(Also known as Ramen Fighter Miki.)
Like with my entry on Yuyushiki, there isn’t a lot to say with this anime, as both series don’t have a lot going on within them. Where Yuyushiki is a calm, yet comedic slice-of-life flick, Ramen Fighter Miki is a parody-comedy slice-of-life flick. That entails that the series will be loud, obnoxious, full of ongoing jokes, have references to other popular media, and occasionally defy the laws of common sense. And boy, does it do all this and more.
I’ll be blunt: this series is really dumb. But it’s supposed to be dumb, it’s a parody. Situations are typically over-the-top, satirical, and blatantly overexaggerated for comedic effect. However, that also implies that characters will act one way, and only that one way, from beginning to end. Ramen Fighter Miki does not disappoint in that regard. The characters are archetypes, the situations are fantastical, and each and every episode is zany to the max. If you enjoy that kind of thing, this will be your perfect bowl of ramen. If not, it’ll be a long twelve episodes.
What do I think? I enjoyed it. I’ve learned that I tend to enjoy “comedy” in anime more when the characters are energetic and morph their faces appropriately to the situation. I like spirit and enthusiasm in my comedy anime! But I also like when things are creatively stupid. Any anime can be stupid, but it takes effort to be creatively stupid. I feel Ramen Fighter Miki does a nice job of balancing itself with both raw stupidity and creative stupidity to service fans of both things. Lots of slapstick, too, if you dig that sort of thing.
However, the most prevalent flaw of parody anime are no different here. As I mentioned previously, the characters have zero development over the course of the series. A lot of jokes and character traits are recycled, leading to an inevitable feeling of repetition or laziness (I fucking hate the male rival). Constant use of yelling which can either ramp up the comedy or shatter the viewer’s eardrums (or both). It lacks that emotional impact that makes series more memorable. Sure, one can be memorable for being stupid, but it’s a fleeting feeling. “Oh! Remember that one series that had the ramen girl punching the dog in the face? That was weird, right?”
Animation is standard for its time. The color palette is fairly bland but present enough to distinguish characters. The animation is, obviously, over-the-top and littered with weird backdrops and fanciful feats of comedic gusto. It serves the comedy well and does what it can to service the viewer. Surprisingly little sexual fan service for a series with two cute teenage girls with decent-sized busts. For a parody anime, I would’ve expected at least one “boy walks into room unaware that a girl is inside half-naked” scene. Instead, the focus is on slapstick and funny faces. A neat change-up.
It’s a humorous, but ultimately absent-minded series that does the one thing it knows it can do well: comedy. Unfortunately, it’s only a certain kind of comedy that only some will appreciate. They hardly change it up whatsoever and the series struggles with trying to find that balance between stupid and normal. When I found myself paying more attention to Grey’s Anatomy than episode eleven of Ramen Fighter Miki, it was then that I knew I was done with the series. The fun had wore off and I was simply watching it to finish it. It’s not really a bad series, per se, but it’s one that perhaps could’ve been better suited as a three or four-part OVA special.
Personal Score: C+
Critical Score: C-
The rating for this title and all others can be found on MyAnimeList.
The Visualist's Veranda 
It’s series like this that was better when it was released on single discs. You had to wait months in between discs, so you got to break up the comedy. But I love series like this once in a while. Sometimes nothing beats watching something ultra-crazy or ultra-stupid to relax.
Certainly. It was high-time to see one for me since the last time was re-watching Binbougami ga! back in January.