Cromartie High SChool Review

Wow, two posts so close to one another? It must be the end of the world! Or boredom!Or.. something else! I don;t know, just read the review.

Cromartie High School

In life, I have a few rules. One is that you should always take time to relax, no matter how busy are. Another is you should always have a flash drive on you, just in case. And my biggest rule? No matter what it is, nothing that has Queen’s Freddie Mercury in it is bad, and is usually something amazing. This show sees that rule, and proves it 100 fold. But I might be getting a head of myself. This is Cromartie High School.

What is Freddie Mercury doing here?

 Cromartie High School is about a school for delinquents, all bad-asses who smoke, fight at the drop of a hat, and have no concept of simple mathematics. They have more teeth then brain cells, as it were. All except for the main character that is. The main is a “normal” guy, by the name of Takashi Kamiyama. I put quotation marks because even though he might be one of the smarter members of the school, he is still dumber then a brick, and twice as gullible. Also in the cast is Hayashida, a pink mohawk individual with a strange leader streak, who is dumber then the rest of the school. Then there is Maeda, a strong punk, who isn’t completely dumb as he has to play the straight man to the others funny man. He has little presence and is captured a lot by other delinquents schools. Then there is Mechazawa. He is a robot, no one but the main cast seems to notice, and no one in the whole show cares. There is a gorilla, who is just there, and Hokuto and his lacky, who are trying to take over Cromartie High School. And finally, there is Freddie. Freddie Mercury. There is not much to say other the that an anime has FREDDIE MERCURY in it. It creates win all around itself.

Bad-ass line up. Except they are all idiots.

 The show itself is animated very limitedly, with many still images and reused images over the course of the series. But the cheap quality works with the show. The images look like they were taken right out of the manga, but again, this works. The ascetic makes it look individual and easily recognizable. The show is pure comedy, no real over driving plot, no dramatic moment, no real character development, just pure comedy. It does reuse many skits though, so if you didn’t like, say, the joke that Yutaka Takenouchi, the strongest guy at Cromartie High School, is incredibly susceptible to motion sickness, well then you are out of luck, because that will show up again at least 20 more times. But the show has no specific order to it, so you never know what you are getting next. If you don’t like the skit, wait 2-3 minutes, its going to change.

As I was watching the show, I got a distinct feeling I had seen this before. It was a scene where the characters were having a discussion about the mundanely of everyday life, and how it was the norm around the world, intercut with random scenes where Freddie is riding a horse dramatically and awesomely. And then it struck me. This was a Calvin and Hobbes comic. Not literally, but the comparison was just, right there. And the whole show feels like that.  It has the whimsical world that only a child could imagine, except real, the at times deep conversations that might even seem unimportant to the outsider, and the characters all thinking that this is normal, instead of fracking weird. And I like that part of Cromartie. It is funny, enjoyable, but just plain weird.  It is a show I fully recommend if you want a good laugh. If you don’t like lolrandom humor, or you want something with more of a plot, then this is not for you. But for everyone else, enjoy. Also it has Freddie Mercury in it. You are obligated to watch for his awesomeness alone.

Happy Freddie is Happy

Oh, by the way, there is alive action movie of Cromartie. It is even more insane then the anime, if you can believe it. but it is just an average day for the students at that school

Until next time, have fun watching.

Super Gals Review

Super Gals Review

I first watched Super Gals way back when I was in high school still, and all my anime viewing came from Anime On-Demand. From first look, I remember thinking that this was going to be a random high school girl comedy/drama. And I was right, it had all those elements. But as I watched the show became something much more, especially for me. As I watched it, I realized that the characters grew as the show went on. And I realized that I was growing with them. You see, this show is 52 episodes long. 52, that magical number, the number of universe in the DCU, the number of weeks in a year, the number that Super Gals ended on. On-Demand only showed one episode a week. So it took me a complete year to finish watching this show. I remember, coming home from school, working on my homework, and then, tuning to On-Demand, finding what was new, and the first thing I watched was Super Gals. This show is my go to good anime, but I might be getting ahead of myself. Lets start.

Super Gals is the story of ran Kotobuki the number one gal in all of Shibuya. She is hot headed, always hungry, always out of cash, a bit shallow, and a bit of an idiot. But she also ahs a strong sense of justice and fair play, and lives by the code she sets out for herself, her “Iron Clad Rules for Gals.” Now when I say that the story is about Ran, that isn’t exactly true. It is more of a slice of life, and we follow all of Ran’s friends, all the drama and fun they have, and the life of ran herself. There is no central plot, no over arching goal, and no real central conflict. There are a myriad of subplots though, and it is through those that the “story” moves, you could say.

So many characters, but where Second Place?

Most of the “plots” seem to focus on the people that surround Ran. There are stories about the budding relationship drama that Ran’s friends Aya and Otohata go through. There is the comedic stories about Yuya, the man in love with Ran, yet destined to never be with her, until someone better finds him that is. There are the stories about Ran’s best friend Miyu, and how she has to deal with her dark past. There are stories about Ran’s idiot boyfriend, her detective obsessed little sister, her arch enemies, and even a TV detective, The Odaiba Shark.

The Odaiba Shark never sleeps!

The show has a huge cast, it seems ever expanding usually. But it works for the show. It is not uncommon to know a large amount of people. Through friends, friends of friends, and just the random guy you meet on the bus, just by living a normal life you know a ton of people. Super Gals mixes realism and complete fantasy for comedic effect quite well in my opinion. The problems of the world just seem like real problems, from the subsidized dating, AKA prostitution, to seeing how rumors get quickly out of hand. But then it has just stuff that is over the top, like Ran’s signature attack the “Double Platform Boomerang”, which is her kicking her shoes at someone, and having them return to, catching them by putting them on again. It gets pretty intense.

There is Second Place! Poor poor lucky Second Place.

The art style of the show is very…noodle like. The tall skinny characters all look like they could be from a CLAMP story, or even an old style American cartoon. But it is a plus. There is no moe-moe pandering, and very little fan service, which is impressive for a show that has a beach episode or a beach episode equivalent every ten episodes. The music is very pop-ish and light, but always managed to change to fit the scene. There is a good amount of repeated music though, you will hear the same music that they use for the para-para dancing about a million times before the show is over. Also there is an intense genre shift from the opening and closing music. The opening is light and happy, and is fun to listen to. The opening is one of the most depressing things I have ever heard, and I skipped it nine times out of ten.

Dramatic look! What's going on over there?

Super Gals has incredible character growth through out the series. You get the feeling that the characters grew up by the time the series ended. When I said earlier that the characters grew with me, I meant that literally. This show is great. If you want some good comedy and drama, mostly comedy, find this show. Warning though, the first half has been dubbed into English, but the later half is only in sub form, so that might be a little jaring if you are not ready for it. Until next time, have fun watching.

"Lets get together again someday!!"