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So hot off my Mah Jong Anime Kick, I decided to watch another Mah Jong anime. I was told that Akagi was not only better, but the best Mah Jong based show out there. (Then again, I can’t suppose that it’s too competitive a field)

My first impression was that it was going to be too manly. Instead of being about cute girls giving it their all at a tournament, it’s about some guy running the Yakuza for all they’re worth? Didn’t seem like my kind of thing.
Then I kept putting on the next episode. Then the next…

The show is actually less about Mah Jong than it might first appear. The show is more using Mah Jong as a medium for mind games, and it works really well. It has the same kind of competitive mind game back and forth that makes Death Note so addictive when it’s “on.” Because these are back alley games, players can cheat, lie, and talk their way out of situations and, as long as they don’t get caught, it’s completely legal to do so. Akagi beats his opponents by both playing skill and sleight of hand. I just sit there, mesmerized. It is so compelling, not only seeing how he wins, but watching those watching the game try to guess his weird strategies.

But man, this has to be the cheapest show to animate EVER. There is a narrator voicing over and explaining things constantly, and as he does, you’re mostly seeing still shots of people’s poker faces being panned over, or shots of Mah Jong tiles that are obviously CG, so they just rendered each tile once and kept shuffling it around. It is so clear that this is so cheap.

Still, as I said, the show is completely compelling. It is certainly working inside budgetary limitations to bring me an amazing show, and for that, I am thankful. I’m about halfway through the series now, and I am almost certainly going to finish it… however, watching it has put me so behind on podcasts, I feel like I should spend awhile catching up on those first… but soon! Soon.