Upotte!! Is Not a Crime

The other day I found that my childhood buddy has finally landed a job of his dream/calling, which is to work as an attorney working on gun ownership related litigation in the state of New Jersey. Just a blurb about gun ownership, it’s something of an American tradition; living in the land of excess you do see people abuse their rights and go overboard with their firearms. On the flip side, for every 10% of bad apples there are probably a bunch more good apples, more victims of circumstances than anything, now having to navigate the varying firearms laws of each individual state, plus the federal one. It can be tough especially if you live in a state that progressively restrict certain weapons that you own (and NJ is one of the more difficult ones); something legal that you bought 10 years ago may be illegal now and you might not even know about it, or can do anything legal to make it un-illegal again. It’s interesting to see how not each instances of grandfathering work as flawlessly as designed, and regardless of your position on the issue of gun ownership, enforcement is always never perfect. That’s why my friend has a job, I guess.

While he doesn’t quite fit the pigeonhole of your average libby gun nut, my attorney friend does have a modest firearm collection that he has probably left in some degree of neglect due to work. He also grew up in the country and the ‘burbs, and is not a city person at all. Well, it’s all good to me because I know he is a responsible and trained individual when it comes to this, to the degree that I know the kind of, uh, misdeeds he has committed that he probably won’t be doing anything dangerous.

That said, would he enjoy Upotte!!? I’m not sure. I’m not much of a gun nut at all (although I do enjoy skeet shooting on occasion) but I find Upotte entirely a riot. I mean, in a post–Qwaser world, Upotte is light-hearted and fun stuff that is easy to get in to and get the joke. If you’ve never seen Qwaser, this may all be a shock. I’m pretty sure my friend had not, so Upotte might be shocking to him in the “right” way, which is the shock of seeing how boobies now are analogues to barrel protective covering for guns that he know. I mean, there’s little anyone can say about that, and more about emoting the unspeakable, that “mfw,” that jaw-drop.

Upotte is about assault rifles, for the most part. Those weapons are generally heavily restricted in America today. I think that takes the show’s military otaku context up a notch in the sense that most Japanese gun/military otaku don’t own guns, contrary to their American counterparts. But I think no matter if you are Japanese or American or any other nationality, Upotte’s blend of moe and firearm is more of the point, the gag if you will, than any kind of contextual gateway to appreciation of someone’s favorite weapon. I mean, it’s basically what this is all about.

It’s clearly different than, say, when my aforementioned friend and I watch Gun Smith Cats and Riding Bean, he’d point out the sort of things they were using in the show, the stopping power of human muscle on small-caliber arms, what have you. I think it’s hilarious that we’ve come so far. And I can’t imagine anyone taking this seriously. But I think it is precisely why Upotte can be good entertainment!

PS. Ever look at the ads pixiv serves you when you look at Upotte artwork? LOL.