I’ll start this post off with a confession: I have a thing for side characters. You know, the ones who don’t get as much of a turn in the spotlight as the lucky main few; the ones who aren’t the stars of their series. Maybe they’re the ones who should be or could be, though, and at the very least, they help the stars shine brighter. I love these characters. I’m not sure why, either. Perhaps it’s that the lack of character development allows me to theorise endlessly about potential hidden depths. Or perhaps it’s just the fact that if a character has less screen-time, there’s less potential for them to be irritating. Regardless, this side character fascination is certainly there. Throughout 2010, we were presented with a wealth of delicious flat characters – ‘flat’ in the sense of a lack of character depth, of course – in anime, and I want to take a look at some of them here.
I suppose the girl featuring in my current avatar is as good a place to start as any, eh? Aoi Yamada of Working!! is largely a mystery. What we do know about her is as follows: she’s a klutzy, incredibly blunt, drama-mongering, supposedly sixteen-year-old girl who fancies herself a ‘super waitress’, has a huge collection of disguises and is inexplicably good at bugging people. Aoi is also a fantastic comedic side character. She’s entertaining and charming, and she also brings out the funniest in everyone around her, whether they’re members of the main cast or not. To quote what I said in my final post on Working!!, “I honestly think that her addition [to the cast] directly or indirectly led to each character’s funniest moment of the series”. One more Working!! character who definitely deserves mention is Maya Matsumoto, who only had her first real lines in the last episode of the series. Her obsession with normality was what set her apart from her bizarrely-behaved coworkers… and it was also what makes her fit perfectly among them, as it caused her to act as strangely as the best of them.
Another creator of hilarity and easily one of my favourite side characters of the year was Railgun‘s Mitsuko Kongou. Mitsuko toed both the fanservice character and gag character lines, but got a bit of development as well and a crowning moment of awesome (or two, arguably) to boot. She’s essentially presented as the ojou-sama with the giant ego. She’s confident to the point of boastfulness, and self-assured to the point of narcissism, and I loved her for it. We got hints, though, too, of her private persona being quite different to this – she seemed a lot milder and kinder to her friends, albeit not less boastful, telling them stories about how she single-handedly brought down one of Railgun‘s primary antagonists with ease. I think she’s fantastic, but I don’t at all think she could have carried Railgun. (For the most part, it was too laid-back for all Mitsuko all the time.) She was, however, both an excellent rival to Kuroko and an excellent unknown rival/self-proclaimed friend to Mikoto.
Sometimes, side characters don’t have terribly much to say or do. If we’re lucky, though, whatever they do end up saying or doing is hilarious. Angel Beats! had TK with his nonsensical English backed up by an array of dance moves, Seitokai Yakuindomo had Satomi Arai playing another schoolgirl lesbian in the snarky and slightly depraved Ranko Hata, and B Gata H Kei had the permanently cheerful and cheerfully frank Mami Misato. But perhaps the ultimate scene-stealer of the year was Milky Holmes‘ unforgettable Twenty. Milky Holmes actually had a few characters like this – another notable example being Arsene/Henriette’s chest, which seemed to have a mind of its own - but even in a show full of people with little tethering them to reality, Twenty managed to stand out the most. Whether he was stripping at an alarming pace, showing off his incredibly pointy nipples to the camera, moaning and screaming in Engrish about how beautiful he was, or going on a date with a hug pillow of himself, he demanded attention.
There were the usual side character duos, too. Occult Academy‘s sardonic janitor Smile and cheerful goth JK begged many questions. Why were the two of them always together? How was JK able to consume so much pudding? Why was Smile permanently wearing a smiley face badge, and what the hell was up with his giant spanner? Even more mysterious were Durarara!!‘s Erika Karisawa and Walker Yumasaki. Prone to fast-paced banter and off-the-wall conversations on topics ranging from fandom to philosophy, the two also displayed a wide variety of skills and prominent sadistic streaks. In addition, they made an excellent couple.
Lastly, we had – or should that be ‘have’, given she’s in a still-ongoing show? – Ruri Makina of Star Driver. … Yeah, she’s kind of only here because she reminds me of Utena‘s Wakaba, somehow. I’d love for her to get even comparable character development to Wakaba; I really want there to be more to her than “Her specialty is meat and potatoes!”. Star Driver, I have faith that you’ll deliver. Don’t let me down!
Okay, that concludes day five of Borderline Hikikomori’s twelve days of Christmas. Who were your favourite anime side characters of 2010?
With only a few weeks until the start of the fall season, it’s probably a good idea to finish up my look at the spring season. 
I’m always surprised how every anime season develops a distinct feeling to it that separates itself from those seasons that came before it and the seasons that will come in the future. The difference between the Summer 2010 season and the Spring 2010 season have been huge. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, I like to change things up but I wish there were more seasons like this Spring season.
In deciding the number of shows to include in my seasonal countdown I have two criteria; the first is to include only those shows that deserve the recognition and the second is to limit the number of shows to no more then half of the shows watched. This time the second criteria was the limiting factor and not the first criteria. I could have run the countdown up to 12 spots and still feel those extra shows deserved the attention.
And with that, let’s head to the countdown.
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In the same vein as those Microsoft commercials where people say they made the new Windows, I can say I made the new season of K-On!.
The first season of K-ON! left me in the small minority of people who didn’t think it was the second coming or reviled it as the spawn of Satan. I thought it was decent but had a couple glaring problems that held it back. The first was the pacing – it covers 2 years of high school life in a single cour – which made it a relaxing type show that was always rushing to the next thing. It felt wrong. The second was the sub-optimal characters that dragged the series down. Yui was the best main character and the only one that pulled her weight on the show.
For the new season of K-On! I wanted both of those issues fixed and that’s what we got. And it was just what K-On! needed. We went from covering 2 years of high school over 13 episodes to 24 episodes to cover 1 year of school. This gave/gives the characters the time to do what they’re supposed to do and it’s not becoming the next great band. With that problem fixed now some of the other characters needed to step up and Mugi and Azunyan (I can’t even remember her real name anymore) did. They, along with Yui formed a triumvirate of main characters that was able to raise the quality of the show and keep it there. And let’s not forget the addition of Jun and creating a secondary triumvirate of Ui, Azunyan, and Jun. This group creates a completely different feeling dynamic that’s fun to watch by itself and also by adding some variety to the show.
Since I’m so late doing this, instead of hoping the second cour could match the first cour in quality, I can say the second cour – currently running over the Summer season – is on track to finish very, very high in the countdown. Which makes me glad KyoAni decided to do another season of K-On! and didn’t waste their time on Angel Beats.
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What I think hampered many from liking this show more was that we all wanted Baccano! season 2 and tried to fit Durarara into that mold. I know it got to me; I watched Baccano! for the first time just before the start of Durarara because I wanted to get a feel for the work of Ryohgo Narita and spent most of the first cour trying to look at the two works as separate. It didn’t help that the two shared many similarities, as you’d imagine coming from the same author and animated by the same people.
For the most part, I worked this impulse out of my system by the time the second half of Durarara aired (during the Spring season) and was able to appreciate the show for what it was, not what I initially wanted it to be. It still wasn’t perfect, the ending was really telegraphed and lacked the dramatic tension to wow the viewers, but there was plenty to like about it like: the characters, animation quality, setting, and characters (the characters were cool enough that they deserve two mentions). In a different season, Durarara would have easily placed in the top 5 and maybe even in the top 3.
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Katanagatari has shown that sometimes less is more.
To see Katanagatari ranked this season would have surprised me back in January, when the series first started. I wasn’t that impressed with the opening episode and even if I was, there was only going to be 3 episodes shown per season (one ~50 minute episode per month for 12 months) which would make it very difficult for it go head-to-head against the excellent shows that run the full 11-13 episodes per season. However, as I’ve seen so often with anime, the first episode isn’t the best indicator of the overall quality of the show. It took a little time to develop the main characters and the relationship between them and to introduce the real villains of the series. It also took awhile before I noticed that the format worked in the show’s favor. The only thing that carried over between episodes was the character development and overarching plot so an exact memory of what has happened the previous month isn’t required. And the month-long wait between episodes correspond to the downtime of the characters experience as they journey to where the next sword is which rids the animators from the need to throw in some fluffy episodes to connect the sword hunt stories together.
That’s not to say I wouldn’t enjoy more Katanagatari episodes per season or that more episodes wouldn’t make it easier to compete against the likes of Full Metal Alchemist:Brotherhood but there are some positives to how the show is being done. The three episodes that ran this season (4-6) saw Katanagatari really hit it’s stride in terms of character development, plot, and general all-around awesomeness. And because it’s so late into the Summer season I can say, much like I did with K-On!, that Katanagatari has continued it’s run of excellent episodes and is well-situated to place higher when I’m doing the summer awards.
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The story of one girl’s quest to sleep with 100 men before high school does not sound like a show that you’d attach words like “smart”, “clever”, “heartwarming” or “a tender love story” to but I’m attaching those and plenty others including “highly entertaining” , “hilarious” , and “one of this season’s best”. The one thing I won’t say is that I was surprised at liking B Gata H Kei because I remembered 2 AIC shows from 2009 - Asu no Yoichi and Sora No Otoshimono. Both were “fan-service” shows that performed much better then the typical “fan-service” show so I figured there was a pretty good chance that AIC would do it again and I was right.
I’ve mentioned before that I watch anime with my one younger sister. There’s some anime that we watch together as it comes out (the spring season included Arakawa, FMA:B, Katanagatari, Durarara, and K-On!!) and some that I finish myself and decide afterwords that she’d like and rewatch it with her. Picking a show to rewatch with her is one of the best ways to show that I love that anime since I hate picking a show she’ll hate to watch. Rewatching a show with her also allows me to get her feedback and to see if my thoughts about the show hold up the second time through. For B Gata H Kei, as one might guess at this point, I decided to rewatch it with her and have already, in fact, finished a second viewing of it. I loved it just as much the second time and she liked it quite a lot too.
Therefore, I won’t be swayed from putting B Gata H Kei so high and kinda wish I could rank it higher.
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I decided to split this list up because I ended up writing much more then I thought would about each entry. Don’t worry, I’ve already written the other half so there’ll be no month long wait.
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Spring 2010 Awards Part 1: Cast and Character Awards
Spring 2010 Awards Part 2: Genre and Misfit Awards
Spring 2010 Awards Part 3: VMA Awards
Spring 2010 Awards: Top 8 Anime – #4 – #1
It’s that time again – the voice, music, and animation awards – or as I like to think of them: the set of awards that are completely subjective and some of the most difficult awards to pick as a result. And this season was no different.
Winner: Hiroshi Kamiya as Izaya Orihara from Durarara!!, Hiroomi Souma from Working!!, Otonashi Yuzuru from Angel Beats, Kou Ichinomiya from Arakawa Under the Bridge and I think I missed some
The Overall 2008 Best Male Seiyuu and Summer 2009 Seasonal Best Male Seiyuu makes it a hat trick. Then again, it was essentially impossible for any other guy to win this time since so many shows featured Hiroshi Kamiya in leading roles and he continues to do a great job.
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Winner: Maaya Sakamoto as Nino from Arakawa Under the Bridge and Akashi from The Tatami Galaxy
Runner-up: Yukari Tamura as Yamada from B Gata H Kei and Togame from Katanagatari, Aki Toyosaki as Yui from K-ON!! and Kena Soga from Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou and Satsuki Hyoudou from Kaichou wa Maid-sama!
Picking the best female seiyuu was a much different experience with a bevy of strong performances from many different women. In the end I had to decide on a tie-breaking criteria so I chose to pick the seiyuu with the best characters to win. And that was, Maaya Sakamoto, for voicing two female characters that came off as slightly odd at times but were really deep, interesting characters.
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Winner: Working!!
Runner-up: Rainbow, House of Five Leaves, Durarara, B Gata H Kei, Arakawa Under the Bridge
There were a lot of openings I liked this season but no one single opening was able to break from the pack to be the easy pick, at least initially, because I remembered the old argument about picking the MVP in a sport. Do you pick the best player in the league or the person that contributed the most to a team even if the team didn’t do well? In this case, I’m picking the opening to Working!! because I loved it and it was the sole reason that I didn’t drop the show. Working!! eventually got watchable, barely, in the last 3-4 episodes but before then, it was the desire to see the opening one more time that kept me watching.
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Winner: B Gata H Kei
Runner-up: The Tatami Galaxy, Arakawa Under the Bridge, Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou
And I’m picking the ending to B Gata H Kei because it was by-far-and-away the best ending and it was always like the cherry that one leaves to eat last from a piece of awesome cake.
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Winner: K-On!!
This award is one of the awards that I almost never feel real comfortable picking the winner because I often don’t remember the background music to most of the shows I watch. There are exceptions, in the case of K-On, the BGM is light and airy and it perfectly compliments the show which is what the BGM is supposed to do.
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Winner: K-On!!
Much like the award for best action going to Full Metal Alchemist:Brotherhood was completely apparent and needed no justification, this award going to K-On is also completely apparent and needs no justification.
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Winner: The Tatami Galaxy
Runner-up: House of Five Leaves, Katanagatari
I fell in love with the animation style of Masaaki Yuasa in Kaiba so it shouldn’t be a big surprise that I’m picking The Tatami Galaxy with it’s similar style to Kaiba. What kinda surprised me was the number shows that were more stylized in nature this season. When I see animators willing to experiment and these shows actually given air time, I relax when thinking about the future of anime.
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Winner: Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood
Runner-up: Angel Beats, K-On!!, Durarara
There were several very well animated shows this season but Full Metal had this award in-the-bag when it took it’s already great animation and bumped it up even higher this season for the final arc of episodes. Durarara was it’s closest competitor and might have pulled it out if there had been more cool action scenes.
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Winner: Madhouse
The Fall 2008 Seasonal Top Animation Studio and Overall 2008 Top Animation Studio makes it a hat trick this season as well by producing two of the best anime of the season – The Tatami Galaxy and Rainbow. Both were very original works that showcased the best anime has to offer viewers. Both works also turned out to be, surprisingly, heart-warming series that always left me impatiently waiting for the next episode. And it’s possible that Madhouse could win this award again in the summer season because Rainbow continues on which puts them in a strong position.
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That’s it for part 3 of my spring 2010 anime awards. Stay tuned for my top overall picks of the season.
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Spring 2010 Awards Part 1: Cast and Character Awards
Spring 2010 Awards Part 2: Genre and Misfit Awards
Spring 2010 Awards: Top 8 Anime – #8 – #5
Spring 2010 Awards: Top 8 Anime – #4 – #1
Before we get to part 2, I wanted to mention that I’m going on vacation in a couple of days but I plan on getting all sections of my picks for the spring season written and queued up before leaving. If you know me, it’ll take only one guess to figure out where I’m going. Which was what I wrote assuming I’d get this up before leaving on vacation but I couldn’t finish enough of the parts so it had to wait till after the vacation.
This time around I’m adding two categories that probably should have been included earlier in my seasonal awards and the inaugural winners are very well deserving.
Winner: Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood
Easiest.Decision.This.Season.
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Winner: Shichika vs Kanara from ep.5 of Katanagatari
And yet when I started thinking about specific fights, I kept going back to this fight and not one from Full Metal (an example of not being able to see a single tree in a forest). The fight in Katanagatari wasn’t the most flashy, complex, or intricate fight but it was unique, unexpected and felt very important in terms of developing the main characters and the story.
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Winner: B Gata H Kei
Like many awards I give out, this one is very subjective. For example, some people thought Working!! was funny; whereas, I found it to be probably the least funniest show of the season – the awesome yet very serious anime Rainbow made me laugh more often. And some people disliked B Gata H Kei when I thought it to be, easily, the funniest show of the season.
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Winner: Arakawa Under the Bridge
Runner-up: B Gata H Kei, Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou
A comedy entertains but not all entertaining shows are comedies; thus, the need for two separate awards. And once again, a different show wins each category. Arakawa Under the Bridge wins for it’s superior ability to mix it’s comedic side with it’s heartwarming and surprisingly poignant side while always maintaining it’s high entertainment level.
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Winner: The Tatami Galaxy
Runner-up: Durarara
Durarara gave The Tatami Galaxy a strong run but it’s near impossible to beat a show that involves dozens (if not many more) parallel worlds connected by a 4.5 tatami mat dorm room with the only constants being a castella cake, a hidden 100 yen bill and a stress toy.
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Winner: Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood
Runner-up: Rainbow – Nisha Rokubou no Shichinin
Full Metal has been working for a year to build up to this final climax and boy was it an awesome ride, topped only by events of this season. Those that followed the manga probably had a good idea about where the story was going but, after the debacle that was the first Full Metal series, I stopped following the manga and got to be surprised as a result. (The type of surprises that I like. )
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Winner: The Tatami Galaxy
Runner-up: Durarara, Arakawa Under the Bridge
The story of Watashi’s quest to find his rose-colored college life and subsequent enlightenment in The Tatami Galaxy could have been a SF story I read. That probably sounds like weak-sounding praise but, being a life-long fan of print SF, I’ve come to accept that in America (at least) television or movie SF will, 99.9% of the time, lack the depth found in print SF. Which is fine, sometimes, but I love it when somebody makes a TV series that equals the quality of the best print SF. Incidentally, if you liked The Tatami Galaxy, I’d suggest reading The Walls of the Universe from Paul Melko; it lacks the cool animation style (obviously) but it was a good read and the theme was similar to The Tatami Galaxy.
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Winner: Izaya from Durarara
Runner-up: Father from FMA: Brotherhood
Izaya falls into the conniving, intelligent villain category. It doesn’t seem like he’s out to cause the same level of villainy that Father from FMA:B was planning to do but, on the smaller scale, Izaya’s ability to manipulate everyone around him to his messed-up whims earns a great deal of respect from me, even if I’d wish he got more of a comeuppance at the end of the series.
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Winner: The Tatami Galaxy
I wasn’t sure The Tatami Galaxy was going to be able to pull itself together by the end but I shouldn’t have worried. The final episode showed exactly how in control of the story the director was even when each episode felt completely disjointed and the final episode was also just plain epic. If I could, I’d lock the people behind Angel Beats into a room and force them to watch this show a few dozen times and hope they learn the right way to do a final episode.
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Winner: Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood
The ending to FMA:B took up the entire spring season so for the same reasons why it won Best Plot, it’s also winning Best Ending.
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Winner: B Gata H Kei
Runner-up: Durarara
I liked Durarara a lot and it would have won this award easily (since it seems like there is so much more that could be done) but I’m not convinced that the sequel could surpass the first season in “awesomeness” and I want a Durarara that was just a bit more “awesome” then the first season. (If that makes sense .) Therefore, my desire to see a second season of B Gata H Kei was able to pull ahead to win this award. In the case of B Gata H Kei, I think the next season has to include Yamada finally getting what she and Kosuda desires to be a successful show. (Which then kinda ends the point of the series but the creators could then go off in a new direction and have the luckless couple make a mistake and Yamada get pregnant. They’d probably never do something like that but it would be hilarious and completely different.)
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That’s it for part 2, the next part is the VMA awards.
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Spring 2010 Awards Part 1: Cast and Character Awards
Spring 2010 Awards Part 3: VMA Awards
Spring 2010 Awards: Top 8 Anime – #8 – #5
Spring 2010 Awards: Top 8 Anime – #4 – #1
After one of the weakest anime seasons in recent memory (Winter 2010) and the accompanying apathy nixing it last time, the seasonal top anime awards returns to The Null Set for one of the most diverse and interesting season of anime in a very long time. We had alchemy, parallel worlds, demon kings, train wrecks, socially-inept samurai, pretty boy samurai, surprisingly deep commentary on what’s truly important in life disguised as a comedy about homeless people living under a bridge, a cute and sweet love story disguised as a comedy about one girl’s quest to bed 100 boys before graduating high school, an uplifting story of heroism set in post-war Japan, a neighborhood full of bizarre people in Japan, and a high school band known as much for the cake they serve in their clubroom as for their music, to name just a few anime.
Before starting, below is a listing of the shows that I watched this season and are the pool from which the picks for all the awards are coming from. Also a reminder, I’ll try to keep spoilers to a minimum but there’ll be some because of how they’ll relate to specific awards and for the continuing shows, only the part of the series that ran during this season is under consideration for this season’s awards.
Carry-over shows watched this season (3): Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Katanagatari, Durarara
New shows watched this season (12): B Gata H Kei, Arakawa Under the Bridge, Angel Beats, K-On!! Season 2, The Tatami Galaxy, Kaichou wa Maid-sama, Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou, House of Five Leaves, Working!!, Mayoi Neko Overrun, Rainbow – Nisha Rokubou no Shichijin, Hakuouki – Shinsengumi Kitan
Shows that got dropped (1): Heroman
Winner: Nino from Arakawa Under the Bridge
Runner-up: Yamada from B Gata H Kei, Yui from K-On!!
There was tough competition in this category but the self-proclaimed Venusian won out by being awesome enough that Ko still looks like he hit the jackpot by becoming her boyfriend even if it meant having to live under a bridge with a bunch of very weird people.
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Winner: Sakuragi Rokurouta aka Bro from Rainbow
Runner-up: Kosuda from B Gata H Kei
I love heroes with their ability to act contrary to self-interest for a greater good so I was unsurprised when I developed such a quick liking of Sakuragi from Rainbow. Alphone Elric almost made runner-up for the same reason but the large cast to Full Metal lessened his time onscreen too much. Sakuragi, much like Kamina from Gurren Lagann, also oozed awesomeness and had the gravitas to make being a hero look really cool.
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Runner-up: Ozu from The Tatami Galaxy
A headless mythical creature from Ireland, Celty rides a black motorcycle, wields a scythe, communicates by writing messages on a cellphone and somehow isn’t the oddest person inhabiting the Japanese neighborhood where Durarara takes place. She’s loyal and handy to have around in a fight and the only thing that really scares her is a tough-as-nails traffic cop. She was one of my favorites from Durarara (obviously) and pretty much had this award locked early on.
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Runner-up: Misato from B Gata H Kei, Shizuo from Durarara
Screen-grabbers are characters that don’t have much screen time but make the little time they are onscreen very memorable. This season seemed to have an abundance of great screen-grabbers but TK from Angel Beats won this one pretty easily. Just goes to show you how far speaking nonsensical English phrases in a Japanese anime and just randomly dancing can take a character.
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Winner: Ko and Nino from Arakawa Under the Bridge
Runner-up: Kosuda and Yamada from B Gata H Kei
This was a super tough pick and I debated it back and forth for a long time. One could argue that Kosuda and Yamada should have won because they’ve done more couply things together but there’s just something about how Recruit and Nino interact with each other that’s so nice to see.
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Winner: Fortune Teller’s ability to send people to parallel worlds from The Tatami Galaxy
The animators never come right out and say it specifically but they show her living inside the clock that always runs backwards when Watashi jumps universes and she is aware of his parallel world jumping so I’m pretty sure she does have this ability. And it’s a very cool power, useful in gaining enlightenment or making a fortune by taking a popular invention from one world to another that never invented it.
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Runner-up: Rainbow, Arakawa Under the Bridge, B Gata H Kei
There was a plethora of shows with great casts this season but Durarara pulled ahead by having a large cast of very eclectic characters that somehow meshed well together and were truly awesome by themselves as well. At times I thought Durarara wasn’t trying it’s hardest but it was always the fault of the plot and not the characters.
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Winner: Rainbow
Runner-up: Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood
I did not expect Rainbow would be as strongly character driven and focused on character development as it turned out to be though I should realize, by this point, that it’s often the most unexpected show that turns out to be. Just look at the past winners of this award – Railgun, Umi Monogatari, Cross Game, Asu no Yoichi, Toradora, Bamboo Blade. And I can’t wait to see where the characters go as Rainbow continues into the summer season.
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Winner: Watashi from The Tatami Galaxy
A look at the past winners of this award – Kemono no Souja Erin, Phantom, Toradora, Clannad ~After Story~, Natsume Yuujinchou, Ga-Rei: Zero – showcase some of the best anime that have aired in the past 2 years and The Tatami Galaxy is no exception. A common thread connecting these shows is the director and animation company excelled at telling a story that focused on a few main characters and allowing the characters to grow naturally. In the middle of The Tatami Galaxy, I was a little worried that all the reboots were not doing anything to help the show along but I should have had more faith in Masaaki Yuasa and Madhouse because the final episodes show just how in control of the story they really were.
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That’s the end of part 1; I hope to have the second part up within a day. Comments and feedback are always appreciated – I’d love to see what others would pick.
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Spring 2010 Awards Part 2: Genre and Misfit Awards
Spring 2010 Awards Part 3: VMA Awards
Spring 2010 Awards: Top 8 Anime – #8 – #5
Spring 2010 Awards: Top 8 Anime – #4 – #1
Until a while ago, I (naively) thought that all 4-koma manga series were sweet, clean, slice-of-life comedy affairs. You know, like Working!!, Hidamari Sketch and Azumanga Daioh; the medium just seems so well suited to this. But the past seasons of anime have featured two 4-koma adaptations that are a far cry from the cuteness of K-on!. B Gata H Kei (which I’ll abbreviate to B Gata here) aired from April until June earlier this year, and focuses on a 15 year old girl known only as Yamada, who aims to accumulate 100 casual sex partners. This season, we have Seitokai Yakuindomo (which I’ll abbreviate to SYD), which centres around an almost all-female student council. It’s a comedy propelled largely by sexual innuendo and even totally unveiled sexual references.
What’s interesting about these two shows is that the sex humour contained within them is driven pretty much entirely by the female characters. In SYD, the male lead acts almost exclusively as a straight man for the girls’ zaniness, and in B Gata, male lead Kosuda falls into a similar role, although he goes along with all the insanity much more willingly. Suffice to say, this isn’t exactly an unusual concept in anime – the guys being bland and the girls being stars. But these girls are in no way your typical female leads: they’re unashamedly perverted and sometimes crass, and they think about sex as much as society seems to only expect from boys their age.
In essence, these girls may be beautiful, but they in no way fit the ideal of the yamato nadeshiko: the traditional Japanese concept of the “perfect woman”. From Wikipedia: “known as an ideal Japanese woman per Confucianism, [the concept] revolves around acting for the benefit of the family and following instructions or acting in the best interest of patriarchal authority figures. Virtues include: loyalty, domestic ability, wisdom, and humility.” Although the yamato nadeshiko concept hasn’t entirely persisted into the modern day, the idea of a creating a perfect woman seems to pervade the anime world. Moe series star girls who aim to appeal to men with either their perceived perfection or their charming fallacies, and a trope for every possible kind of “perfect woman” has sprung up. Whether you believe the yamato nadeshiko, ojou-sama or even the tsundere or dojikko is ideal, anime and manga will cater to you.
So how do SYD and B Gata fit into this? The girls these series focus on are loved by their peers. In SYD, the trio of main girls – Shino, Aria and Suzu – are all presented as stunning and/or extremely intelligent, and they do their jobs excellently; in B Gata, Yamada is seen as gorgeous and desirable by her classmates, and her rival Kanejou is rich, talented and beautiful. But look even a tiny bit beyond the surface, and you find “perversions” (Shino, Aria and Yamada’s sex obsessions; Kanejou’s obsessive, romantic love for her older brother) or surprising personality traits (never, ever call Suzu a ‘little girl’). Even the leads’ younger sisters in the two series, who seem to fit the ‘cute little sister’ trope to a T, are remarkably sex-minded. Essentially, none of these girls have been created with perfection, or at least the traditional sort, in mind.
And I find that refreshing. Even though they’re only so sex-crazed for comedic purposes and arguably lack depth, these girls are independent and strong. While all of them have their fair share of moe traits – Yamada in particular – they aren’t ruled by them, and (it certainly seems like) they haven’t been created just to meet certain archetypes. In addition, it’s great to see girls at the helm of sex comedies. Indeed, if the leads’ genders in the shows were reversed – i.e. guy seeking 100 casual sex partners; single girl joins otherwise all-male school council and has innuendo thrown at her – the results would almost certainly be utterly, utterly awful.
I’m not watching this show, though it seems like it sounds better than it’s description made it out to be at the start of the season, so I may catch it eventually.
Spring has sprung – as the saying goes – the tulips, azaleas, lilacs are in bloom and all plants, from the biggest oak tree to the smallest blade of grass work their green magic to make the snow and cold a distant memory. Is it a surprise, then, that this season of anime, like the season it’s named after, offers an abundance of good titles.
Rating for episodes 1 to 4 – 10.5/12 Strong A
Anticipation Level: 4.5/5 – High
Yamada is her school’s idol even though she’s only a freshman. She has flawless skin, beautiful hair, long legs and mesmerizing eyes so accomplishing her mind’s desire (to woohoo with 100 different guys before she graduates high school) should be a cinch. The problem is that even though that’s her desire, she’s pretty naive about such things, she over thinks things in a very similar manner as Minami-ke’s Hosaka, and she lacks many of the basic social abilities like holding a conversation with someone because her mind has stuck on the ecchi stuff and has never learned.
As a result, she hasn’t so much as held hands with a guy and that’s a problem because all the “cool” guys are very experienced (according to her) so she decides that before she can bag her 100 guys she needs to train on a loser “cherry boy” that won’t mind that she’s not experienced. She picks a really plain looking guy sitting next to her in class by the name of Kosuda and so starts one of the most hilarious, confusing courtships I’ve seen in anime.
I have a stately old lilac bush in my backyard and that lilac reminds me of B Gata H Kei. There’s been some attempts to update lilacs but the type people still like the most is the tried and true bluish-purple lilac that their grandmother’s and probably their grandmothers grew. And as an ecchi comedy, B Gata H Kei, belongs to a very old genre within anime – lacking the bells and whistles that get people excited about the newer types of shows. Also like lilacs, most of the time people don’t expend much time and thought about shows like B Gata H Kei; no one grows lilacs for their interesting foliage or fall color or “winter interest” and no one watches an ecchi comedy for it’s well-drawn backgrounds or animation style or the cinematography.
So why does almost everyone love lilacs?
It’s their flowers that bloom over the course of a few short weeks in late April-May and the nostalgia. But let’s be honest, even if the lilac is incredibly old and can only muster a few flower spikes in a year that’s enough to keep people from digging it up and planting something newer and better in it’s place. It’s a rather short bar we ask the lilac to jump over and the same can be said for ecchi comedies – they have to be really lifeless for people to scorn them.
Sometimes, though, these stately old lilac bushes surprise you and, instead of a couple flower spikes, there’s dozens and dozens – putting on a show as memorable as the most sought after cherry trees or rose bushes. And sometimes an ecchi comedy like B Gata H Kei comes along and really surprises you.
As with any good show, several things have to be done right for the show to be good. One important element is the main characters and B Gata H Kei gets the ball rolling with Yamada and Kosuda. Introduced as a generic male character, Kosuda looks the part but is way more interesting the longer we get to know him. He’s an accomplished photographer, he’s kind and considerate, and he occasionally displays an actual backbone. Yamada’s character, for all it’s ecchi bluster, feels very similar to Minami-ke’s Hosaka though she’s been a little more successful in attracting her target. The side characters haven’t been given a lot of time but that’s okay since the animators have been using the time to focus on making the main characters work. From what I can see so far, the side characters are all decent characters with Yamada and Kosuda’s siblings being the standouts.
Another important element is for an anime to be entertaining. Different types of anime are entertaining in different ways and I’m very flexible in what I find entertaining which probably accounts for finding so many different types of anime entertaining. Comedy is one of the easy ways to make a show entertaining and I love the comedy found in B Gata H Kei – the miscommunications between Yamada and Kosuda, their inexperience in dealing with another person while in a relationship, their fears and expectations sabotaging everything they do. Another way to entertain is come up with something new and different (or at least something that’s different from what everyone else is doing) and B Gata H Kei can be given a thumbs up for creating Yamada from a pretty standard male archetype and letting her mess with everyone’s expectations and for making Kosuda with just enough backbone so he’s not a pain to watch but enough shyness to make him believable in the role he plays. And the final way a show can be entertaining that I’ll mention today is for that show to keep fresh and the viewer guessing what’ll happen in the next episode and that’s certainly true with B Gata H Kei. I have no doubt that the pair will end up together but the path to do so is really up in the air due, in part, to Yamada’s conflicting drives between the superficial confident idol that eats, drinks, and breathes ecchi stuff and the deeper feelings of inadequacy at not being good enough to attract the eye of “cool” guys and the fear from actually experiencing the events leading to what she desires.
Which leads me to probably the biggest surprise to B Gata H Kei, that underneath the superficial setup to the show, it’s really a sweet story of two shy losers falling in love and learning what it takes to have a real relationship. And before the voices speak up about the well-wornness of that story, let me remind those voices that put in the right hands even a well-worn story feels new (last summer’s Taishou Yakuu Musume was a great example of both an underdog story and a girls prove their equality to boys story) and so far B Gata H Kei has been in good hands.
The final thing that I wanted to bring up was that after a fair amount of fan service in the first episode, there hasn’t been too much since. As an aside, that’s why I decided not to call this a fan service show and use the better fitting term “ecchi”. I bring this up because I know some people gauge a show’s worth by how little or how much fan service is involved and however one feels about the subject, I wouldn’t be doing my duty as reviewer if I fail to mention this point.
Okay, one last final thing. Another reason I’ve been enjoying B Gata H Kei is that I like both the opening and closing songs. So, if you haven’t given B Gata H Kei a chance yet – maybe you read those horribly done ANN impression posts – watch a couple of episodes and I bet there’s a good chance that you’ll fall for B Gata H Kei like I have.
Is the TK in the background a reference to Angel Beats or just a coincidence?
