First Date: Kyou no Go no Ni
- Title: Kyou no Go no N
- Studio: XEBEC
- Genre: Slice of Life/Comedy
Ratings (out of 5):
- Story: ♥♥♥
- Animation: ♥♥½
- Characters: ♥♥♥
- OP/ED Themes: ♥♥½
- Overall: ♥♥¾
Thoughts:
Okay, the Kyou no Go no Ni (Today in Class 5-2) TV anime is in the unenviable position of arriving some years after a really excellent OVA adaptation of the same manga (by Minamike’s Koharu Sakuraba). The OVA clearly had a higher budget (per episode, anyway), and also had more flexibility to showcase the occasionally ecchi lives of middle schoolers. (It’s not so much ecchi in a fanservice-y way as it is ecchi in that middle schoolers are curious about and generally pretty ignorant of all things sex-related, and therefore it’s a topic that comes up a lot.)
Anyway! As with the OVA, the anime episodes are broken up into chapters. It opens with the same one the OVA opened with, featuring Aihara (a calm and collected-type of girl) with a wiggly tooth, which she likes to bite things with for the time being…and her new favorite thing to bite is Ryouta, our mostly-protagonist. Following that is the “Super Balls” story, in which Ryouta and his friend Kouji compete over which one has a rubber ball that will fly the highest, to the dismay of their female classmates who are inadvertantly hit by the balls– Yuki and Natsumi.
The third story is one that I believe doesn’t exist in the manga, in which Ryouta and Kouji play broom-guitar and are hassled by Yuki and eventually joined by another character, Chika. And finally, we end with the “Rain” story, featuring Ryouta wedged between Chika and Natsumi, sharing their umbrella.
In and of itself, the show is decent…but it doesn’t come off looking very good compared to the OVA, figuratively or literally. The visuals are less distinct (see above), and oddly enough, so are the voices…the TV series features an entirely different cast from the OVA, and I find that Chika, Natsumi, and Yuki have relatively indecipherable voices.
Also, the designs have changed so thoroughly…they’re both more like Sakuraba’s original look (in terms of the characters looking younger) and less like it (in terms of the style just being less detailed in general). It feels like the colors are sort of washed out, and some of the characters have changed in appearance as well. Ryouta’s friend Kouji has blonde hair in the OVA, and their other friend Tsubasa is black-haired…in the TV series the two have swapped hair colors. (I’m not sure which way it is in the original manga.)
It’s hard to say this early on how much the ecchi will be lightened up, especially since it depends in some part on which stories they animated. From the look of the next episode they’re keeping in the one with Ryouta and Natsumi locked in the PE storage closet together, which has its unintended (by the participants) dirty moments…but will they keep, for example, the “Collar Bones” story, in which Ryouta insists that a true connoisseur of women is more interested in their collar bone than in their breasts? Or the “Flip” story, in which the kids discuss their various theories on skirt-flipping-up (which, of course, contains some shots of said act)?
Hard to say. All in all…it’s more Kyou no Go no Ni, which is yay! But on the other hand, so far it isn’t as…I guess the best way to put it is that it simply isn’t as strong as the OVA; everything feels somewhat watered down. It just remains to be seen if it’s been watered to the point of not being interesting enough.
But I guess the important thing to tell you folks who haven’t seen it is: if the idea of middle schoolers talking about anything sex-related or perverse creeps you out, you shouldn’t watch it (or have kids). For the rest of you, it’s still pretty funny, even if it’s not as good as the OVA (so far).
Tags: fall-2008, first-dates, kyou-no-go-no-ni
October 7th, 2008 at 11:03 pm
man, the OVA had an epic cast..and hte opening song sung by 3 of my all time favorite VA’s…kinda hard to beat that ..plus the OVa was just great over all..one of my favorites…but this disappointed me..but I’m still gonna watch it because like you said, it’s still funny…but my screenshots for it will be very few compared to the OVA XD. I seem to be agreeing with most your reviews so far though..doesn’t happen often..my tastes seem very different from most people
October 8th, 2008 at 11:57 am
I recently watched the OVA and loved — felt a bit dirty while watching it, but it’s hysterical. Definitely agree with you on the point about the character designs; watching this so soon after seeing the OVA was jarring to me, haha.
Still, I enjoyed the first ep and hope the series will get better. Of everything there, I think the air guitaring made me laugh the most. It reminded me of Doug when he and Skeeter start a band and write their first song. “Plunger, plunger, whoooaaaaa, plunger, plunger!!!!!!!!”
October 26th, 2008 at 3:58 pm
[...] not alone in voicing my confusion - Gia @ a geek by any other name also had mixed feelings about the first episode, especially in comparison to the OVA. Normally, I [...]