Pop Team Epic – Episode 8 – “The Dragon Of Iidabashi Pipi’s Revenge”

I’m back once more for another round of Pop Team Epic, as the last recap had the irresistible charms of Hellshake Yano, in all his drawn-up glory, along with Blu-Rays and video games. This one has a tale of loyalty, revenge, yakuza, lemons, and bamboo, along with all the other shenanigans that come with this show.

In the first segment, we meet a piece of bacon named Chomp-Chomp Bacon. He is a happy strip of pork, who loves one thing: eating bacon. Yeah, that’s right. He proceeds to fry some on the pan as he watches in ecstasy, seeing how it cooks up as he waits to cannibalize his food. He can’t wait and touches it, getting burned by the hot grease.

The next part is where we being the main story. At Abashiri Prison, lunch begins. A girl named Popu sees other girls looking at stamps … on their smartphone? They allow those in prison? Popu gets mad and tries to beat the girls up. As the guards tries to break her up, someone watches her through it all. Popu is put in solitary, and said person wants to talk with her. Since the prison guard can’t say no, he allows it. She is Pipi. Pipi gives Popu some rice to eat. Pipi sees that Popu is an interesting character, and since Popu has no way to get out of prison, Pipi gives her an ultimatum.

Popu agrees to it. To seal this new oath to brotherhood without any sake, Pipi decides to use lemons. Popu licks it, and they both make faces. Pipi will be waiting for her when she gets out.

On a lucky day in October, Popu is released on parole. She likes the smell of freedom. Pipi then pulls up in a car, and tells her new “pardner” to get in. Together, they start to spread their notoriety through Hiroshima. Pipi is actually the young boss of the Bamboozle Gang, who is actually just a gang with bamboo for heads. Their boss is Funazo Iidabashi. The gang’s power and influence spreads under Pipi’s guidance, and Popu becomes the gang’s assassin, taking down rivals and enemies with no mercy.

One day, Pipi and Popu go to one of their hideouts and find some of the members doing stuff they shouldn’t because it will get them noticed. What is this thing that they’re doing? Why, YouTubing, of course. Pipi tells them to stop as Popu gets very angry, with only Pipi holding her back.

That’s when another Bamboozle member appears, wanting to talk. They know the cops are getting suspicious (because of the YouTubing), but they’re doing this because someone at the top is doing this. Pipi guesses who it is: Boss Iidabashi. Pipi can’t believe the old man is doing this, but as they meet him, he tells them how they stopped walking the path of chivalry. They know with the pressure of the cops bearing down, they will have to survive in some way, not just survive with the yakuza code. He tells Pipi he needs to grow up from this ideal. As Pipi holds off Popu’s rage, Pipi tells the boss she has her own principles to follow. She quits the gang to find her own way. Both she and Popu leave, as the boss makes a decision.

In a gambling place, we see Popu there, but as she is playing, some of the Bamboozle gang appear and shoot Popu, and she dies right there. Boss Iidabashi and the Bamboozle gang attend her funeral. It a very well thought-out arrangement

It is then that Pipi arrives to the funeral with a briefcase. She asks her dead partner if they took the wrong path. She then opens the briefcase, shocking the others as a man pops out of it, and she has him read to Popu, basically dissing her.

The words immediately wake Popu from her casket, and she shoots the guy in the head 3 times. Pipi herself has dynamite on her, shocking the Bamboozle gang. This was their plan all along: to eliminate them there. The dynamite explodes the place, as Pipi and Popu drive off together.

The next segment is another Bob Epic Team. Popuko is doing the “Eisai haramasukoi” dance. It’s a dance she invented herself. She asks Pipimi if it will catch on. Not a chance. This upsets Popuko, as she runs off. Pipimi tries to calm her, but she keeps taking off by train and by boat, making it to the Statue of Liberty. Pipimi catches up to her there, and tells her that it will catch on. Popuko happily does her dance on Lady Liberty’s head.

In the next segment, Pipimi gives Popuko a present. It’s some weird “edgelord” dragon keychain from some souvenir shop. But then the keychain talks, revealing it’s actually a real magic item. He tells her his name is Lord Calamity and asks Popuko if she is his new master. Popuko apologizes to Pipimi for her harsh words. The next segment has Pipimi cut her bangs. As does Popuko. And also a bald dude. They tell him to shut up. A soccer star does as well, and the girls say the same thing. And a balding rocker also says he cut his bangs, but he still has hair where it is, so the girls whisper it over. They say he passes, and he joins the girls.

The next part has Popuko want to watch “Sun and Green, Healthy Living.” But then she sees Pipimi has a cut on her knee, and she freaks the ever-loving fuck out. Popuko tries to put a band-aid on the scratch, but it gets stuck on her finger, again and again. It’s too much, and it cause Popuko to spin out of control. Luckily, Pipimi uses one of her ribbons to cover the cut up.

In another Bob Epic Team bit, Popuko has made a music video called “Popuko Midnight Dancer.” It’s the personification of action, as Pipimi calls it. Popuko pops in the VHS tape, and what plays is just a bunch of animated heads of her and random others going “YEAAAAHHHHH!!!” Or basically, anything you’ve probably seen on Adult Swim. Pipimi wants this to stop and tells Popuko to burn the tape, so she does. It’s the personification of action. The next bit is a video game one where the girls fight each other in a game called “Heaven or Hell.” As they fight, Pipimi uses “Finger” and beats Popuko.

The last one is called “Pop Team Epic: Tales from Long Ago.” In it, the scene shows a person making art from sand to tell what is happening. The sand turns into creative animation as well. Popuko is gonna make a dead tree bloom, and she throws stuff on it. The tree blooms, but Popuko fooled it, as she only tossed ordinary flour. The tree then chases her down. As “Poppy Pappy Day” plays, the singers (I assume) ask why they weren’t included in the anime. They complain, even dissing one of the writers before singing the song. For Hoshiiro Girldrop, Hoshifuri is in charge of writing lyrics for a new song, but can’t think of any. So she’ll write about her love for Daichi. Juicy.

On to the male VA’s and the differences in the 2nd half. In the bacon bit, Chomp-Chomp tells how he’s gonna fry the bacon and how to make it. In the main story, Pipi tells Popu when she’s about to go off “It’s okay. Stay, stay” instead of just “Stay.” There’s more talking and whispering during it, and before being blown up, Boss Iidabachi tells Pipi “He was wrong!” In the dragon keychain bit, the dragon talks until the end. In the bangs segment, the guy who passes is named Xavier (he didn’t give out his name at first.) In the band-aid bit, the male VA for Popuko may have overreacted a bit more than the female VA, making the thing even more funny. And in the tales one, we go more in-depth on who Popuko is, as he is Flower-Boomer Popuko. Plus, there’s more talking here too. The last part for “PPD” has the male VA’s, instead of complaining, tell everyone to sing their hearts out to the music.

For the roles this time, the female VA’s for the girls were played by Sumire Morohoshi and Azusa Tadokoro. There’s not much I found on these roles, with the latter having been in such shows like Sound! Euphonium and Violet Evergarden. However, the former did have one big role. She was in Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood. I’ll give ya a hint to who she played: “ED … WARD. BIG …. BROTHER.” The Male VA’s for the girls were played by Masaya Unosaka and Daisuke Namikawa. Unosaka voiced Vash the Stampede on Trigun, and that piece of shit, annoying motherfucking douchebag Spandam on One Piece. Namikara has a few big roles himself. He voiced Rock on Black Lagoon, Mystogen on Fairy Tail, and Ulquiorra on Bleach. However, I think he is more known for voicing this guy.

Yeah, the male VA’s were the best part this episode, but there were still good performances from both sides. Either way, this one wasn’t as good as the last episode. Was it still good? Yes, it was. But trying to compete with Hellshake Yano is going to be kinda hard. But as stated, this was still pretty good. The Yakuza story with the lemons, YouTube and Bamboo, the fact Bruce Willis may have been on here, the way Bob Epic Team continues to impress/scare me. The train still continues on for Pop Team Epic in how they deliver this shitty anime into being such a good show. It may not have been as good as the last episode, but it’s still as good as anything out there now.

Pop Team Epic is simulcasted on Crunchyroll and HiDive, and can be seen at 12:30 PM ET Saturdays.  The dubbed episodes of Pop Team Epic are on Funimation. The simuldub can be seen on Funimation Now at 5:00 PM ET Mondays.