Sore ga Seiyuu!

This series started as a 4-panel doujin (indie) manga, and it feels like it has extended SHIROBAKO in a way.

Sore ga Seiyuu! (Seiyu’s Life) is about three voice actresses Futaba (voiced by Rie Takahashi), Ichigo (voiced by Yuki Nagaku) and Rin (voiced by Marika Kouno), their struggles and achievements as they dabble in the voice acting industry in Japan. (All three of them compose the seiyuu unit Earphones.)

This series is written by voice actress Masumi Asano who started a career in voice acting a decade ago and is a notable for roles such as Shakugan no Shana’s Yukari Hirai and D.N.Angel’s Risa Harada, so this should be a no-brainer for her. The only thing that I can tell you about the illustrator is Hayate no Gotoku! and nothing else.

The series’ plot is written in a linear manner, where you can see Futaba’s typical day at work, up to the moment she met Ichigo and Rin on the series Bodhisattvon, up to the time that they get together in a radio show and eventually form the unit, with some backstories dished in the side.

There are many interesting scenes in the series, in which I would list here:

Guest voice actors

Prior to the review, I checked the people tweeting about the series on Twitter, and I’m very confident to say that every time Hiroshi Kamiya is seen, I can hear two to three fans gushing, because why not, it’s HiroC. We also have Yui Horie, Rie Kugimiya and Rikiya Koyama among others, which makes me wish that more seiyuu make cameos in the series.

The conflicts have an emotional punch

In one instance, Futaba did a role on a drama CD, which is something she still expect to do now that it has been green-lit for a full series, but Rin was selected to do her role instead, which really hurts for her.

Juggling school/part-time work with seiyuu work

Futaba and Ichigo does part-time work, which is something typical for the people in the industry, but thank goodness the series didn’t delve on that and instead focused on Rin’s life as she juggles seiyuu work and school, how she was really shy when she was a tot, how she hang out with her friend and number one fan Sayo and what will be her decision in the future.

It did not only settled talking about anime work

Sore ga Seiyuu! also dabbled on dubbing work and narration. You should know that voice actors are not just limited to anime (and/or cartoons), but they also dub western movies (the last one I remember is that Nana Mizuki dubbed Katniss Everdeen, and that Koyama dubbed Jack Bauer in 24, but you can find more on Wikipedia).

I really seek their ending sequence

The ending sequence for most of the episodes in the series is done like a web radio show, in which they bob left and right. Perhaps the only thing I was really waiting for at each ending sequence is that they bob their heads to the tune of “Plug In! To Your Ears.” It’s a blissful thing in itself.

This is perhaps Gonzo’s best series in recent time – most of you know the company through their works from the start of the millennium until the current decade when they started to just do one series for a year (unless you count their three-series record in 2011 and 2013). The only gaffe that I am clearly aware of is that a frame or two just jumped in the last few minutes of the last episode, but that can be solved in the DVD/Blu-ray version.

Every episode of Sore ga Seiyuu gives a sense of edu-tainment, and we slowly learn more about the voice acting industry as the show progresses. We recommend this series to everyone who have watched SHIROBAKO, just in case you miss Shizuka and realize the fact that there will be no more second season of P.A.Works’ adult moe series soon enough. DAMN IT, WE WANT MORE OF BOTH!

As for the 4-panel doujin manga series, it is still on-going and is available at every Comiket. So far I have seen that the anime series has covered all of the source material, up to the latest doujin released in Comiket 88. [More info]