Isekai inversion is a genre that hasn't been completely killed off like its non-inversion cousin. In A Salad Bowl of Eccentrics, the parallel world conceit is primarily used to give us two very different fish-out-of-water characters and exploit their odd situations to create bizarre comedy. After the first episode, the presence of fantasy and magic almost completely disappears from the story, leaving us to focus on the hilarious character-based shenanigans.
The absolute star of the show has to be the ever-optimistic, completely clueless maid Livia. Spending much of the first few episodes living under a bridge with a random homeless guy, fishing (and bathing!) in the river, she has no idea how Japanese society works. She finds herself prey to shady characters who lure her into some pretty questionable lines of work. Luckily, after a disastrous clean-cut spell at a seedy escort bar, she's thrust into the position of becoming the most evil of modern scourges—a limited edition Gunpla scalpel! Boo, whiz!
Along the way, Livia befriends Puriketsu, a sweet and cheerful struggling musician, and Noa Minakami, an innocent-looking but deeply corrupt female cult leader who lures the unlucky into her fold using mind control. Noa makes no attempt to hide her identity from Livia, either. Noa sees her subliminal messaging and predatory scam tactics as essential to running a good and profitable cult. Despite pulling back from the overtly fanciful embellishments, A Salad Bowl of Eccentrics remains consistently entertaining.
I absolutely love the crazy subplot of this cult because Livia has absolutely no idea how completely evil her new friend Noa actually is. Livia shrugs off Noa’s bizarre behavior because maybe that’s how people act in this world? Noa develops an increasingly (obviously more romantic than religious) obsession with Livia, naming the confused servant as the new savior of her cult. This apparently means that Livia stays at Noa’s house for free, wastes money on Pachinko, and is also forced to model (naked) for Noa’s 3D scanner. There’s a running gag that spans several episodes where Noa creates an… erm… “anatomically correct” doll of Livia, even using her real hair for accuracy. Livia’s attempt to gift this cursed item to her former Princess is hilarious, in a surprisingly vulgar way.
Livia's story gradually escalates in strange ways, linking back to Puriketsu as they, along with Noa, become a singing idol-supergroup, with packed performances attended by hundreds of cult members. Each episode gets crazier and crazier, but everything always comes down to the beautifully drawn characters and their bizarre foibles. Characters pop in and out of each other's stories, sometimes getting involved in their own random subplots that often pay off over multiple episodes.
Sara and Sosuke's storyline is less deranged and therefore not as interesting as Livia's. Their relationship is incredibly heartwarming, however, as the soft-hearted and caring Sosuke provides Sara with a safe, loving home and a normal life, unlike anything she has in the afterlife. Although he initially drags her along on his detective cases, she eventually starts school and her interactions with the other kids liven up her scenes. It seems like once-royal, always-royal scenes, and her graduation from elementary school, along with Sosuke's horrified confusion at everyone's respect for this little kid, is a hilarious one.
While not the best aspect of the series, Sara and Sosuke provide the emotional core, with plenty of heartwarming father-daughter interactions, thankfully without any hint of inappropriate weirdness between them. Sosuke's work colleagues are particularly strange, especially 34-year-old pink-haired lawyer Brenda Aisaki, who (not so) has a secret crush on him. Strangely enough, she looks like a little girl, and all her attempts to seduce him are met with tragic failure.
Sadly, A Salad Bowl of Eccentrics is decidedly less impressive visually, looking like it could have been made on a shoestring budget. It rarely looks bad, but the characters sometimes seem overly simplified, and there's a general lack of dynamism or movement in the animation. This doesn't matter too much for the most part, as this is primarily a quirky slice-of-life comedy, with plenty of clever blink-and-you'll-miss-them visual gags. The story flows smoothly from one seemingly unrelated subplot to the next, tying together unexpected elements in a fun way later on, often with a wicked sense of humour underpinning it all. There are still enough loose ends left in the end that I'd welcome another season of these lovably quirky weirdos picking on each other's eccentricities.