Seasonal First Impressions is a column where I detail my thoughts, however brief or long, about a currently-airing anime’s first episode or so.

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To hear some tell it, there’s a lack of wonder in the world these days. Yes, if you put your ear to the ground or gaze out your nighttime window you might understand; once again, the world is changing.

Of course, we’re hardly the first generation to deal with this sort of thing. And My Master Has No Tail, an ostensibly straightforward gimmick comedy based on a 4koma that’s been running since 2019, might seem like an odd vessel to even briefly touch on that idea. But it belongs to a growing body of available-in-English Japanese pop media set in the Taisho Era, so it has more reason to think about the subject than one might assume.

But we’re starting in the deep end of the pool here; let’s back up a moment. On a premise level, My Master Has No Tail is pretty straightforward. Enough so, in fact, that instead of wasting time and effort, why don’t I just drop the relatively succinct official English summary right here, verbatim? (With VA credits added by yours truly, of course.)

Throughout time, supernatural, shapeshifting tanuki loved playing tricks on humankind. One plucky tanuki, Mameda (Mao Ichimichi), is no different. But there’s one big problem. She wasn’t born in the days of yore — she was born in modern, more cynical times! How can she fulfill her mischievous tanuki destiny when supernatural hijinks are a thing of the past? She finds an angle when she meets Bunko (Hibiku Yamamura), a master of the Japanese art of rakugo, which uses storytelling to beguile its audience. Mameda is determined to use rakugo to cast a spell on humanity, but first this tanuki trickster must convince the no-nonsense Bunko to take her on as an apprentice.

My Master Has No Tail – HIDIVE Official Summary

So yes, it’s about a tanuki—the supernatural kind—getting interested in the art of rakugo and trying to get a successful rakugoka to take her on as an apprentice. This simple premise belies two things; one, a genuine appreciation for the artform the series is centered around, and two, some interesting musings on the Taisho Era itself, and its nature as a transitionary period in human history. Of course, that must coexist with the fact that it is, at the end of the day, a comedy. The primary goal here is to charm you and make you laugh. If it can get you to think, that’s more of a nice bonus. (But an important one!)

Indeed, the first half of the opening episode is about Mameda’s attempts to trick people in the city of Osaka. But her pranks—trying to pass off leaves as money, attempting to spook policeman by appearing to have no face, etc.—go awry, and end up making the townsfolk cross with her instead. Disheartened, she eventually finds her way into an entertainment hall, where Bunko, her to-be mentor, is performing. She finds herself unexpectedly enraptured by the story that Bunko tells, and she likens it to her own quest to deceive humans. (By the end of the performance, she’s had such a good time being “tricked” that she actually looks rather drunk, which is pretty funny.)

Bunko’s story is done well, too. It is (apparently) a well-known stock rakugo routine, but she tells it well, and the world of the show is supplanted by sketched, pastel drawings to enhance her tale.

The rakugo bit itself elicits more sensible chuckles than full-on belly laughs, probably owing to both the age of the bit and the simple fact that an Anglophone audience isn’t necessarily going to pick up on all the subtler details. (Certainly, I’m including myself there.)

After the performance, Mameda finds herself surrounded by angry townspeople, who recognize her from her earlier pranks and attempt to chase her out of the city. She’s cornered on a rooftop and nearly falls to her death because she forgot that, as a female tanuki, she lacks the comically large balloon-scrotums that are traditionally ascribed to the creatures. (Yes, that’s a real thing. Folklore is wonderful.) Luckily, she’s rescued.

By Bunko.

Who is piloting a flying boat.

Bunko’s musings; on the nature of human development, on the fact that both she and Mameda, as creatures of myth (Bunko herself is a kitsune) will soon no longer have a place in their world, and on the nature of storytelling, put an intriguing spin on the series’ solid but otherwise fairly simple first episode. This sequence exposes My Master Has No Tail as having a thoughtful emotional core in addition to its simpler concerns of comedy and charm. Bunko herself serving as the wise—if reluctant—mentor figure rounds this out nicely.

The episode concludes with Mameda deciding to stay and committing to studying under Bunko. Whether or not the fox spirit is interested is an entirely different question, and I suspect that much of the comedy of the weeks to come will involve the inherent push-and-pull baked into their dynamic. But capping things with a nice bout of quiet introspection is a nice trick, and while something like this is never going to find a massive Anglosphere audience, I do hope it finds one that appreciates it for what it is. It’s a subtle sort of magical; like all good stories are.

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