Pigs fly in AMW. At least, figuratively, they do. They fly off the handle and dive-bomb the other maids. Perhaps they fly too close to the sun. Let's dip down and take a look.
AMW is about the world beneath the surface - the hidden underworld of the Maid Cafe. When they aren't serving up parfaits and omelets they are serving up some blood, guts, and righteous vengeance. It's not just brightness, sparkles, and shining-blinding cuteness.
It's dark and rainy as AMW opens, and then it's a gore-fest. We quickly jump back 23 years to 1999 and follow 17 y/o Nagomi Wahira as she arrives for her first day of work at the Oinky Doink Cafe. The other newbie, Mannen Ranko, is a 35 y/o Femme Fatale. She has an edgy haircut, she's dry-witted, and she's sexy looking, but she's the /opposite/ of perky. She makes deadpan Aubrey Plaza look animated.
On their first day, a strangely threatening patron comes to the cafe and the two newbies end up being tasked to deliver something to a competitor (Wuv-Wuv Moonbeam Cafe) across town. Actually, Nagomi was tasked. Ranko volunteered to go along. The bubbly Nagomi is soon baptized in blood - but none of it is her own. Mannen Ranko served the Wuv-Wuvs some whatnot and now the gals at the Oinky Doink live to work another day. Wuv-Wuv Moonbeam has permanently landed. Nagomi's innocence shot to smithereens, she wants to quit. She didn't know that maid cafes were just covers for organized crime... and disorganized gang warfare! Ranko knew all about it; she just got released from prison. She's on a little mission to do some payback & clean-up, up in here❕
AMW is a 2022 release that is rated 7.62 on MAL. It is 1 season consisting of 12 23-minute English dubbed episodes with CC available. While the dubbing is top tier, we get no interpretation of any written communications. They should just have a voice actor read them, sigh.
Techno? Punk? Pop? The opening credits song is edgy and rocky and then it devolves into squeakish pop. It's perfect for the twisted show AMW appears to be. The art is garish and electric in the most fun sort of hyper-fantasy way. Go BIG: Big b👀bs, big eyes, big muscles, big colorful hair, big color-palettes. Backgrounds are super-colored stylized realism catching the glitz and the grunge underneath it.
Nagomi, just over the edge of 17, is our fresh and pink protag. She had no idea what she was getting into. Mannen Ranko's backstory is not revealed except through all-encompassing innuendo and implication. Every muscle twitch screams that she has an interesting (most likely terrifying) past. She's 36, which in the maid world might as well be 75.
Yumechi is the resident "queen" of the cafe. She's been there the longest, she's got the largest base of customer-fans, she gets the most tips, and she doesn't tolerate nonsense. At the end of the day, she's loyal, though. Don't criticize the Oinky Doink or you'll feel her wrath. Yasuko is the manager of the Oinky Doink, and she has a weak character. You just can't trust her. She will capitulate to the higher-ups and save her own skin before she protects her employees. Zoya, the Russian, seems severe when one meets her, and she certainly has that side. But she also adores cute things and has a lovely doll collection. Shiipon sort of fell into the job and seems the least motivated and the most likely to do a no-call-no-show.
The Oinky Doink has a mascot! Okachimachi is always in panda costume and doesn't speak, so there's a mystery there, beyond the fact that this is a cafe based on swine yet they have a panda as a mascot.
Sure, the action-packed all-out war is an asset, but the real fun in watching AMW is the humor. It's a pun-a-polooza: Sow-wee (sorry). For-pig me. Looking for a Ro-ham-tic time? Dream pig! Oinky Doink is hap-pig to serve any master... I didn't even start jotting them down until the 2nd half of the show. I might watch it again just to slop them all up.
Who knew that a military background is a real bonus in the maid cafe game? Guns, kicks, punches, disposal. Run out of money? Go put up your organs as a loan collateral. Look! They have a stomach lung combo! You only need half a stomach to live, afterall. It's like free money! Once they're properly financed, it's time to go full-boar on those swine❗
Nagomi can't pull herself away before all the maid cafes get into it. Ranko always pulls out a win; she's not unlike the Terminator, that way. It's going well (if one considers a slow, bloody creep up Hamburger Hill a positive thing), until the formidable Crimson Supernova is paroled and returns to the tray...er, I mean the fray: 'Where's Wuv-Wuv Moonbeam? ❗💢❓💥 ...WHO took them out❓' She turns a dark vampire-red crimson. It's about to get Hog Wild up in here.
Do maids get a happy ending? The ending actually boars... um, bores beneath the surface and has a near profundity to it. The show is fun and it's wrapped up very well.
There's more content after the closing credits. Watch to the b&w credits.
QUOTE📢
...age shouldn't matter. People can start over however many times as long as they're motivated.
〰🖍 IMHO
📣8.3 📝7.5 🎭7.5 🌞3 🎨8 ⚡7.7 🎵/🔊7 😅4 😭5 😱4.8 😯4.5 😖4 🤔3 💤0 🔚7.5
Age 16+ Language- R-rated with F💣s. It opens to a gunfight in which one woman in a maid outfit slaughters another. Rated R-17+
Re-📺? Would
Recommendation: I just started Gintama, which also Has hilarity and action and is a tad outrageous. Solo Leveling-9.5 is freakin awesome, Princess Principal 8.6 & Girls Und Panzer-8 feature gurl warriors, and ,Assassination Classroom-9 gifts us with unexpected assassin's. Akame ga Kill! 8.6 is violent and very, very good.
From lite&trite to heavy&serious, here's some recs ~
Maid Sama 10,
The Eminence in Shadow 8.8,
Love Chunibyo And Other Delusions 8.4,
Toradora-8.5,
Assassination Classroom-9,
Chaika The Coffin Princess 8.4,
Reincarnated as a Sword 8,
Hunter × Hunter-10,
Princess Principal 8.6,
Jujutsu Kaisen-9.5,
Solo Leveling-9.5,
Made in Abyss 9,
Parasyte the Maxim 8.9,
Akame ga Kill! 8.6,
Tokyo Ghoul-8.5,
Violet Evergarden-9.5,
Fullmetal Alchemist-10,
Psycho Pass-8.6,
Vinland Saga-10,
Attack On Titan-8.9.
