#(while we’re at it can reiwa just make his name Saburo Hojo so I can stop tagging him as the name that’s not actually his name

[tamamatango]

Unplanned character analysis I should’ve saved for 6/23 but I need instant gratification whenever I have a thought or I explode

Sup nerds, thanks for reading my master’s thesis completely overanalyzing what literal scraps we have in relation to the new anime. Unfortunately no updates yet on that front but I’m starting to go a little Cuckoo For Cocoa Puffs in anticipation so fingers crossed they drop something soonish. I have a couple of longer form posts in my back pocket that may or may not happen in a nearish timeframe, we’ll see what I get around to.

I was going to not do any more posts until one of those materializes but I’m detouring from that for a bit because I had an epiphany about Saburo now that I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about this series again. Those if you who know me and/or were around for when I was most active here know he is my favorite character behind Kururu and that’s still true. So here’s like. A reading of him that I think completely changes the way you will look at this character. If you don’t see him like this already.

Saburo(/Mutsumi since this goes equally for the manga side) is not actually cool. Like this kid is totally cringe and a weirdo right. Literally thinks of the most unnecessarily extra solutions to things, wardrobe that gets increasingly bizarre over time, writes poetry that is usually either obnoxiously cheesy or just doesn’t make any sense. Spends his free time doing stuff like talking to cats and collecting shitty kids’ meal toys. His drawings aren’t even that good most of the time. Unironically Momoka has more swag than Saburo does (granted Momoka has more swag than most characters but that’s besides the point). Yes he is a super genius and athletically gifted and conventionally attractive to other people his age, and (for manga Mutsumi only) it’s later implied he was modified by the N326 in some way. But here’s the thing—a lot of his peers either think he’s a smarmy ass show-off little shit (manga) or just completely inaccessible to the average person so why bother (anime).

The reason why he’s such a celebrity is because the only people who think he is really cool are children and preteen girls (and secretly Giroro but the whole reason that’s a funny joke is because Saburo is totally not appealing to adults at all let alone hardened super serious soldiers). But this is a very profitable and exploitable audience so he is really successful. He is the equivalent of a Disney Channel teen star. He’s like what Justin Bieber was in 2010 or whenever. In the manga Mutsumi gladly eats up this attention, but the anime pretty heavily implies especially toward the (until this year tee hee) end of the series that Saburo kinda dislikes being under the celebrity microscope and having producers who want to milk their child star as much as possible; he just wants to create and entertain and express himself freely which is why he does everything anonymously.

I think the anime tried a little too hard to make him unironically cool and my guess is that this is for a couple reasons. One, he has Akira Ishida’s voice coming out of him which yes was obviously chosen primarily because lol Kaworu but also his voice is just inherently associated with “we want you to think this character is a mysterious ikemen” most of the time. Two, compared to the manga there’s a lot more fillery stuff revolving around Natsumi idolizing him and because so much of the show is from Natsumi’s perspective, that’s the perspective the viewers (who were also intended to be children then, though I think now that it’s a 20 year old series they’re going more for the nostalgic adult audience) get as well. Don’t get me wrong though the VERY few serious moments he had were fantastic, 229 best episode movie 3 best movie etc etc.

You could also argue Kururu thinks Saburo is “cool” but I think he respects him more in the way that he’s kinda like him but younger so they understand each other intrinsically and that makes Saburo more reliable in fulfilling Kururu’s specific needs than most other characters. Saburo’s a lot kinder ostensibly but unlike the rest of the cast, who recoils at Kururu’s mannerisms and psychological torment of everyone, Saburo usually just thinks it’s funny. Kururu is much of a freak as he is but is very particular about his image and actively micromanages almost every aspect of his personality to get people to see him a certain way and avoid showing too many of his vulnerabilities (it’s all but confirmed in the anime that his entire cadence and vocal tics are an elaborate act and his normal voice is totally different). We don’t see it much on screen but it seems he can kinda relax a bit around Saburo who himself is totally out there but in a more genuine and unabashed way, like even in the anime where the radio persona is a secret it’s not like he acts that much differently on the air than he does in his personal life. Besides maybe the early manga Kururu is not really a romantic and probably thinks Saburo’s sappy wappy poetry is cringe too, but he likes Saburo enough that he supports him being himself no matter what bullshit that entails (besides getting himself killed of course). Sorry had to shoehorn best partners talk for a bit longtime Kirb readers know how it is.

So there is actually a specific thing that made me decide let’s do a fucking character analysis for the first time in like 5 years or something, and that’s that I was browsing through raws of the one 4koma book I don’t physically own (shoutout to @kagender for those scans along with some other cool stuff like Keroro Land issues, storyboards and ref sheets!), and it was these strips:

This is a 4koma series in which Meru and Maru from Movie 2 hang around with the main cast for funny shenanigans. Not super relevant because these two strips don’t have them pictured but anyways. They’re having a beach day and Natsumi runs into Saburo who is there to “surf” but actually there are no real waves and he is just pretending. Because he’s copying the 1978 film Big Wednesday (it is Sunday in the comic). In other words teenager larps because he saw it in an old movie once. I know this is not really a pertinent example because the Keroro Land 4komas are all very silly and non-canon (a lot of the artists are actually former doujin artists) but look. This is peak, okay. This is my ideal Saburo outside of serious scenarios. I’ve seen the vision.

I swore I was gonna make this a short post but it’s not I guess. Can’t resist turning these into goddamn essays. So to wrap it up: Saburo is some dorky kid who thinks he’s way more of a hotshot than he really is and totally owns it with no shame. This is adorable. I will defend him with my life. I need Anikero The New to agree with me here. In like 85% of cases I prefer the anime’s takes on everything but Yoshizaki cooked with the ideas behind this guy so listen to word of god. Give us more Silly Saburo. The TikTok teenagers of today deserve this representation.