Chiwa Saito (AKB40) -- Ponytail no Shijuu（ポニーテールの四十）

Chiwa Saito（斎藤千和）is a seiyuu that has appeared on a number of anime that my friend and I have seen. She has played the mysterious Akemi Homura on "Madoka Magica", the childish Francesca Lucchini on "Strike Witches", the saucy Chloe in the "Fate/kaleid liner Prisma Illya" franchise, and the usually calm-and-collected Uomi on "Seitokai Yakuindomo". However, for the purposes of this blog, she's only been represented up to now with just one song and that was for the ending theme for perhaps the not-too-well-known "Nobunagun" from 2014 in which she played one of the supporting characters, the kickass Geronimo.

Purely by accident today, I came across various YouTube videos for this other 2014 anime called "No-Rin"（のうりん...Agriculture & Forestry）. From the description, it seemed like a typical slice-of-life show about being a student at an agricultural high school and finding out that his favourite aidoru retired and showed up secretly to become a fellow classmate. Little did I know that "No-Rin" also possessed the same zany surrealist comedy that other school-based anime have had such as "Asobi Asobase", "Nichijou", and this season's "Joshi Kōsei no Mudazukai".

Probably one reason for the lunacy at Tamo Agriculture School is one character voiced by the aforementioned Saito, Natsumi "Becky" Bekki（戸次菜摘）. With the other zany comedies that I've mentioned, the teachers there have either been bemused witnesses to the hilarious students or folks who have quirks of their own but not quite to the level of their young charges. Becky breaks the mold utterly as she is a deranged homeroom teacher with no particular love from her class who is absolutely desperate to get married. Akemi Homura, she is not.

Anyways what got me to finally enter a second article for Saito is the song Becky sings at the end of Episode 8, which should be titled "Becky's Episode". Cleverly identifying herself as AKB40 (Around 40, Kyoushi (teacher), Becky...40), the region's oldest aidoru even finishes her episode with her own ending theme "Ponytail no Shijuu" (Ponytail 40). In full contemporary aidoru regalia, she provides a pretty good AKB-esque tune about her need to get married if at all possible. Desperation hasn't sounded so plaintive and cute! I also have to admit that some of the faces that she pulls off in the ending credits are terrifying. That must have been a good amount of budget that was used for those credits.

Aiko Nakano（中野愛子）and Daisuke Mizuno（水野大輔）provided the lyrics for "Ponytail no Shijuu" which was only used for the end of Episode 8, with Mizuno handling music and arrangement. The haunting thing was the final note which came down with a very solid feeling of uncertainty, after AKB40 almost falls apart screaming out her needs. Perhaps Becky ought to get some advice from the man-hungry Yokoshima-sensei from "Seitokai Yakuindomo".