Make me cry or make me laugh, but whatever you do, Anime-senpai, entertain me! Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san is one of a few anime that mixes edutainment and laughter to keep us coming back for more facts. Will Skeletor’s cousin make us care about the book industry?
Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san is a gag anime, with each episode of ten minutes (after you chop off the intro and credits) divided up to tell different stories. It’s the perfect format for TikTok-addled concentration spans and promises variety. The screen grab below neatly sums up the premise: what’s it really like working for a Japanese bookstore?
Outliers get Outliers
Before we unpack Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san, join me for story time. After all, Honda-san is a master of teaching through showing, so let’s take a page from his book.
I hoard trash. True story!
I hoard bits of plastic, scraps of wire, and broken toys because I love scratch bashing miniatures. Unlike building miniatures with a kit or gluing together store-bought models, scratch bashing takes useless junk and turns it into model spaceships, tanks, monsters, or anything you can imagine.
Scratch bashing is a tiny niche within hobby gaming, and scratch bashers are the rebels who seemingly flaunt “the rules” of how others usually do things. They’ll turn up with an army of spray can top robots to take on armies that easily cost over $120 off the shelf. But the innovation and creativity that make scratch bashers outcasts make the scratch bashing community incredibly close and supportive.
Otakudom’s Many Tribes
How does this apply to anime? Well, sexy ecchi and hentai media are a relatively small slice of the anime and manga pie. But it’s the spicy slice sure to cause a reaction if you mention it. We’ve no problem talking about Naruto or One Piece with strangers. But we’ll keep tentacle porn and futanari for places like the J-List (Official) Discord. It’s places like this where the tribe gathers and grows.
Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san is an anime that gets manga fans and otaku. Or, as Joeschmo1of3 put it, they’re our tribe. The show particularly understands the diverse range of tastes anime fans have. And it understands foreign (non-Japanese) manga fans. Check out episode one if you consider yourself a weeb or otaku, and you’ll come away with the same conclusion.
Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san is for Manga Fans and Book Nerds
Not every episode of Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san dives into otaku culture, however. Some episodes focus on Japan’s unique bookstore culture, others on working as a clerk, and some on the Japanese publishing industry. That means the series sometimes won’t make sense unless you’ve visited a bookstore in Japan. But don’t let that stop you from watching Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san. Those few moments of “this anime gets me” are well worth it.
The show celebrates manga fans, otaku, and book nerds. And it makes jokes about Boys Love manga and hentai. Honda created a human connection that many anime lack.
Honda-san is the Barefoot Gen of Bookstores
Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san goes deeper than celebrating our human connection as otaku. Honda’s story puts bookstores — those wonderful treasure troves for imaginative and curious people — into an anime-shaped time capsule.
Today is tomorrow’s history. The relentless churn of time turns our normality into stories we’ll tell our slack-jawed kids. So, let’s never forget the feelings we had browsing isles of books and comics. Or the smell of a freshly printed book. Even the smell of an old, musty classic.
History Through Comics (and Anime)
Junji Ito’s Cat Diary: Yon & Mu, Barefoot Gen, and My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness (by Kabi Nagata) are all autobiographical works. Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san is autobiographical too, but instead of focusing on cats, nuclear bombs, or lesbian encounters with sex workers, Honda wrote about selling books. Nukes never felt like ancient history because the threat of Armageddon lingered. Bookstores might not be so lucky.
That’s why Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san is cunningly charming. Especially as the COVID-19 pandemic becomes a distant memory! Do you still remember video rental stores? How many bookstores have you seen close? Do you still buy paper books? Honda-san is a snapshot of a world on the brink of change.
Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san Celebrates Paper Love
There are a few great stories about books, writing, and authors including The Professor and the Madman (2019), The Great Passage (2016), and Shadowlands (1993). Black Books (2000-2008) embedded the line “duty-to-do” in my prefrontal cortex, so I’ve all the evidence I need to prove humans have a soft, squishy place in our hearts (or brains) for every trade involved in producing and selling dead trees with words inside.
Watch Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san and Impress Women
Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san isn’t the most exciting anime around. It’s not particularly well animated, and you won’t necessarily cough up your sakura-flavored Pepsi because of the jokes. But you might. Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san is easily in the top 20 percent of anime, even if it’ll never be a ten percenter.
That said, the anime guarantees you’ll learn something about manga and books. In a fun way! And we all know ladies find a man incredibly sexy when he rattles off manga factoids.
2018 Was Nearly Ten Years Ago!
Ouru Todoroki directed Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san on behalf of studio DLE. Shin Okashima wrote the anime. Technoboys Pulcraft Green-Fund produced the show’s music and performed both the opening and ending themes. Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san’s original run of twelve episodes ran in late 2018. No Skeletor was harmed in the making of this series.
Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san streams on Crunchyroll with Japanese audio. A ton of subtitle options are available. Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san earns a solid Chibi Megumi rating of four. Your reputation as an otaku depends on you watching Honda and his friends.
When has an anime intersected perfectly with another of your hobbies? Ask Joeschmo1of3 about Rinkai! or Bartender Glass of God, and you’ll come away with a deep understanding of modern cycling tactics or bartending culture. Ask Kashou about Yuru Camp or any outdoor anime, and you’ll leave ready for a ten-day survival course in the wilds of Antarctica with only a copy of Newtype to keep you warm. Human passion explored through anime is deeply inspiring. Have you had such an experience? Tell us in the comments or on social media.
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