What is fanservice?
When you say the word “fanservice”, I feel like most people think of something very particular – the beach episode, the hot springs episode, panty shots, or anything else that puts cute girls (or beautiful women) in skimpy outfits or less for the viewing pleasure of the audience or otherwise indulges prurient desires. And, certainly, this is a kind of fanservice… but it’s not the only one. I’ve talked about others before; in Granblue Fantasy when a ton of characters we’ve never seen jump out and show their stuff in the final plot episode, obviously to appeal to people who were their fans in the game even though the plot didn’t have room for them, that’s a kind of fanservice.
In short, while there is absolutely one
kind that stands heads and shoulders above the rest, fanservice is
material that exists to gift the audience with exactly what they
believe they want, satisfying some natural viewer desire whether or
not it’s actually germane or intellectually fitting.
I bring this up because, in a sense,
even though there’s almost nothing even remotely titillating in this
show, Helpful Fox Senko-san could be seen as something of a
“fanservice anime” to the same degree as any title with a
ludicrous concept excusing lots of bouncing boobs is a “fanservice
anime”. It’s just looking to scratch a very different itch: one
for comfort and solace in a sometimes abusive world.
The basic idea of Helpful Fox Senko-san
is that a salaryman, Kuroto, is miserable. In his case (eventually
explained in the manga, but I won’t go into depth here) it’s no
garden variety misery, manifesting as a dark aura that draws the
attention of the spirit world. Because of this, one of the kitsune
observers, the 800-year-old gold-furred loli Senko, decides to go to
the mortal world to pamper him and make him feel better.
That is, honestly, the plot of most of
the show. After a (funny) token resistance to the idea, Kuroto
accepts Senko’s presence and intent, and though he sometimes has more
trouble accepting particular pampering, he finds he’s brought a
surprising lot of peace by fluffing Senko’s tail, safe and warm with
silky soft fur.
In all honesty, that covers a great
deal of the show: most episodes center around some particular thorn
in Kuroto’s side and/or Senko’s attempt to pamper him out of his
stress. It’s saved, though, from being a true Slice of Nothing by a
little recurring low-key comedy and the occasional moment of plot.
Humor, for instance, may involve the fact that Senko, as an
800-year-old Kitsune, doesn’t quite understand how the modern world
works, and is particularly bad with machinery. More funny elements
creep in as we expand the cast, introducing first Kuroto’s neighbor,
the university-student manga artist and frequent gamer Koenji, and
then Senko’s smug, higher-energy, white-furred kitsune friend Shiro,
who ends up crashing with Koenji. This adds the two of them in as
comic foils to Senko and Kuroto.
Eventually, we introduce the third
kitsune, Sora. She’s got multiple tails, womanly curves, and a
teasing demeanor. She’s also Senko’s superior, and acts as something
of a trickster mentor, challenging Senko in a way that Shiro’s brief
interference never could and delivering the closest thing we get to a
dramatic plot: Sora summons Senko back to the spirit realm at a
crucial time and questions her about her ties to Kuroto, with a
decent hang-time (including an episode cliffhanger) where it’s
uncertain whether or not Sora will permit Senko to return to the
mortal world and keep pampering Kuroto. Which, of course, she does.
Knowing the show we’re in, it’s not exactly a serious question.
Most episodes (possibly all of them, I
didn’t go back to double-check) have a post-credits section: “Super
Senko-san Time!”. In this segment, the entire show is done via a
point of view shot where Senko directly addresses the viewer, and
offers a little pampering. To an extent, this is the hallmark of the
show’s fanservice: this thing exists, primarily, so people who find
themselves weary or worn-out by life can self-insert into the
experience of being taken care of by a being as nice as Senko-san,
the same way that your stereotypically “fanservice” isekai-harem
lets viewers self insert into the romantic escapades and power-trip
adventures of its leading character.
And yet, despite not really having much
of a plot that I could go into detail on, I think there might be a
little more to Helpful Fox Senko-san than many other shows that exist
for the express purpose of fanservice. It’s something that’s hard to
put your finger on, but even though the appeal of the show is
flagrantly apparent, it feels more comfortable in its skin than
others, like that’s not really a problem, it just is what it is.
Perhaps it’s the nature of the
fanservice. Helpful Fox Senko-san wants to be inviting,
approachable, and soothing. Unlike other fanservice, that can stick
out like a sore thumb, the fanservice in Helpful Fox Senko-san (with
the exception of Super Senko-san Time, which is a post-credits
segment that’s allowed to stick out more) is served by being
relatively unobtrusive. It works by creating a comforting
atmosphere, not by shoving anything in particular in your face.
There’s also the fact that by its
nature Helpful Fox Senko-san needs to play the right notes in terms
of emotions. If the viewer is going to be comforted, they need to
understand the misery (to a certain level, enough to know their own
and project but not enough to empathize and gain any – hence
Kuroto’s generic overwork and mysterious dark aura) and experience
the catharsis (hence getting a heavier focus on what Senko does for
him than on why she’s doing it for him).
The fact that it goes beyond Slice of
Nothing into the realm of actual comedy also does help. Again, it’s
low key and pleasant, but there are parts of the show that are
genuinely funny. When Kuroto first finds Senko and does the mental
math as to what her appearance could mean for him (before she proves
she’s a real kitsune with real magic), that gets a laugh. Shiro’s
bratty and haughty behavior, especially contrasted with the fact that
she’s more of an eccentric goofball than anything else, gets a laugh
most of the times she makes meaningful appearances.
Further, the show doesn’t go 100%
indulgence. Senko is great, and honestly does well with the
pampering, but she’s not perfect – she has trouble because she’s
not good with modern technology, she has (and causes Kuroto) trouble
because she looks like a little girl in cosplay. She has her limits,
and things that bother her and can even have bad days. Because she’s
not portrayed as a perfect angel of infinite fluffing, the story
she’s in ends up a lot more grounded. In some ways I’d kind of liken
Senko’s weaknesses to the fact that Mary Poppins could be stern as
well as wonderful: it helps round out the experience, and not only
ground it in something the audience can better accept, but create
nuance within it so even though the characters are no doubt getting
this good thing, it’s not just saccharine nonsense.
I’m not going to pretend that Senko is
one of anime’s greatest characters, but she is at least a legitimate
character, memorable in her own right. For a show that has the
ambition this show has, that’s actually quite nice.
The occasional darker overtones also
work with that. When Sora summons Senko back and questions her
mission, it’s not a total throwaway: she asks serious questions that
we don’t have perfect answers to, just Senko’s answers, about what
she wants and what might or might not be good for her. When I know
source material I try to keep it out of these reviews to an extent,
because an anime should be judged based on what they put on screen,
but it’s worth noting that these elements are something that the
manga continues to develop, giving an actual story (however sparse)
to the events that transpire and some actual building of their world.
Even in the show itself, characters do
learn and grow, rather than remaining static objects. It’s not a
high bar, but passing it is a plus.
And on the whole, that kind of brings
us to how I feel about Helpful Fox Senko-san. It doesn’t really go
anywhere or do anything spectacular. At the end of the day, this is
a fanservice anime. If you want to be served the way that the show
offers to serve you, you can watch it and be pretty pleased. If you
don’t care one way or another about experiencing a brief slice of
comfort, you probably won’t find much rewarding your time or drawing
you back.
But, all the same, there is a little
more than the baseline of putting on screen what you want to be put
on screen. There’s a little extra comedy, a little extra
intelligence, and a little extra depth that does make Helpful Fox
Senko-san just a little more memorable and worthwhile than it
strictly had to be. For me, that means it earns a C+. Watch it if
you want to relax and have some of your daily stress soothed away.