So... Beck...

Ignoring the fact that there actually is a band named Beck.  This is entirely about the anime of the same name, which I've been watching at CAINE's weekly showings.  Our next showing contains the final three episodes, and this post will hopefully explain why I won't miss the series at all.

So in the beginning some kind of unimportant stuff happens where you just get to cringe at how stupid the show's main character, Yukio, is.  You think it's all going to be over once you actually start hearing the name "Beck" being thrown around when people are actually talking about a band.  This is also because there's a dog in the series that's named "Beck", and that's where the name of the band came from.

They play a few concerts and get their name out there.  So, smooth sailing, right?  Well, another stupid thing pops up.  It's the same deal whenever anyone first hears of them.  "Beck?  That's a stupid name for a band."  EVERY.  FUCKING.  TIME.

That's not that big of a deal though, because you thought Yukio was done being an idiot?  HahahahahahaNO.  Every time you think he couldn't possibly be any stupider, he breaks his previous stupidity record with flying colors.

Basically, there's this girl named Maho, and if Yukio wasn't a giant fucking retard he'd realize that she'd totally get in his pants if he wasn't a giant fucking retard.  They get along so well, then without fail he always does something to screw it up.  Every time.  Hell, she even promises him at one point that if he wins an event in his school's swim team competition that she'll do anything he wants, and even though he wins the event, he remains completely oblivious to what she meant.  Seriously.

The swim team?  What the fuck does swimming have to do with an anime that's about a band?  Well, there's this old guy, Mr. Saitou, who's generally a creep but is a really good swimmer and also happens to play the guitar.  He provides our resident retard Yukio with guitar lessons, a guitar to use until he can buy his own, and critiques his swimming at the local pool.  Honestly, you could take the swimming out of the series and it wouldn't lose anything.  Mr. Saitou later gains the affections of Yukio's teacher, and all but disappears.

So eventually they get a record deal.  With an American label.  Who tells them that the name "Beck" is no good in the States.  Rather than coming up with something else, they just let the label make up a name.  Which happens to be "Mongolian Chop Squad".  Add to that that the record deal doesn't give them any royalties.  So even though the album does pretty well, they get no money out of it.  Point, fucking where?  Nowhere.

For a show that's supposed to be about a group of people who start a band and try to rise to stardom, it has quite a lot of completely unrelated shit happening.  There's always setback after setback.  They can't go an episode without pissing someone off, it seems.  The grand motherfucker of pissing someone off comes up later on in the series when it's revealed that another character, Ryosuke, stole the guitar he plays, named Prudence, as well as the dog named Beck.  The original owner of the guitar tracks him down, and has goons beat the shit out of him before taking him away in a fucking helicopter that they landed in his front yard, all to end with Ryosuke playing blues guitar with him.

Then this music festival comes up and you'd think for once Beck could get its shit together for just one story arc, but no, everything falls apart there too.

I...  I don't even think it's worth mentioning anymore, to be honest.  It's not a series that's really worth anyone's attention.  If you want a series about people getting together and starting a band with the goal of trying to rise to stardom, just fucking watch K-On!.  Even if you absolutely hate moeblob anime, it'll be more enjoyable than Beck.  There's more of the "people playing music" thing and the random extra stuff is at least funny.  Yui may be an idiot, but she's a fucking genius in comparison to Yukio.