I've seen a lot of anime in my day but I'll be upfront and honest; I have never seen a show like Nerima Daikon Brothers before.

What makes this show so unique is the fact that it's inspired heavily by the Blues Brothers. It's rare that you see a Japanese project influenced by an American Film but what really takes the cake is the manner with which Nerima Daikon Brothers tells its twisted tale. The entire show is a musical. That's right; a musical. While there are talky bits in between the many songs whenever there is something changing in the plot or an emotion that needs to be let out it's done through song. Combine these elements and you have one of the most original comedy series to come along in quite some time.

ADV has picked up and started releasing the 12 episode anime but manga enthusiasts will probably recognize it from Takamitsu Kondō's printed version that ran in 2005. The series focuses on the lives of three individuals and a panda that happened to wander into their daikon (radish) garden. Hideki, Ichirō, and Mako all aspire to be singing sensations and to sweep Japan off its feet. Nerima Daikon Brothers is the name that they have given themselves and with it Hideki hopes to build a stadium for their performances. Lofty goals indeed but with the help of the little daikon panda named Pandaikon they might just do it.

The thing to understand about this show is that while it's adorable beyond reason and there are many attractive elements to the concept it is grossly perverse. There are constant sexual gags and jokes as well as wedding propositions between cousins. The show even goes on to slide in some racial jokes such as Koreans are only attractive if they have plastic surgery. If you've never seen a rocket-powered robotic enema machine before then Nerima Daikon Brothers will set another landmark with you. Needless to say this show is willing to cross the line and go above and beyond decency to get a laugh out of you.

The first episode introduces each of the characters and through song we get a good grasp of who they are and what they want. From there it breaks into a random bunch of songs as Hideki and company attempt to enter an audition. Things were going just peachy until the guy starts rubbing Ichirō's "hot dog" (which is a less than subtle visual). He rejects the guy's attempts but doesn't really put up a fight about it. When Hideki steps in to offer his "daikon" for stroking the freaky guy is not impressed and promptly boots the Daikon Brothers to the curb. Pandaikon concocts a plan to get revenge that involves a bazooka and a bizarre gay harem filled with thongs and champagne.

Up next the Daikon Brothers get involved with a Korean pachinko parlor that is sucking in old hags. At first Hideki didn't care or even know about it but when one of them appears in his garden to steal daikon he goes ballistic. Our heroes slip under cover dressed as a cabbage, radish, and cucumber but despite their devious disguises they are discovered. Mako almost gets raped by the head pachinko guy and Ichirō gets his cucumber rubbed by Pandaikon. At least there was no lover boy harem in this episode though the panda stroking kind of took the cake.

Nerima Daikon Brothers' sense of humor is so out there that you have to be really demented in order to appreciate it. With that in mind I do have to admit that I laughed more than a few times while watching the four episodes. The fact that each of these jokes is delivered through song makes them less disgusting somehow but it's entirely immature despite its mature rating. The song selection tends to follow the same melody from episode to episode too even though the lyrics are typically different.

In the end Nerima Daikon Brothers was a show that I had a hard time really getting into. Yes I laughed and yes conceptual presentation of the show was fantastic but the oft disturbing and trashy humor did little for me. I felt like I had to lower myself in order to get a chuckle (especially during the "hot dog" scene). You really have to enjoy watching the perverse to get any satisfaction from this show at all. There are some decent moments apart from these particular scenes but they are few and far between during this entire volume.

Nerima Daikon Brothers is literally hot off the presses and looks great on DVD. The 1.33:1 aspect ratio features a vibrant palette and very little grain and aliasing to complain about. The four episodes here exhibit an overall clean appearance that compliments the style of the show. This is a series that utilizes simplistic animations and really recycles stock footage so it appears as if it received a lower budget than most anime.

It's not often that the spoken language dramatically changes the content in a show but that's the case with this one. Both the English (5.1) and original Japanese (2.0) tracks have their own variations on the musical material and much of the dialogue. The English track for instance offers more vulgarity and tends to parody the anime at times. Otherwise both selections deserve to be listened to because they each bring something different to the table. English subtitles are included as well (naturally).

As is the case with most anime we get some clean animations and previews to accompany the four episodes. Thankfully Nerima Daikon Brothers got some extra content to go along with the standard fluff. It helps add some weight to this release that fans will appreciate.

A music video is included in the extras menu that features the voice actors for the main trio performing on the Nerima Daikon stage. It's a cute addition but not much more than that. There is also a sing along for the songs in the show while you watch. Along the same lines is an ADV in video pop up thing. Every once in a while a little bubble appears while you're watching an episode with this feature enable that doles out some information and a bit of wit. It definitely added some value to watching these episodes again but the blurbs came and went so quickly that I often had to pause the DVD in order to read them. In addition to these there are also two commentary tracks with some of the Japanese cast

The more that I had heard about Nerima Daikon Brothers the more I got interested. Unfortunately the humor that the show bears is rather exclusive; meaning you have to love everything perverse and twisted. I can take a lot but when it comes to flying enema machines, pandas stroking a guy's cucumber, and racial jokes I tend to draw the line. In between each of these things that put me off I did find plenty of other stuff that entertained me. The implementation of the musical skits is brilliant and the characters are very likeable. There is an audience for this show out there but if you think for an instant that you would be turned off by any of the jokes I mentioned in this review you might just want to rent it and see for yourself.

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