First Episode Impressions: Nana Maru San Batsu

Synopsis

This is the tale of a young male named Shiki Koshiyama, a boy who loves books but finds difficulty with speaking up and making friends. Upon entering into high school he discovers the world of quiz bowls, he finds himself being brought into a completely new world.

The Good

The concept of the series is an interesting point of the series as intellectual games without the extra features of fantasy or action is not often seen in the anime community. The art may seem general at first but the background tones such as blue lies or the thinking moments of the main protagonist sticks out. On the note of characters, they have their own little twists as well that make them unique.

At first you may think that the protagonist is the general loner type but then you see that not only is he smart but he is a book lover as well, something that is not often seen with male leads of this type. Most often you get either the highly yto borderline genius protagonist or the otaku type with a special quality, Koshiyama seems to be an even mix of both qualities. This applies to other characters as well who provide an interesting turn for the series.

The music as well brings another good point to the series, though it may not be exactly memorable, it is catchy for the series.

Overall, the series holds quite a bit potential with a unique but not overly exaggerated plot and theme, well enough art and animation, and interesting characters that actually attempt to steer away from the usual stereotypes.

The Bad

The amount of cliches and general concepts are found everywhere in just this single episode. From the monologue of the protagonist to them being a loner because they were “different from the other kids”, there are many points that a long time anime viewers would recognize. Then there is, what could be referred as the “zone moment” where the character enters into a certain headspace where the viewer sees their “special quality” at the peak.

Here, a certain visual tone is presented and with the protagonist, it’s either hit or miss depending on the person as the zone is made blatantly obvious. The same could be said about the characters and their rather cliche roles and their portrayals, for example, the “circle” president of the quiz bowl circle seems like a combination of the classic glasses character and the character meant to be either the comedy figure or mentor type.  

Overall the cliches, use of visual tones and character portrayals are either something you can ignore or something that may break you from the rest of the series.

Conclusion

There are many different ways that a game of intelligence is presented in the anime community but the concept of quiz bowls is something unique to the anime community and luckily enough the anime didn’t completely exaggerated itself. While it does have its moments the anime plot and execution was done well so the exaggeration points were not all too bad.

The art style and animation brings out some unique qualities to the series and when the background tones come into play it’s either a hit or miss. The main problem however is in the amount of cliches you may see in the episode, for the most part, it’s not too bad but it truly depends on the viewer.

To put things simply, the anime series has potential but the cliches in it could steer the viewer away depending on how willing they are to see past it.

Rating: 7.5/10