Arakawa Under the Bridge x2 - Episode 10

So, it looks as though our bridge-dwelling residents are still all set for their trip to Venus... but apparently there's a weight limit of 500kg on the rocket they'll be using.  Wait, what rocket, where did this come from?  Of well, anything to give us the contents of another episode of Arakawa Under the Bridge x2.

Given this strict weight limit, it's pretty clear that all and sundry are going to have to do some significant dieting, especially once it comes to light that Sister is already all muscle and no fat.  To reduce their part of the weight burden, the rest of the gang look for varying ways to shed a few pounds - for P-ko, Nino and Stella this involves taking up P-ko's "innovative" strawberry diet, which involves eating nothing but a bowl of strawberries a day.  Understandably this isn't the most successful plan in the world, and it certainly does nothing compared to Jacqueline's  magical massages which do wonders for the Mayor and Ric's figures, or indeed Sister's rather brutal "boot camp" training which inevitably involve guns and running away from a hail of bullets.

It's Sister's tough training and its results that provide the second half of the episode, with metal-masked brother Tetsuo the only one who has kept up with such intensive work-outs, leaving him looking decidedly beefy.  With these muscles comes a hefty dose of attitude, and it's this arrogance which brings him into conflict with Stella - never a good idea considering her own rather terrifying abilities.  Cue some actually pretty impressive action scenes as the pair of them duke it out, before Tetsuro gets involved in the fray in a desperate attempt to stop his brother from going too far.

This body beautiful, muscle-bound episode didn't prove to be one of Arakawa Under the Bridge x2's finest, while it also soon forgot about the whole "Venus trip" thing that started off being the entire point of this instalment.  Then again, the crazy and ever more bizarre goings-on still got a good number of laughs out of me, while the show's ability not to take itself too seriously with its characters commenting on how ridiculous things are getting helps things along in the face of the increasing insanity.  This wasn't Arakawa Under the Bridge at its finest, certainly, but it was still fun (and funny) enough to get by.