There is a particular kind of show that I always find myself gravitating towards unconsciously. It’s the type that specifically focuses on either the inner workings of making anime or the culture surrounding it. They take a small portion of what we know to be the anime making process and then expand further to inform us of the trials and tribulations of making the very media that we have come to enjoy.
Back in 2015, I ended up watching a show that quickly became one of my favourites of all time, Shirobako. It covered the anime making process as seen from the eyes of a production assistant in an anime studio. But as great as that series is – and believe me when I say it’s superb – there was one glaring section of the industry that I thought it went rather lax on. Voice acting. Sure, Shirobako had a character devoted to that section of the industry, but throughout the show’s 24 episode run, she never really got as much focus as the others.
Thankfully for me, 2015 also had another separate anime series that filled in that gap very nicely. It covered the struggles of being a seiyuu in Japan while also being surprisingly informative about various parts of the industry viewed from their perspective. Ladies, gentlemen, and others, my name is Arkada and today on Glass Reflection we’re looking at the 2015 anime series from Gonzo based on the work by Masumi Asano: Seiyu’s Life. Let’s jam.
Futaba Ichinose is a rookie voice actress who is extremely unsure of her own abilities. She’s shy, easily distracted, and constantly overthinks everything she needs to do on a regular basis. She is one of three seiyuu that the series focuses on to showcase a potentially rose-coloured look at the industry. Futaba, alongside her fellow seiyuu – the energetic princess of strawberries Ichigo and the young but seasoned Rin – start off by all being cast for an anime series “Buddha Fighter Bodhisattvon”, a mecha series that despite its weird title and logo is of no relation to “Neon Genesis Evangelion”.
While Rin and Ichigo perform their roles of operator and “large-chested girl” respectively, Futaba’s few lines as the show’s mascot character Pipo leave her flustered and anxious. Even more so when she’s asked to do some impromptu lines of a secondary character, and after failing the first several attempts, gets passed by as one of her senpai’s is asked to come in and do it in her stead. This is what this series is about: the sometimes harsh reality of the voice acting business and the internal thoughts of one rookie who’s just trying to do her best and weather the storm.
Throughout the series, Futaba is thrown into a variety of different jobs, from narration to foreign film dubbing to running a web radio show alongside her fellow seiyuu. For most of these jobs, she ends up being the same bundle of nerves and anxiety that she showcases in episode one, but eventually (with experience and advice from the rest of the cast) she starts to become more comfortable in her roles and in her life as a seiyuu…only to get discouraged again and start over. As is the way of the industry.
What I really like about the series though is how it’s structured. Each episode focuses on a different aspect of the voice acting industry as a whole, as indicated by the episode’s title: Recording, Auditions, Starting a Unit, Being Part of an Event, and between the three main leads the show is able to show off how each of these parts work. They even left an episode dedicated to the role of manager, which replays a number of scenes from previous episodes but from the perspective of Futaba’s rookie manager Konno.
One of the reasons the show was able to get so much of the little details right about both the industry and the plight of rookie seiyuu was the fact that the original material was written by one. The original manga was written by Masumi Asano, a voice actress who’s been in the industry since the early 2000’s. While she is no longer a rookie by any stretch of the imagination, many of the situations that we find Futaba in can be traced back to a point in Asano’s own career.
For example, in one episode we see that Futaba had a part in a Drama CD playing the role of little sister to the queen of tsundere Rie Kugimiya. Previously, Asano had roles in both the Drama CD and television anime for Shakugan no Shana, both of which had Kugimiya playing the lead. This is of course not including their work together in the anime production of Hayate the Combat Butler. There’s a nice little circle of people that we keep going through. And also, there’s the little technical tidbit that both Seiyu’s Life and Hayate the Combat Butler take place in the same universe apparently, but the crossover between the two is small enough that they rarely interact.
There are a lot of crossovers with a variety of personalities from the industry though! In each episode of Seiyu’s Life, a well-known name like Kugimiya appears to play as themselves and give advice to the cast about the particular facet of the industry that the episode focuses on.
This all leads to a story that has gotten even more interesting as time passes. Because you know, when you have a story about rookie seiyuu, who do you get to actually voice them? Well, in style true to the story itself, you get rookie seiyuu. In particular, for the voice of Futaba, you get the formerly rookie voice actress Rie Takahashi.
While Futaba was not Takahashi’s first role, or even her first role with a named character, it was the first time that she held a show’s lead role. Then, in less than a year, Takahashi went on to voice characters in two of the more well-known anime series from 2016 with both Megumin from Konosuba and Emilia from Re;Zero. It does my heart good to see someone cast as this socially awkward but motivated and driven character to eventually find greater success on their own beyond the airing of this series.
Not only that, but the series has relevance for the lead actresses in other ways. Along with their characters becoming part of a unit called Earphones and releasing their first single in the show, the actresses themselves actually recreated that and went on to continue to use Earphones as a unit beyond the release of the show. This wasn’t just some one-off thing. They made this work and simply for that I applaud them!
It’s just the little things that this show gets so right that makes up for everything else. Because, on the surface, this series doesn’t look like anything special. The designs and animation are simple and the character’s personalities (barring their occupations) are nothing particularly noteworthy. But the staff behind this series about rookie voice actresses trying to make a name for themselves was still able to take that and add in enough polish in other ways to make the series interesting.
I’m happy that this got the adaptation that it did, especially when there are so few anime that focus on this topic. Like legit, I can count the number of anime that focuses on the occupation of voice acting exclusively on one hand – two of which have questionable scenes in them that I wouldn’t always be comfortable recommending and a third, which just stars a big piece of shit who is still somehow entertaining to watch regardless of how horrible her personality is. Despite how important voice acting is to the anime industry and despite the way that it has become an idealized dream job for many on both sides of the ocean, we rarely see this sort of story put to screen in any form. So when we do get them, I will be gunning for a front row seat because this sort of thing just fascinates me.
The most depressing thing of course is that the show sets up a potential sequel that will never occur. The ending specifically leaves open a challenge for Futaba to overcome in the following year or risk having to quit being a seiyuu, but it’s a finale we’ll never see animated because, well, the manga hasn’t even made it that far. Heck, despite still being listed as “ongoing” the manga ends even before the live concert in episode 12 let alone what happens beyond the show itself. Combined with its less than stellar amount of popularity the chances of seeing the story beyond this season is unlikely.
But you know, it’s also depressing in other ways, because this show is about voice acting….and it never got dubbed. Like I know it’s a bit of niche show, but when Funimation first grabbed the license to the series, I was extremely excited! I wanted to see what they would do with it, how they would handle the various guest spots by famous Japanese actors, what they would do for the ending sequence where the leads all sing, usually spout some personal anecdotes during a 15 second free-talk, and then do a brief karaoke session singing songs from Evangelion, Nadesico, and Slayers. But ultimately, their solution to that was…to just release a sub-only DVD and leave it at that.
Really?! Come on! I know that I’m extremely passionate about the show, more so than anyone else I know. Like, I went and bought a Futaba nendroid at Anime Expo last year and walked out of that place feeling as though I had just successfully smuggled contraband, despite the reality that I was probably the only one at that event who cared enough about this series to actually buy any merch related to it.
But it’s shows like this that sparked my love for anime as a whole for so long. Back in the day, I used to recommend shows like Genshiken that focused on the Japanese fan base of anime and how they go about showing their love and enthusiasm for the medium. I’ll still spend time talking about shows like Comic Party and Doujin Work that do similar things. I will shove Shirobako into the watch queue of anyone who will listen because these shows and Seiyu’s Life are the few that show us another side of all of this. They show us the parts of how anime is created and viewed with a variety of different perspectives and anything that does that I will watch with enthusiasm from this day until my last day.
So, it should go without saying that I’d like to present Seiyu’s Life with the overall rating of Certified Frosty, a rating that I reserve for only the best of the best and those shows too important to ignore. Sure, if the lack of buzz is any indication, there are many out there who won’t find this series to be worthwhile. And I’m not naive enough to believe that many people just haven’t heard of it before and that by making this video I’m somehow spreading the word. But on the off chance that I can somehow reach the ears of at least one person who would be interested in and love this show to pieces as much as I do, I couldn’t help but make this video about it.
If my passion has peaked your interest in any way, you can find copies of the sub DVD online, or more conveniently you can watch this series on Crunchyroll.
Until next time – ladies, gentlemen, and others – watch more anime! And stay frosty.
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