02.06
Oh boy, this is going to take a while.
I’m going to keep this family friendly, because I’m told by several sources that this is a family friendly show, and being that this is a family friendly site (right, Foggle?), I feel it’s only right to review it from that angle.
K-On! is a show about the “Light” Music Club at some high school in Japan. The four members sit around and eat snacks while talking about nothing (while also playing as little music as possible) while nothing at all happens of any importance in their lives whatsoever. I should clarify… The first 6 or so episodes focuses on the band getting together and getting ready for a concert. Supposedly. I mean, very little actually happens in any of these episodes to give you the impression that any sort of plot is being worked towards. One of the main characters tries to learn guitar… That’s basically it. She somehow masters the instrument in a few months somewhat degrading the challenge of learning such an instrument – but let’s not get into that, we have a non-existent plot to get to! Most of the show is spent with the characters avoiding doing anything music related at all, and is spent instead doing things you see on every other moe show out there which is… Y’know, nothing at all. This is a music show, by the way. Just thought I should remind you of that.
The characters are all tropes you’ve seen before, the main character, Yui, is the clueless ditsy type with no talent. Mio is the popular girl who gets embarrassed easily. Ritsu is Tomo (Azumanga Daioh character) clone #163. Mugi has no personality to speak of like every other character I haven’t listed, except that she’s from a wealthy family. There is a fairly important (by this show’s standards, I guess) character that appears later, but she’s really pointless and inconsequential, so who gives a care?
There are several technical problems with this show that really hamper it beyond the fact that it’s cliched pap that’s been done 100 times prior. First is the editing is really herky jerky and random. Scenes frequently end with no rhyme or reason and some of which have absolutely no purpose and should not have been put into the show. The sound is awful, and for a show about music this is unforgivable. The background music is typical ‘Casio-keyboard sound effect’ level that you’ve heard in almost every other moe show about nothing, and the sound effects… I swear there’s just a dartboard of moe sounds and the anime industry just throws apples at that wall or something and sees which one sticks and uses the one with fewest apple chunks on it. But, the biggest problem with the show is everything is paced like a glacier. More often than not one episode could fill like three episodes of this show, because the pacing is so freaking bad. This entire plot could probably be done in like 6 or less episodes if they didn’t have a director who loved looking at long cuts of scenery with NOTHING HAPPENING. Not even mentioning the barely there animation that even puts the ladder scene in Higurashi (look it up) to shame. This is one terribly paced and put together show.
If you would like a better description of episodes, I can handle that! There’s the one where they have to buy a guitar and get jobs to pay for it that somehow takes up a whole episode. You know what the job consists of? DOING NOTHING! I’m not making that up. There’s the episode where the main character fails a test and spends the whole episode distracted from taking a make up exam. Exciting, huh? But there is an episode where they play at a festival! But first we have to sit through over half an episode where nothing happens! The song they play there is actually pretty decent… Too bad it is capped off with a joke that is really, really lame and really poorly edited. Later episodes are your standard fare for this type of show, such as a Christmas episode, a new member joins (this seems to take two episodes somehow- or three if you’re picky), and there’s a summer beach episode. Do I need to go any further here? Again, the problem with all of these episodes is that barely anything happens in them. The pacing is beyond poor, and any enjoyment one might get from this show (how fleeting that feeling might be) is sure to be squelched during the long periods of blank space happening on screen.
The only real positive I can think of to add to this is that the opening and closing themes aren’t too bad, music wise, and the songs in the show (what little there are) are passable pop music songs. However, content wise there is nothing redeemable about this show or worth remembering.
Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not putting down slice of life shows when I criticize this show. One of my favorite anime is Chromartie High, and that’s as crazy as all get out but still grounded in simplistic every day plots in the end. School Rumble and Azumanga Daioh are also not bad for the type of show they are. They feature a pretty sizable cast of characters, all of which who share pretty complicated (not always complex) relationships and are usually capped with a clever character related joke. This is just dull. In every way.
Okay, you might be reading this review and pegging me for a KyoAni hater. Let me be upfront about this – I am not a KyoAni hater. I do like The Melancholy Of Haruhi Suzumiya (even though the Endless Eight is the stupidest idea since Han shooting first), and they also did a little show called Full Metal Panic! that I know a few fellow staffers are big fans of, and it has earned it’s place as a reputable animation studio. I know there are those who would argue with that, but my feeling is that while they may not always be top notch, they’re at least competent at what they do.
That being said, I really hate Lucky Star and everything it has done to anime.
Ever since the show came out, everything has been attempting to copy it’s success by featuring schoolgirls with “quirks” who lead normal everyday lives. All these shows about schoolgirls who look around 10 years younger than they’re supposed to be and doing meaningless things, with “interesting” (try “overdone”) quirks with the same darn 4 repeating plot-lines over and over again somehow stretched over 13 (or even 26+) episodes. Yet, somehow, otaku keep swallowing this tripe over and over again. And yes, I mean otaku, because there is no one else who could possibly find this stuff amusing. Why do they find this amusing?… Use your imagination. There are things I can’t say on a family site, after all. (This is a family site, right Foggle?) This show is no different than all of those generic clones.
Now, I’m a music fan. Music is pretty deeply embedded into my DNA and even though my tastes are constantly changing, I don’t think I will ever not love it as much as I do. So as an animation fan and music fan, I get giddy with excitement when there are shows based on music. In fact, they are frequently some of my all time favorites. Let me list just one of them and tell you why I like it. Don’t worry, I’m going somewhere with this.
The show was called BECK: Mongolian Chop Squad. The anime is not as good as the manga (due to sheer length), but this is the perfect show about music. You have a group of characters that want to play music simply because of the passion they have for it, no matter how hard life kicks them in the face. You can understand why Taira’s bass is so funky, why Ryosuke is such a deep sounding guitarist, why Chiba is a tongue-twister with words… It all shines through their characters and perfectly matches with their music so when it comes together, it works on a whole other level. In K-On!, music can be replaced with basket weaving and it would have the same emotional attachment it already has. Which is none. Geez, is anyone even reading this anymore? You could be sleeping or staring at paint dry instead of reading about K-On!
To be fair, I’m not saying all music shows have to be like that, because they frequently aren’t. But while music shows like Detroit Metal City, BREMEN, Nana, and BECK may all be totally different from each other, they all have respect for music in the same way they have respect for characters and the universe they reside in. This is why they are all highly regarded and recommended, and will most likely be looked back at for years to come. I severely doubt this will be remembered outside of a few select circles, and no, I don’t mean on the family friendly market.
Why did I go on about music shows and Lucky Star clones, you might be wondering? Because K-On! is both a music show (it’s what it’s marketed as), and is also another Lucky Star clone that we’ve seen a hundred times in the last few years. It’s too bad it fails at each of the camps it’s targeting and falls right off a cliff as far as… Well, as far as EVERYTHING about it goes. This is only a review of the first season, because I severely doubt the show will change after this point, and because if I went any longer I would probably lull myself into a deep, vegetative coma… And as tempting as that is after watching this cerebral bore, I have things to do… Like finish this review. *sigh* The irony hurts.
I can not recommend this show to anyone reading this review. If you like slice of life, stay away. If you like music, stay away. If you like moe… You should probably watch this to see what you’ve done to the anime industry. If you like anime, please don’t watch this. And that’s pretty much all I have say about K-On! and it’s genre. Now go watch rain roll off your rooftop or something. I guarantee that doing that instead will offer far more entertainment value per raindrop than this entire worthless show does per episode.
Oh wait, this family friendly show’s ending theme has the four underage teenage girls topless? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
Fuck this show.
(PS: Most of my notes for this review consisted of “Nothing is happening” written over and over in various different ways. Seriously, don’t bother with this show.)
Originally posted on Wednesday, July 28, 2010.