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This review may contain spoilers
Silly, sweet, and informative
Sannin Fuufu is a fun show! I love watching shows about polyamory and so immediately was excited for this one. While I was not the biggest fan of the directing, I did enjoy other aspects instead.
Directing:
One of my complaints is that the director's camera plotting didn't always make sense to me. I'm not sure if they were working with a limited crew or perhaps were on a time crunch, but while the framing was fine, sometimes the choice of distance between the camera and the characters, or how long a specific camera held the scene, didn't really make sense to me. Some stories really do well with a single camera holding a scene of dialogue for an extended period of time, but to me it felt like the director (or maybe the editor?) didn't really know where to hold tension. The camera was also a bit more distant in some scenes than I would have preferred, which can be done well, don't get me wrong (Imaizumi Rikiya is excellent at that!) but again, just didn't feel... it just felt like some of the emotional beats in the story were underutilized at times.
Casting:
I fucking love whoever casted the secondary characters. The moms especially were so fun and full of personality. The actors were just so naturally these characters! However, when it came to the main cast, I wasn't always convinced.
Story:
This is where I did enjoy the show. I know not everyone loved the bunny narrator, but I actually really enjoyed that. It added a layer of silly and I liked how it focused on unresolved tension and emotions. I was surprised to find that the one who proposed the ex comes back into the relationship was Mia's boyfriend and not Mia herself, and quite liked that twist of my expectation. I enjoyed the building relationship between Shinpei and Takuzo, but I sometimes wished that Mia's dynamic with these two was explored a little more. Still, she is often the one who pushes things through dialogue if not through action. She's the one who brings a threesome to the table after all.
One big theme of the show was Takuzo's lack of self-esteem. He kept saying (and so did other characters) he didn't have much choice because he didn't really have many options to date. And so this trial marriage seems a bit forced by circumstances, though of course we also know that he does enjoy having people in his life and eventually comes to love both Mia and Shinpei deeply. Still, because this was a part of his character, I was very glad for Tenma's contribution to the story. First, she provided another look at alternative relationships which I thought was fun because I love that stuff on screen. But importantly to the narrative, she gives Takuzo a choice. Instead of circumstances and opportunity pushing him into this dynamic, he gets to CHOOSE to be a part of his throuple. That was really important to me and to the development of the story, so I'm very grateful the writers went that direction.
Another element I really liked was the way the show explores realistic challenges in making a throuple work in society. They talk about having a child and the legal status of their union. It would have been nice if the three of them could have talked about the child element a bit more deeply, and if we could have seen the various opinions each individual had about it, but I understand this was only an element of the story and not a major theme. Meanwhile, the legal element was also pretty interesting. Learning how it was possible to make something similar to a marriage certificate was cool. I also found it interesting that Takuzo decided not to be fully open about his relationship at work. That was such a small detail but I appreciated it for some reason. It was framed in like a "yes in the future but not now" sort of way, but just that this was something being considered at all, whether or not he is ready to be out, was kind of nice.
These characters were not perfect, and the story did not aim to tell a squeaky clean version of polyamory, which I appreciate. There were some things I saw that I didn't really agree with and would have handled differently. One thing that really bothered me was when Shinpei and Takuzo had sex mainly because Shinpei was crying about it. That just really rubbed me the wrong way. Whether or not Shinpei meant to, that was coercing consent rather than getting enthusiastic consent from Takuzo. I'm glad they seemed to like it in the end, but to me that was pretty uncomfortable. This was the main issue I had though there were a few others that had to do with boundaries and the lack of discussion around them. But hey, that might just be because of the way I explore my own relationships. And again, the show doesn't need to be perfect, it just needs to be what it is. And this show is about people who are trying this for the first time, just following their feelings, and that in itself is very sweet.
Skinship:
I needed more. Way more lmao. There's a scene in like the last arch where one of them is sitting at the table and feeling very down and I just... couldn't believe her boyfriends wouldn't at the very least touch her arm or her hand to comfort her? Idk maybe its a cultural difference, but that struck me.
Overall:
I enjoyed this show and was very grateful to watch it. Thanks to Kura2Ninja for requesting this review!
Directing:
One of my complaints is that the director's camera plotting didn't always make sense to me. I'm not sure if they were working with a limited crew or perhaps were on a time crunch, but while the framing was fine, sometimes the choice of distance between the camera and the characters, or how long a specific camera held the scene, didn't really make sense to me. Some stories really do well with a single camera holding a scene of dialogue for an extended period of time, but to me it felt like the director (or maybe the editor?) didn't really know where to hold tension. The camera was also a bit more distant in some scenes than I would have preferred, which can be done well, don't get me wrong (Imaizumi Rikiya is excellent at that!) but again, just didn't feel... it just felt like some of the emotional beats in the story were underutilized at times.
Casting:
I fucking love whoever casted the secondary characters. The moms especially were so fun and full of personality. The actors were just so naturally these characters! However, when it came to the main cast, I wasn't always convinced.
Story:
This is where I did enjoy the show. I know not everyone loved the bunny narrator, but I actually really enjoyed that. It added a layer of silly and I liked how it focused on unresolved tension and emotions. I was surprised to find that the one who proposed the ex comes back into the relationship was Mia's boyfriend and not Mia herself, and quite liked that twist of my expectation. I enjoyed the building relationship between Shinpei and Takuzo, but I sometimes wished that Mia's dynamic with these two was explored a little more. Still, she is often the one who pushes things through dialogue if not through action. She's the one who brings a threesome to the table after all.
One big theme of the show was Takuzo's lack of self-esteem. He kept saying (and so did other characters) he didn't have much choice because he didn't really have many options to date. And so this trial marriage seems a bit forced by circumstances, though of course we also know that he does enjoy having people in his life and eventually comes to love both Mia and Shinpei deeply. Still, because this was a part of his character, I was very glad for Tenma's contribution to the story. First, she provided another look at alternative relationships which I thought was fun because I love that stuff on screen. But importantly to the narrative, she gives Takuzo a choice. Instead of circumstances and opportunity pushing him into this dynamic, he gets to CHOOSE to be a part of his throuple. That was really important to me and to the development of the story, so I'm very grateful the writers went that direction.
Another element I really liked was the way the show explores realistic challenges in making a throuple work in society. They talk about having a child and the legal status of their union. It would have been nice if the three of them could have talked about the child element a bit more deeply, and if we could have seen the various opinions each individual had about it, but I understand this was only an element of the story and not a major theme. Meanwhile, the legal element was also pretty interesting. Learning how it was possible to make something similar to a marriage certificate was cool. I also found it interesting that Takuzo decided not to be fully open about his relationship at work. That was such a small detail but I appreciated it for some reason. It was framed in like a "yes in the future but not now" sort of way, but just that this was something being considered at all, whether or not he is ready to be out, was kind of nice.
These characters were not perfect, and the story did not aim to tell a squeaky clean version of polyamory, which I appreciate. There were some things I saw that I didn't really agree with and would have handled differently. One thing that really bothered me was when Shinpei and Takuzo had sex mainly because Shinpei was crying about it. That just really rubbed me the wrong way. Whether or not Shinpei meant to, that was coercing consent rather than getting enthusiastic consent from Takuzo. I'm glad they seemed to like it in the end, but to me that was pretty uncomfortable. This was the main issue I had though there were a few others that had to do with boundaries and the lack of discussion around them. But hey, that might just be because of the way I explore my own relationships. And again, the show doesn't need to be perfect, it just needs to be what it is. And this show is about people who are trying this for the first time, just following their feelings, and that in itself is very sweet.
Skinship:
I needed more. Way more lmao. There's a scene in like the last arch where one of them is sitting at the table and feeling very down and I just... couldn't believe her boyfriends wouldn't at the very least touch her arm or her hand to comfort her? Idk maybe its a cultural difference, but that struck me.
Overall:
I enjoyed this show and was very grateful to watch it. Thanks to Kura2Ninja for requesting this review!
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