A Wacky Tale of Frienship: Ogawa to yukai na Saitou-tachi

Synopsis

Rio Ogawa is a shy fourteen-year-old who dreams of making good friends and living a fun high school life. That dream is dashed however as she is treated like a slave by everyone in school. One day, her biggest bully, Mutsumi Narita orders her to hit the back of the knees of the “three feared Saitous.” Three boys in different grade who have been ranked as the most feared students in the school. What happens when Rio, instead of hitting them, bumps into them instead?

The Good
Slapstick humor; in anime, it’s you mostly see this type of humor when involving a character being perceived as a pervert or such. For long time fans, you get somewhat used to the whole slapstick scene in most anime, but with this one, there is a refreshing change.With the three main males of this series, you get all kinds of crazy slapstick humor that takes on different levels. Add it with the way that the art gives way to the expressions of horror and anger for the scene adds another touch of comedy to it as well.

The story for the most part is rather simple and it’s because of this that there is much room for the wackiness of the characters to set in. The characters are the real strength of the story as each of their quirks and their stories brings something different to the series. Also, the further you go into the story you can’t help but appreciate on how well their friendship was developed in the midst of all the craziness of the antagonists and the plots.

The Bad

With all the wackiness and the slapstick that goes one, it seems that there really isn’t much of a solid plot to the story and instead, comes out as a collection of different stories involving the same characters. And that is the second problem of the series, there is practically no change in the plot cycle whatsoever. The villains are the same, their personalities have little to no change and basically, the plot comes off as rather repetitive in certain parts. Especially given how the results are almost always the same, just given a different scenario for the first half of the series

Another thing is that while the exaggerations of the characters expressions help in giving an added touch to the comedy, it also comes off as a bit much in certain scenes as well. While it is nice to see the development of the characters as friends, it would have been nice to have also seen their own personal development and background exploration as well. In addition to this would also be a better dynamics over the personalities of the antagonists as well.

Conclusion

This is rare comedy series that makes use of slapstick comedy that isn’t often seen outside of a character being beat up over being thought of as a pervert or such. The characters are solid in their quirks but also quite predictable for the most part on the antagonist’s side. As solid as their development is, the repetitive factor of the plot and the atics of the antagonists brings a slight downfall for the series. For the most part however, it is as the title states, a good wacky tale of friendship.

Rating: 6/10