Despite being only eight minutes per episode, Tonari no Seki-kun: The Master of Killing Time is possibly the funniest anime this season. One of the latest episodes, “Disaster Drill,” features the titular Seki-kun playing house with robot action figures that look suspiciously like Transformers.
Tonari no Seki-kun: The Master of Killing Time is the story of Rumi, a normal Japanese girl, who sits next to Seki, a boy who goes to amazing lengths to keep himself entertained in class—and paying attention to the teacher is not an option he considers.
In “Disaster Drill,” Rumi and Seki’s school has an earthquake disaster drill in the middle of class—interrupting Seki’s distraction of the day: acting out traditional Japanese home life scenes with his robot action figures. Seki himself doesn’t take the drill seriously at all; instead, he sets up new scenes with the robots showing how seriously they are taking the disaster drill. It’s even funnier when you realize that these robot toys are clearly transformers knockoffs.
The role of the father in Seki’s scenes is obviously Optimus Prime.
The son is Bumblebee.
And the wife, despite the color difference, appears to be Arcee (though I suppose it could be Nautica).
These earnest scenes of the transformers trying to survive a natural disaster as a normal Japanese family would—and Rumi’s reactions to their ordeal—are equal parts cute and hilarious.
To see more pictures of this episode, check out gallery below or watch the full episode for free over at Crunchyroll.
Tonari no Seki-kun: The Master of Killing Time airs on Tokyo TV in Japan and can be watched for free with English subtitles in the US on Crunchyroll.
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