So I haven’t really been watching much anime since starting grad school, but I latched onto Minami-ke a few weeks ago and I’ve been watching it whenever I have free time.
I’m about four episodes into the second season, Okawari, and I have to say, the series seriously jumped the shark transitioning seasons (and apparently directors).
Note: trying to stop a crossdressing guy from removing his panties: funny
The first season was a nearly perfect slice-of-life + weirdness anime. Kind of like Azumanga off of the crack. We had some cross-dressers and weird shirtless stalkers, but besides that, things were cool.
Note: Creepy students in blackface looming in the background: not funny
But the second season just doesn’t do it for me. The direction is horrible. The stories are boring. The Bible Black faces are completely misused. And the blackface that all of the supporting characters wear is just kind of unnerving. Am I watching an anime or an h-game? Also, what happened to Sensei + Ninomiya-kun? It was the best show within a show since Binkan Salaryman! And the ultimate harbinger of shark-jumping has arrived: a new character! Things do not look good for the Minami sisters…
I’m going to keep watching since the first season was so awesome, but if things don’t shape up soon, I’m going to have to refuse this second helping.
Well it is a different studio after all…
I agree with you, Okawari is nowhere near the quality of the first season, but it still brings some lulz.
Also, I’m only episode 4, so I can’t say much.
Things pick up after episode…. 5 or so, with 6 and 7 starting to return to full form as far as the original Minami-ke is concerned. No Fuyuki in 8 or 9 either, so far… which is the best part of the last few episodes for me, on top of a reeturn to the character-based comedy.
That’s good to hear. Because the emo neighbor kid is really pissing me off!
Yeah, I’m seven episodes into Okawari and it doesn’t seem as bad now as it did at the start, but I doubt it will ever match the awesomeness of the first season. And why did they introduce that annoying Fuyuki when the series already had so many great characters?
There also seems to me more of an infusion of “slice of life” properties in this version, which can annoy people who don’t really like that sort of thing. :/
Hung: He’s anime-original, and a piss-poor addition. It’s like they decided they needed another boy with issues, and then decided to make him so completely unentertaining (unlike Hosaka, Makoto, and Fujioka or even Takeru) that he pisses everyone off by being on screen. As another blog commentor put it, the boys in Minami-ke tend to be ENTERTAINING and they serve the purpose of the series (comedy/humor/slice of life) well. Fuyuki… doesn’t - he’s boring, he’s bland, and he drags down the mood like an anchor.
I think that’s why the more recent episodes have been better, to be honest - I haven’t seen him much since episode 6 or so.
TheBigN: It’s not slice-of-life that bothers me - if it did, I wouldn’t have loved Honey and Clover. It’s FUYUKI that bothers me… like a harem manga loser lead in a show that didn’t need one.
I’m going to have to disagree with everyone and say that it does not improve at all. I’ve been watching it from the start, and Okawari has just been consistently letting me down. I used to laugh my way through every episode in the first season, but now I just blankly sludge through every boring episode of Okawari. I feel like the second season is geared towards different fans or something.
I feel like Mako-chan is the only part of Okawari that is still funny, but he’s not really that funny. A lot of the jokes feel cheap and the infusion of fanservice seems out of place. There are no more brilliant jokes like the tera-bouzu moment at all. I didn’t even think Fuyuki was that bad, considering how unfunny everyone else has been.
FYI, I just watched an episode of Potemayo, and it was AWESOME. Why can’t it get a (good) second season?
There’s still hope for Okawari. The last few episodes weren’t terrible, though I enjoyed the first season more.
If I can get past the cleft-lips and hair-horns, I’d like to watch the first season.
The more I think about it, the more it seems unable to live up to the first season….sign.
Ahh…. That explains why season 2 came out so quickly after season 1. I was wait… there’s another season of Minami-ke already!?! Awesome. I haven’t had time to start watching it yet, and now that I find out it’s nowhere close to the original, I’m feeling even less inclined to watch it.