Don't talk to me!!! Don't mess with me!!! Mind your own biz!!!

January 7, 2017 12:18 PM

Hello Kitty sure is an adorable character, but Sanrio also has someone for those of you stuck in the grind of modern office life. Meet Aggressive Retsuko: (SLYT *loud*) a "very, very emotional red panda with a penchant for heavy metal."
posted by selfnoise (39 comments total)

Aggressive Retsuko is almost, but not quite, as awesome as Gudetama.
posted by tclark at 12:28 PM on January 7, 2017 [4 favorites]

She complies with her manager's request and completely suppresses her anger, does she not? I do not wish to quibble but she does not appear to be aggressive.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 12:30 PM on January 7, 2017 [9 favorites]

I've not seen the name "Aggressive Retsuko" hardly anywhere. Everyone calls her "Aggretsuko."

The Verge's report is the best I've seen so far.
posted by JHarris at 12:33 PM on January 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

The sound's not working for me in the linked episode, but this one is a delight. (English subtitles.)
posted by minsies at 12:41 PM on January 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

Okay, from now on I'm substituting "Aggretsuko" for "Death Metal Vocal". Very 2017.
posted by oneswellfoop at 12:45 PM on January 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

I do not wish to quibble but she does not appear to be aggressive.

Exactly. Never show how you feel on the outside, just keep it inside, shove it deeper and deeper until...
RAGE/駻

*koff*
posted by Rora at 12:51 PM on January 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

Sanrio calls her "Aggretsuko". It looks like it's only the people filtering, editing and reposting the videos who are calling her Aggressive Retsuko.

In conclusion: Needs "aggretsuko" tag.
posted by ardgedee at 12:53 PM on January 7, 2017 [4 favorites]

Apologies, I have made a bad. Admins please hope.
posted by selfnoise at 12:56 PM on January 7, 2017

Sanrio's official web page.
posted by ardgedee at 12:56 PM on January 7, 2017

> Apologies, I have made a bad.

Don't sweat it. "Aggressive Retsuko" seems to be the operative term for tracking down the fansubs right now, so roll with it. (as for the tag, OPs can edit their tags after the fact)
posted by ardgedee at 12:57 PM on January 7, 2017

From Sanrio's Gudetama page linked on the Verge article... "Look closely and you will see the eggs that you eat lack spunk." Alrighty then.
posted by lagomorphius at 12:58 PM on January 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

The drinking part kind of freaks me out. The video I watched makes it look like drinking is her way of coping with her anger. Perhaps I am overthinking this cartoon character.
posted by Nelson at 12:58 PM on January 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

Fuck that poser panda.
posted by chococat at 1:29 PM on January 7, 2017 [16 favorites]

Fuck that poser panda.
posted by chococat at 4:29 PM on January 7

Look who's talking.
posted by needled at 1:38 PM on January 7, 2017 [8 favorites]

It's not people "filtering and reposting the videos" who call her Aggressive Retsuko.

The Japanese title is アグレッシブ烈子, which translates as "Aggressive Retsuko". Aggretsuko is a portmanteau that the Sanrio site used as a nickname for the main character.

There have been 47 episodes so far, and none have been officially translated until now. The fan subbers went with "Aggressive Retsuko" because that's what it says on the title card.

I'm glad this looks like getting an English translation, but based on the preview video the subtitles aren't as good as the fan translations. They found rhymes and puns for the songs that are missing from the presumably literal official subs, unfortunately,
posted by robcorr at 1:50 PM on January 7, 2017

While browsing Sanrio's YouTube account, I discovered that Sanrio subscribes to exactly one channel: RuPaul's Drag Race.
posted by ardgedee at 1:51 PM on January 7, 2017 [43 favorites]

Nelson: drinking isn't a regular feature of the show. She does yoga probably as often as she drinks.
posted by robcorr at 1:53 PM on January 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

The fact that Sanrio is subscribed to Ru Paul's Drag Race makes me so happy. I suppose the Hello Kitty-themed challenge in season 7 inspired that little piece of social media cross-branding.

Also, the drinking that happens in these videos is very much part of the repressed rage, but maybe not as a coping method, as it might seem. In the introduction video, it looks like she's drinking at a work party, which involves a lot of social pressure to drink and a lot of expectations to pour drinks, especially for junior women. I completely understand how infuriating this angry little red panda might feel.
posted by wakannai at 2:29 PM on January 7, 2017 [5 favorites]

My Asian lady friend is always trying to push Badtz-Maru on me. I like this better.
posted by nevercalm at 2:56 PM on January 7, 2017

So I discovered this a month or two ago and suddenly this week the official nerd media have done so as well and suddenly I understand the feelings of people who dump underground bands for having become popular.
posted by MartinWisse at 2:58 PM on January 7, 2017 [10 favorites]

This is basically what I imagined when I learned about the concept of the Office Lady or OL.
posted by chrominance at 4:12 PM on January 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

There are 47 episodes?

Here's a site that has 38, with subtitles (Flash required). The last one is a lonely Christmas Eve (which, I think, is treated more like Valentine's Day in Japan).

(Yes, I watched them all, and yes, it is entirely possible that I had better or more important things to do).
posted by eye of newt at 4:59 PM on January 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

There's a 30+ episode series of one-minute animated shorts in japan. It's been fansubbed but if it doesn't get an official sub or dub, scooch aside Hitler, there's a new atrocity in town.

Nelson: It's a clip from the series. To learn the context, either hunt down the fansub or pray to Sanrio's mouthless god that it gets an official sub or dub.
posted by BiggerJ at 5:28 PM on January 7, 2017

Oh my god I identify with this so much.

DON'T BELITTLE MEEEEEE

Thank you for this post!
posted by bleep at 5:39 PM on January 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

Well, if we're going to do want we want because pirates are free, I am a pirate! (Ad blockers/NoScript-or-equivalents on, people.)

robcorr: Looks like 38 to me, or maybe that's just what's been fansubbed. If there's really only 38 episodes, the internet-rage part of my brain is aching to echo Radagast's Street Sharks post.
posted by BiggerJ at 5:42 PM on January 7, 2017

this one is basically my life. this cute red panda really gets me.
posted by bleep at 5:47 PM on January 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

Yeah, my bad. There are 39 episodes so far; 38 have been fansubbed.
posted by robcorr at 12:19 AM on January 8, 2017

I watched this ages ago and wanted to love it, but there are a couple of episodes that are weirdly fixated on the gender of a side character in a very very transphobic nature (boy?!? girl?!? omg Adam's apple?!) that it got hard to continue. So be warned.
posted by divabat at 1:55 AM on January 8, 2017 [1 favorite]

Huh. When I saw this, I was kind of excited. I was a bit surprised at Sanrio putting out an actually relevant character, something that would speak to the crushing amount of overwork in a culture where even managing to get a full time job, not contract or part time is a feat for most young people. Maybe it would really deal with the built in chauvinism inherent in most company work places. And yeah, I guess it kind of does, but that Ashita Ganbarresa at the end hair makes it all seem... I don't know. Less challenging? Trivializing?

I guess (if you can read Japanese, sadly) it might be more with it to check out HitorigurashiOL, which is just moments in the life of a single office lady. Awesome, yet soulsuckingly depressing at the same time. It's also on Twitter, but stupid phone and figuring out links is hard.
posted by Ghidorah at 6:37 AM on January 8, 2017

And yeah, I guess it kind of does, but that Ashita Ganbarresa at the end hair makes it all seem... I don't know. Less challenging? Trivializing?

You are totally right, but I don't know if a cute Sanrio cartoon is a good place to expect a forceful argument for a radically different labour culture. I mean, I'd love it if it were, but I'm kind of amazed they even went this far.
posted by chrominance at 9:47 AM on January 8, 2017

....that isn't heavy metal. I'm pretty sure that is death metal. Heavy metal it more like Black Sabbath, Dio, and so on. It doesn't have those growly, inhuman sounding vocals, which are characteristic of death and black metal.
posted by Canageek at 10:27 AM on January 8, 2017 [1 favorite]

Aggretsuko makes me think of Detroit Metal City - the main character is a mild-mannered Swedish pop fan by day, leader of death metal band Detroit Metal City by night.
posted by needled at 11:16 AM on January 8, 2017 [1 favorite]

(Babymetal previously: 1, 2)
posted by ardgedee at 11:17 AM on January 8, 2017

Little cute thing good, not perfect
posted by bleep at 2:45 PM on January 8, 2017

I hear ya, Retsuko.
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:04 PM on January 8, 2017

I'm surprised, too, if that didn't come through in what I wrote above, that they put something like this together, too. What I'm disappointed in is that they've put a spotlight on a pretty awful aspect of Japanese culture (overwork, strict expectations based on archaic gender based expectations, a generation that ranks in the bottom of the industrialized world in terms of hope for their future) and makes it cute. I know that's what Sanrio does, and yeah, I think it's pretty cute, but what I worry about is it trivializing, overwork here. I'd say I'd worry about it normalizing it, but it is normal here. I don't want Aggretsuko to be the thing that an exhausted young office worker looks to and says, yeah, I can keep going, but that's what I see coming from watching that series. The "we can struggle through this unbelievable pile of shit, as long as we can do it together" mentality that exists here doesn't often give people a chance to ask if we should be struggling through the shit to begin with.

And seriously, that this is becoming a popular character at roughly the same time that Dentsu is a big thing in the news is pretty messed up. As quoted in Adage, that revolutionary workers rights publication, the company was founded on ideals like

A reverence for hard work has long been built into the company culture. Dentsu's influential post-war president, Hideo Yoshida, wrote 10 guidelines for employees that are still well-known today. One of them instructs employees not to give up. "If you have tackled it, don't relinquish it," the rule says in Japanese, according to a translation by the Asahi Shimbun newspaper. "Even if you are killed, don't relinquish it until you achieve your goal."

posted by Ghidorah at 5:16 PM on January 8, 2017 [1 favorite]

The "we can struggle through this unbelievable pile of shit, as long as we can do it together" mentality that exists here doesn't often give people a chance to ask if we should be struggling through the shit to begin with.

Well, it's more like, can you find any other options that don't involve struggling through shit? It's one thing to say "take this job and shove it" in your imagination, it's quite another when it seems like that's the only sort of thing you can find IRL. Aggretsuko is full of rage, but she knows deep down there ain't shit she can do about it and she literally can't say no on the job.

I dunno, I just enjoyed the few videos I watched in English where she was wanting to lose her shit at people's jerkassedness and stupidity, but doesn't. I related very, very well.
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:56 PM on January 8, 2017

I think the problem is that we can all relate, and that further normalizing of that fact, especially putting a layer of cutesy on top of it to sell merch isn't really all that helpful. Especially in a culture where they had to coin a phrase for dying from overwork because it's happened enough to warrant it.
posted by Ghidorah at 1:50 PM on January 9, 2017

Incidentally, although I only watched the linked video and didn't track down the series, Retsuko is almost certainly pouring beer for her bosses at an after-work function (hence her growing anger as she does it). In Japan you don't pour beer for yourself; you pour beer for others as a show of deference and respect, and it's common for this to take place at parties with colleagues. So for those worried Retsuko has a drinking problem at the end, it's more likely that it's all part of the job.
posted by honey wheat at 8:49 PM on January 10, 2017 [1 favorite]