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Apparently this is supposed to be some kind of cosplay?

Which character is Maekawa trying to cosplay here?

![Episode 11 - 04:13](https://i.stack.imgur.com/oNoYH.jpg)


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2013-07-31T02:57:51.593
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2014-05-08T05:30:45.503
2014-05-08T05:30:45.503
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denpa-onna-to-seishun-otoko
What was this cosplay where Maekawa had a donut in front of her chest?


The best guess I can come up with (since they're both SHAFT shows) is Shinobu
from Bake/Nisemonogatari. Since Maekawa (pictured above) is wearing normal
clothes, pink shirt and a blue skirt, that she wears throughout the episode.
The only thing in that particular image is that she has a donut.

Shinobu loves donuts:

![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/7eQLA.jpg)

![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/Ms6iO.jpg)

![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/G6CaJ.jpg)

![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/JPwWI.jpg)

![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/aHiIt.gif)


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2013-07-31T05:36:04.570
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2013-07-31T05:36:04.570
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The consensus opinion on a couple of Japanese forums seems to be that this is
actually a reference to the main character's unnamed wife (referred to as 妻,
literally just "wife") from the manga [Uchi no Tsumatte
Doudeshou](http://www.mangaupdates.com/series.html?id=30055) (translated
roughly as "I wonder if my wife is really normal") by mangaka Fukumitsu
Shigeyuki beginning in 2008. There's very little information available about
the manga even on [Japanese
Wikipedia](http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%81%86%E3%81%A1%E3%81%AE%E5%A6%BB%E3%81%A3%E3%81%A6%E3%81%A9%E3%81%86%E3%81%A7%E3%81%97%E3%82%87%E3%81%86%3F),
but from what I can gather it's a semi-autobiographical essay in the form of a
4-koma manga. The main character's wife acts strange in many ways and the
story is about her various weird behaviors. The most notable thing about this
manga, apart from being referenced in Denpa Onna, is that it won [one of five
Excellence Awards in the Manga division of the 2010 Japanese Arts
festival](http://archive.j-mediaarts.jp/en/festival/2010/manga/works/14m_Uchino_Tsumatte_Doudeshou/).

Here's the cover of the first volume of the manga. You can see that the wife
is dressed similarly to Maekawa and holding food (which she does frequently as
far as I can tell from briefly browsing the manga).

![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/zT45Cm.jpg)

Here's an image from the inside of the first volume with her eating a donut. I
looked but I could not find an image with a toroidal donut. The closest is
this donut without a hole (which are not uncommon in Japan).

![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/sb943m.jpg)

I'll readily admit that I'd never heard of this until I looked for it. It was
obscure enough that a lot of the users on 2channel were admitting they had
never heard of it. You can bet that most of the audience of Denpa Onna didn't
catch this reference. I'm not sure if it's more obvious in the novels (or if
the scene occurs in the novels at all), but for anime-viewers this one very
likely went over everyone's heads.


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2013-08-01T05:51:01.950
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2013-12-22T03:03:47.077
2013-12-22T03:03:47.077
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