Irabu and the patients that ask for his help. Each episode focuses on a different patient with a different (often ridiculous) psychological condition that interferes with their lives. The patients show extremely abnormal behavior that end up being manifestations or coping mechanisms for their individual struggles.
  For example, episode 6 is about a teenage cell phone addict that can't go without texting for any amount of time. He can't even put it down for family dinner and when his phone breaks he has a panic attack and immediately makes his mom buy him a new one. From the outside looking in it's easy to view him in a pretty 1 dimensional and negative way, but what this belies has more to do with loneliness and separation anxiety more than anything else.

  The people he texts? They're really the only contact he has and even then they don't talk face to face, they're just text buddies. Texting is easy, instant and lets you articulate yourself more carefully than IRL interaction which comes less naturally to people like him. When he texts his friends, it makes him feel connected, secure, and accepted. When he doesn't, those feelings go away and he's forced to deal with loneliness and the thoughts that come with it, which he can't handle and makes him panic. Lots of people have experienced things like this i'd imagine. Even if you don't even own a cell phone, his feelings of isolation and anxiety can resonate with you and even if you don't relate to any of it at all, it makes you understand those who would.

  This is all while the show is lambasting crazy trippy as hell visuals, changing art styles and even including real peoples faces overlaid onto the characters half the time. I'd hesitate to call the show's visuals "good" going by normal peoples sensibilities but it's at least one hell of a thing to look at and as someone that likes bright colors, surreal visuals and tacky aesthetics I was very much into it. The show also has an extremely memorable and varied OST which I still listen to months and months after initially watching it.

  There's a lot I love about this show, but what might've bumped it up to a 10 for me is the message it sends. Irabu himself is a very unconventional character and you could consider him a very unprofessional psychiatrist. He injects his patients with placebo shots, recommends them to do weird sometimes illegal things to treat their conditions, and generally acts in a very aloof, uncaring manner around his patients. Many cases are treated in strange ways such as when he tells his patient with OCD that obsesses over leaving hot objects like kettles in his house in fear that it'll burn down his apartment and everyone else's in the complex, even if he makes 100% sure to leave it off. Irabu's solution (for one of his anxieties, being cigarettes burning his apartment down) is to just put a bucket of water in his room where he can throw his cigarettes.

  You might think it'd help but ultimately his problems would just persist, but that's kind of the point. There isn't a pill for everything, no easy fixes, some problems just persist after any amount of introspection or psychoanalysis and that's okay. All problems have an underlying reason, but some of these reasons just stick with us for life. as the final scene of the show states, nobody's perfect. it's fine to struggle, it doesn't make you broken. If we could just see a therapist and fix all our issues shows like these shows wouldn't even exist. What we can do is try to understand our own issues and work towards minimizing them with the tools we have at our disposal, as well as trying to empathize with others, considering not just their actions but the reasons behind them as well. Thank you very much for reading this.

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• 

  R2R

  90/100
  "We make our simple lives, complicated"

  https://anilist.co/anime/6774/Welcome-to-Irabus-Office/

  ---

  Note : Spoilers are mentioned wherever needed

  To say that Irabu's office is odd is quite an understatement. "Welcome to Irabu's Office" is a trippy episodic tale that explores problems of mental illness/disorders. If you've seen atleast one scene or clip from this show, there's a good chance you might have felt that it looks off or weird. It's an odd but meaningful experience. Once I started to understand what the show aims at, it became really easy to go with the flow of the show and I think, you should give it a try too. And I'm gonna share my experience.

  Visuals

  Irabu's office doesn't have a single art style it sticks to, and constantly switches between these different art styles. You have your traditional 2D Hand drawn art style with it's colorful touch, you have 3D/CGI objects scattered around everywhere in the backgrounds, you have mob characters that straight up looks like cardboard pieces made by a kid for their science exhibition, you have rotoscoping and more than anything, you have a real 3D waifu named "Mayumi". Not your usual 2D waifu that doesn't exist, but an actual waifu that does exist! Oh mY GoDDDD!!!
  (OK. Ignore the last part).
  What I'm trying to say is that it's an explosion of all these different art styles that keep on switching or blending in the Anime with a clear logic and symbolism. The switch between each art style is used to represent the psychological state of a said character in the show. As for what that symbolism is, is strongly connected to each character that gets explored in each episodic story of the show.

  Characters and the bombastic "Symbolism"

  There's no sane character in this show. Pretty much everyone of em is insane, with each of em having some sort of mental disorder or psychological trouble. Irabu himself is quite the oddball. He sometimes a kid, sometimes an adult and most times, a talking anthropomorphic being. And he's the psychiatrist of the show. And Mayumi (the 3D waifu) is a Kuudere that has not much of purpose, other than giving shots and fan service (which I'll get to it later), and finally there's "Fukuicchi". He occasionally appears at the middle of every episode and gives a vague idea of each problem by directly addressing the viewer (yeah, he breaks the 4th wall). And the rest of the cast are your patients that look like they need some medical advice, since their mental health is very unstable. The symbolism is what sold me to this show cause, as surreal as that might be, it represents the mental problem using animals.
  
  Wood pecker for a cell phone addict, Rhino's horn for a permanent penis erect (it's exactly as it sounds) etc.
  
  And sometimes, it seems a little too perfect to the problem. It also switches between art styles depending on character mental/emotional state and sometimes used to portray a sense of realism.
  
  Take the case of "Ever smiling Hiro" for example. At the end of his story, he finally accepts who he is instead of worrying about his image and laughs at the audience with his trademark smile. At this point, everyone around him looks like cardboards and when they started to laugh at his comedic actions, they change from cardboard pieces to 2D hand drawn, giving the meaning that now everyone exists in the same world and Hiro accepted it.
  This sense of realism amidst the surrealistic visuals is a little rewarding and I think each of these individual stories are like a therapy session, which is probably the main theme of the show.

  Story and "Therapy"

  The entire theme & main aspect of the show is "Therapy". I'm not really sure how IRL ("In Real Life", for all you boomers out there) therapy sessions work but in Irabu's office it generally goes like this and it's this formulaic approach you see in every episode.

  Step 1 : Relax!
  You can't think properly if your mind is filled with unnecessary thoughts. So, it's always important to relax before working on something. In Irabu's office, the characters will be relaxed by Mayumi's vitamin shot, while she exposes her body. Again, I'm not sure if a vitamin shot works in IRL but it worked (Maybe fan service is the main point here (´-ω-`)).

  Step 2 : What's the problem and WHY?
  The "why" is the important question here. Each character share their experiences to Irabu as for what might be their problem. OCDs, Phobias, Addictions, Instability, Insecurity, PTSD etc. all have an origin for their problem. The aim is to find out what's the problem & why it's even a problem in the first place. And after that, you go to the step 3.

  Step 3 : Solve & "Implement"
  The characters in the show, as weird as they might look, are actually humans. Smart ones actually. They are smart enough to find a solution to their own problem, it's just that they are blinded by their overwhelming emotions. Maybe because of their fear or maybe because of something else, they just turn their eye away from following the right path and just adjust to their current state, which is generally where the whole problem lies. And Irabu just does that. He helps them to follow the path they're constantly ignoring.

  And there's actually an interconnection between each individual episode (kinda like an overreaching plot). Each episode actually starts at 16th of a month and end at 24th of the same month. So, you start to see another session happening in the background while also following the current episode. I kinda thought, it really doesn't have a need to interconnect these stories. It doesn't add anything too important to the episodic format, but I don't hate it, so it's not really problem.

  *"We make our simple lives, complicated"*

  The solution at the end of each episode is really simple.
  "Face it".
  If you have a problem, just face it head on. Running away and then worrying about it will only make it worse and this show portrays how many adversities that simple problem will cause you.
  

  ---

  Summary
  "Welcome to Irabu's Office" is an episodic psychological Anime about mental disorders and it does a wonderful job at portraying and delivering the message it's trying to say.

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• 

  SenNkA

  70/100
  Suffer throught the first four episodes, it will be worth it in the end

  Kuuchuu Buranko - Welcome to Irabu's Office

  The story of a psychiatrist doctor and his patients suffering through various disorders and addictions. Simple story, weird animation and a life lesson you need to hear today.

  Story:
  Psychiatrist Irabu Ichiro has it's own way of not only treating people's mental defects but also giving them a life lesson on who they really are and what is actually important. With his assistant Mayumi and horse injections filled with strange yellow liquid, they let your biggest weakness appear in form of an animal head.
  Your problem won't get solved so magically - it's on you to change your life, your fate and yourself.

  _Irabu is so ridiculous, I love them_

  Characters:
  Kooky Irabu-sensei, sexy Mayumi, yellow canaries and of course 10 patiens.
  Of course, Irabu and Mayumi would be the main character, but really... Aren't we all the main characters of our own story? That is the feeling I got when watching this.
  Tagged with 'episodic' there were a lot of moments in the show when the characters' paths crossed (even though they might not have realized it).
  Honorable mentions:
  Shinchi Bando - played by Daisuke Namikawa <3
  Fukuicchi - once you get used to him, you'll miss him

  

  Life lessons I took from various patiens:
  Mitsuo Tanabe - Don't forget about your elders. They have amazing stories to tell and you will want to hear them.
  Eiyu Tsuda - Take a deep breath and look around yourself. We all need to take a break and be with those we love.
  Tatsurou Ikeyama - Never change yourself for anyone. People that love you, will love you just the way you are.
  Yoshio Iwamura - Be yourself and use it for your advantage.

  --> *me ready for ugly crying, but not being there just yet*

  Music:
  10/10. The opening and ending were taken down but honestly, this stuff slaps. I am playing it on repeat.
  As for the soundtrack... yeah, it was all right. I doubt that you'd notice it, given all the unusual stuff happening around.

  Animation:
  You either love it, or hate it. Similar to Marmite, haha. For me, the animation was a pass. It was probably what made me want to finish quickly.
  At first, it was a huge shock to see all the real life faces and Mayumi was a big question mark... but in the end, you accepted it for what it was.

  

  Entertainment value:
  7/10.
  Good characters, some good storylines, great morale of the story, ridiculous moments... All good things.
  You have fun trying to make out something important for yourself each episode, which is also a big plus.
  Animation, art style, mix of real life and anime... those are my cons.

  

  Conclusion:
  Suffer through the first episodes and then ugly cry. Or not. We all are different. And we all have our own place in this world that only belongs to us.
  Fuku- Sen out.

  Bonus:

  ~~~~~~
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