Medaka Kurokami is, in the truest sense of the word, perfect. Beautiful, intelligent, and athletic, Medaka's dream is to make others happy. So when she runs for Student Council President of the prestigious Hakoniwa Academy, winning the election with 98% of the votes is only to be expected.
The very first thing the boisterous new president does is set up the "Medaka Box," a suggestion box allowing students to submit any kind of request for assistance. Together with the cynical Zenkichi Hitoyoshi, her childhood friend who has been strong-armed into helping, Medaka fulfills these requests at a ridiculous rate. For every job completed, she adds flowers to the student council room, with the aim of filling the entire school. However, the two are about to find out that helping others may be a lot harder than they think as they begin to uncover a devastating plan centering on the academy and even Medaka herself!
[Written by MAL Rewrite]
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Detective
1981: A group of folks create the Daicon III and IV opening animations This group would later become Gainax. 1988: Aim for the Top! is released to massive appeal. 1991: Otaku no Video is released, comically cataloging the life and times of the mythical people at Gainax. Also released in this year is Gainax's first TV anime - Nadia: Secret of the Blue Water. October 1995: Neon Genesis Evangelion is released to commercial and critical success. 2000: FLCL is released as an OVA sparking wonderment in the minds of children everywhere. Especially those with ADD (and it's hyperactive cousin ADHD). 2004: Gainax recreates it's critical success with Melody of Oblivion,reshaping the future of anime in a way that no other company could. Also Gunbuster.
2005: Gainax and Shaft team up for a groundbreaking anime - "He Is My Master", which revolutionized the idea that "no concept is too basic".
2007: Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann makes lots of money and also Gainax starts remakes of Evangelion for a lot of money, too.
2010: Hanamaru Kindergarten becomes the perfect deconstruction of the "I just got diabetes" genre.
October 2010: Recreating the level of depth found in Neon Genesis Evangelion fifteen years prior, Gainax blesses planet Earth with a new anime by the name of "Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt".
2011: Dantalian takes a wildly refreshing concept and makes it even better, because it's Gainax.
April 5th, 2012: An anime of pure legend comes to be. Essentially a magnum opus of not only the best company in the industry, but possibly a pinnacle of animation itself. A lovechild between "Baked man gets artsy" creator NisiOisiN and manga artist Shouji Saeki, Medaka Box is hands down the only anime you'll ever need to see.
So you might as well stop watching anime. Here's why:
Medaka Box is the perfect parody of every anime ever. It manages to do this because it is an anime, and all other anime are anime. Therefore just by existing, Medaka Box is parodying all anime ever. If you didn't think that concept was suave, wait until you get a load of the setting. It's a school. That scenario right there perfectly satirizes Neon Genesis Evangelion (which in case you didn't know also had a school setting in it).
So what about the visuals? Let me start off by creating a metaphor. In the beginning, there was the alpha and omega. In 2012, there's Medaka's babycharmers. Capeesh? Let me end this section by creating another metaphor. I'm so hungry I could eat a horse. By horse I mean Medaka's chestnukes.
What does a Medaka Box sound like? It sounds like the opposite of a really wet fart. Unless you like that the best, because then it sounds just like that. It's hard to describe the sound of Medaka Box other than unparalleled. There is indeed an opening and ending. I thought this was a nice touch. If you like music and sound, then you may end up enjoying Medaka Box very much.
How many characters can fit inside of a Medaka Box? Like more than Bleach. Oh my god there's like three new ones an episode. Are they complex human beings constantly developed by the pressure and situations constructed around them by a series of choices that affect the way they live? No. They're just character designs that sometime speak. Easily the best way to handle characters ever. Thank you, Gainax.
Pros:
+Medaka's rack. Just look at it.
+A lot of characters. If you like characters you can find them in this anime.
+There is an opening and ending song.
+Wacky random crazy zaniness
+There's a second season
Cons:
-Medaka isn't real
If you care about anime you will watch Medaka Box. If you care about what it means to live you will watch Medaka Box. There will NEVER be another anime this excellent. It is actually impossible to be this systematically perfect, but leave it to Gaianx!
^------v
Okay, yeah, you got me, all that was sarcasm.
Medaka Box takes a high seated position on my list for being extremely unmemorable. It's up there with a select few titles for being so dramatically dull that I really wish I didn't watch it. It's generic, which isn't always bad, but it's also mediocre. A level of mediocrity that I have never seen before watching Medaka Box. There's nothing offensive or out of place in Medaka Box. Somehow when you're being dragged along by this show, you are never surprised. Anything could happen, and because of that Medaka Box fails.
It fails as entertainment because there is no punch line. In its comedy genre it can't manage to pull out something truly wild because there are no rules to keep Medaka Box in check. When one character is considered so good at literally everything (I say this because she is written to be literal perfection) it is impossible to wow the audience. There's nothing a character does that isn't overshadowed by Medaka, and everything she does is just a positive extreme. If someone is fighting for a physical concept, she chastises that character and then fights for an abstraction. This can be a great technique in writing. Personifying an idea within a character is great, except Medaka does nothing with it. The talk about justice and righteousness is all just smoke to cover for the inadequate motivation the writers inability caused them to script. So yes, a bunch of crazy and unrealistic things happen in Medaka Box. Sadly, unlike some shows it does nothing with them other than present them to the viewer and move on. There are no timed gags and there are no running gags. There are no gags other than shock humor that really isn't even all that shocking. It's a comedy with no jokes.
Medaka Box, primarily being a shounen, must have some unique set up right? Nope. It's a pure concept copy of The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi. Apathetic boy doesn't want to do anything with his high school life, yet an eccentric and attractive female convinces him to do otherwise. They join a club together and there they meet many bizarre people. The one slight alteration between the two productions is that where Haruhi would diverge and create subplots and backplots with it's supernatural characters, Medaka Box just wants to make a battle arc. A character will come in with a problem, and then a battle takes place (sometimes over the course of a few episodes). A villain character is always introduced, and his goals are always blatantly evil. Power Rangers has more intricate villains than Medaka Box. I'd even say that the fights in Power Rangers have more suspense, despite knowing that the Red Ranger will use his super weapon or the Mega-Zord at some point to take down the boss and then everyone will go home happy. In Medaka Box, there really is no suspense. At some point, all you know, is that Medaka is going to win. Why? Because she does so every time. She's perfect.
Mary Sue. The impossible insert character or object of desire. In this case, its the desire. She has everything. Power, popularity, smarts, athletic skill, and so on. It is so easy to write this character. It is so hard to like it. There is nothing unpredictable Medaka will ever do in this anime (other than occasionally surprise the viewer with revealing clothing). Her male counterpart whose name I refuse to even look up because he's that stereotypical is no better. He's simply a self-insert. The writers want you to feel like you're on the adventure, and you live through the most logical choice in the anime - the average guy. If you're a guy, you'll immediately be able to resonate with this fellow. He's average at stuff, he's kinda smart in his own ways, and sometimes he gets angry when his friends are at a disadvantage. He's competitive with another guy who is very much like him. That's as far as the characters in this anime go. There's no interaction that's worthwhile or unique. Even the sound is pathetic, with nothing but pop tracks for it's opening and ending and all instrumental upbeat tracks for its main series. It's all paint-by-numbers.
You change the outfit colors, get new scenery, change the supernatural aspects, include a series of anime cliche episodes (pool etc.) and there you have it. A twelve episode series of nothing better than sleeping pills. The animation is clearly looped when present, otherwise it's stiff characters standing around talking. And there's a lot of talking. It's about whose abstractions are superior, semi-Freudian analysis', and whose most powerful attack really is more powerful. Of course everything has a jargon codename too, because having terminology is really "cool". For example Medaka's Forte #4 turns her hair pink and allows her to hit with the force of a dump truck. Really, why not watch Dragon Ball instead?
If you're interested in this series for its ecchi qualities, it's not even passable in that category. If you saw Medaka's cleavage and said "Oh yes! Sign me UP!" I recommend Queen's Blade, Seikon no Qwaser, and Manyuu Hikenchou instead. Even the fanservice is mediocre.
Please don't watch this anime. There is no way I could recommend this anime to anyone. Not to boys and not to girls. Not if you're ten or if you're twenty and up. Even out of irony I couldn't watch this series again. Anime like this doesn't deserve your time. There will always be something better to watch. If you're struggling between this anime and another one, pick the other one. Thank you.
Stark700
Perhaps one of the most hyped up anime of this Spring Season. Based off the popular manga Medaka Box, the shonen manga written by Nisio Isin (author of the Monogatari series including that oh yes, infamous toothbrush scene from the who can we forget, Nisemonogatari), has officially became an anime. Now, is that a good or bad thing? Hmm..with roughly half the series airing already, let's put our heads together and find out. First of all, there seems to be a trend of strong and unusual female leads this season. Koko from Jormungand, Yuuko from Dusk Maiden of Amnesia, Rea from Sankarea, just to name afew. Then, we have Medaka Kurokami, the beautiful and well-endowed student council president who has in her mind, no problem showing of that voluptuous body of hers which is right now, one of the main reasons some of us may be watching the show. Beyond that, she is nearly perfect and achieves what we can see as inhuman feats. But most curiously, she wishes to help the helpless and does so by creating a suggestion box. You can probably figure out where the title of the series comes by this point. Then, we have the other characters starting with her lucky or maybe not so lucky childhood friend Zenkichi Hitoyoshi. He reluctantly joins the council for the sake of his childhood friend despite the strange put-ups he has to endure daily. (such as Medaka stripping in front of him with little care) Then, we have the other characters. The student secretary Kouki Akune who became an instant fan boy of Medaka and the blue loli Hansode Shiranui who seems to have an eating habit that surpasses the hunger levels of a saiyan. Although these characters are all appealing and makes us anime fans watch further and learn more about them, what are their backgrounds? From here and out, I definitely wants to see more of that than what they do in the council everyday. Lately, another character by the name of Mogana Kikaijima is introduced and so far, we know that she is obsessed with money. To her, it's all about the money, money, and money.
Now, the art and music seems to be alright from what's seen so far. However, I do realize that Gainax is NOT putting their effort into it as much as I originally hoped. The characters are blend, not original and not cutting edge. The absurd amount of fan-service seems to also seems to be thrown into our faces every 5 minutes. To me, that shows lack of effort on their behalf. I honestly expected more.
Some of the music does mix in during the scenes but let's face it, it's not worth a Grammy Award. The OP for this series is somewhat catchy especially those Medaka cameos in nearly every scene. It makes sense after all to have our starring president in it as she's also the title character. However, "Happy Box"? The title of this seems a bit ambiguous. That suggestion box is filled with notes that expresses concerns that I highly doubt would be something "happy" for the council to read.
But beyond that, there are also those little stitches we pay attention in every episode such as the blue loli Hansode Shiranui eating 24/7, Medaka's random symmetrical poses with the other characters, and Kouki Akune's narcissism. Strangely enough, I found these little things to be quite amusing from time to time even though they are served as comic reliefs (or maybe not later?). I mean, after all so far, this series is mostly amusing and entertaining and not one of these deep emotional series like Clannad: Afterstory where we cry tears that will fill the Grand Canyon.
However, in later episodes, Medaka Box lies the smackdown and delivers some unexpected action that some of us may have not expected. Yes, it still falls under the common cliches and fan-service but at this point, who really cares? This is one of those series where you expect the unexpected from our cast, ours truly the Student Council.
This series is something to keep an eye on (especially if you're into the comedy, shounen type genre) but NOT to hype over (especially for those who've read the manga beyond this point). It has its good but also the bad points. If you're a fan of comedy and entertainment, then this series is definitely for you. If not, then just sit back and watch this for the lulz. Later on though, you can expect Medaka lay some smackdown on those she sees as troublemakers to the academy. All in all, this is a busy series. Its first six episodes of half-stories may shun away viewers and make some hit that "drop" button. But if you can survive that, then you might be worth in for a little treat beyond the fan-service and cliches. If it's anything, this show does bring some entertainment especially in the middle of the week where you work your ass off at work or school. But hey, that's why we have anime like Medaka Box to kill reality.
Selsica
Oh the things this could have been. When one of my favorite manga became slated for an anime adaptation you can bet your ass I was jumping for joy, however the initial ecstasy was soon power-slammed into the ground and pissed on as time flew by. Penned by phenomenon known as Nisioisn, the Medaka Box manga started mediocre but eventually established itself as a wonderful clusterfuck combination of every genre known to man. The problem with the anime is that it didn't get past the mediocre part. Story - 6 Gainax produced a 1:1 adaptation of Medaka Box's first arc, but this faithfulness is one of theanime's fatal flaws. By choosing to animate the series with only 13 episodes Gainax trapped the show in its slice of life phase. The problem here is that Medaka Box wasn't meant to be slice of life, it was meant to be a jumbled mess of battle, romance, fourth wall breaking, screwed up villains, and character interaction. The series pretty much focuses on the introduction of the story, and introductions aren't really that stimulating.
Art - 5
The inconsistency in quality is quite apparent, you can clearly tell the budget was saved to animate the last few episodes. One might mistake Medaka Box for an anime made in the early 2000's as the quality is far below the average series produced today. Rejoice though, for the budget can be found hiding in the final arc of the series! Unfortunately the first part was done so bad that I doubt many people even made it to the final arc, which is quite a shame really. In contrast to the questionable animation plaguing the opening sequences, the latter half of the series is animated quite nicely. It displays the vibrancy of Medaka, the immense power she wields, the emotion filled faces of her enemies, and all her splendor when what little sanity she has is substituted for the primal fury of a wild dog.
Sound - 3
There is no better way to start off a series than with a vapid J-pop song that doesn't compliment or tie into the story in any way, right? Thank god Medaka Box has one of these opening sequences to distract us from the generic ending song. All jokes aside though, the only thing memorable in Medaka Box's soundtrack is how unfitting the music is with some scenes.
Characters - 8
Enough with the negativity! The characters of the series are depicted as well as I could have hoped, showing each persons unique traits in a flavorful way. Akune's aura of superiority, Kikaijima's aloofness, and Medaka's overbearing superiority are fleshed out skillfully in the narrative. If you enjoy watching overpowered characters accomplishing a myriad of insane tasks then I definitely recommend this series. Characters are the driving force of Medaka Box, and while there are many who dislike overpowered characters, for those who do this anime is a special treat.
Enjoyment - 6
My views may be biased as a manga reader as I know the series should have been longer and had a quicker pace but I still enjoyed the show, if only for the ending. While the slice of life portion may have drudged on and on, the battle arc at the end nearly redeemed the series. Nearly.
Overall - 6
Many, many things could have done better but if you enjoy school life anime with a twist of battle shounen then I would recommend you at least try Medaka Box. Even if you're only a fighting anime fan then it may be worth it to marathon this series in preparation for season two which I predict will be MUCH better. Manga readers may be disappointed with the anime, but for a first time audience of the series this show may be quite the treat. All I have done is pointed out the major flaws afflicting the series, if you can deal with these gripes then by all means try a few episodes.After all it IS written by Nisioisin, the man who brought us beautiful works of fiction such as Katanagatari and the Monogatari series.
Tzu
There is an abundance of people in the world considered enigmas. Un-explainable, insane and completely out on the outer rim. Their persona ultimately comes to be accepted or completely rejected, most cases swinging either way. Medaka Box or "Suggestion Box" sparked my interest by means of such an enigma known as Kurokami, Medaka but ended up just being another anime I couldn't really appreciate. I can't really say anything let me find a groove of enjoyment. Being another school based setting this rather failed to bring much of anything called "New" to the table, its outright out done and gets boring after dozens of morbid failures. Ijust keep running flaws after flaws in my head but picking a few out of a handful is hard.
First off, the art style just down right turned me off. I can't really say it was done very well at all, it felt almost low budget. The level of detail in anything was non existent and the thing that annoyed me the most were the character drawings. As we all know anything anime related is hardly comparable to real world applications, especially on the character sides. What I really want to touch on are the facial features, everything is low detail, everything overlaps and it just feels like a thrown together slop job. Unless you're into fan service I assume you were staring at "Jugs" a majority of the time.
Now I felt that Medaka's character was out of place all over the map. Going from looking like the innocent school girl to a DragonBall Z parody was just appalling. I for one want to see more of the "Character of interest and power" show less empathy for the students or people around them. I can't really appreciate an overpowered character try and bring out the inner goodness of people then eliminate anything or anyone threatening the peace. Its just been done too much already, and in a school setting it just feels out of place.
I really put this entire series off on weekly basis because it had it lacked substance. It was slow paced and put me off. I can't really say I enjoyed it at all. Maybe one day originality will be norm.
Don't let me make you pass this though, if you're a fan of club based shows with a cute main lead you might give this a watch.
Karpman
Medaka Box is an anime about Medaka Kurokami, a flawless girl and her childhood friend Hitoyoshi Zenkichi, who works hard to follow her, the story follows the two and more in the joining of high school while these two make up the Student Council, but one twist the president Medaka promised to solve everyone problems by the use of the Medaka Box. Note: This review contains light spoilers. Disclaimer: This is my own opinion. They are not facts. Perfection, this subject hasn't been touched a lot in the anime franchise, this anime: Medaka Box is not a real battle shounen and the action is very one sided, butit is neither a fail of a shounen, rather it could be called an anime which mocks these kind of anime. In a lot of shounen the good guy/girl overcomes hardships and in a life or death battle the bad guy gets transformed to the good side by seeing the light or something. Medaka doesn't have this life or death situation or the problems, well because the main character is perfect and flawless and a big physiological factor plays with this:
Can we stand someone who is completely better than anyone in everything? No, obviously we can't. We are humans who have pride, so we dislike the people who do everything right while being modest about it. This is called pride in a positive way and arrogance in a negative way.
The story itself consists of Medaka and Zenkichi solving problems around school, the latter episodes revolves around a fight between the Student Council and the Disciplinary Committee. I think this anime stopped at the point where it becomes somewhat more of a shounen and where the other characters actually get to do something.
Art-wise it does differ a lot from recently aired anime, instead of going for a more realistic look it has a pretty shounen like look. The animation isn't anything special, nothing too be amazed over. Maybe even a bit skippy if you ask me.
The opening song "Happy Crazy Box" fits the anime well and the ending theme is a character song by Medaka's seiyuu. Which is good, again this anything really good, it is decent and that is it all.
Since I already talked a lot about the character Medaka, you might notice that I think this is the anime's strongest point and I do think that. A character doesn't always need to be likeable to be a well done. Medaka's personality and actions might be disliked by a lot of people, but they probably made it so you would not like her and that is the point. On the other Zenkichi is a real typical shounen like protagonist, hard-working self-sacrificing and surprisingly a bit of a tsundere. Akune is more of a supporting character than a main, but still contributes to the story, Kikaijima, one of the many "reformed" enemies is a shy girl who only has money on her mind.
Overall I though this was a very unique anime, which opened some people's eyes about the term "perfect".
Best thing in this anime:
- The various range of characters and their personalities and the view it gave me on "perfect".
Worst thing in this anime:
- The art, animation and sound part were very lacking. The series might also have been a bit too episodic, but with only 12 episodes this probably could not have been helped.
Life lesson learnt: People rather have a hard-working failure, than a talented, flawless person.
_mahoushoujos_
After finishing this series, there are just a few things I'd like to clear up. First of all, this series was adapted (quite faithfully, I must add) from a relatively popular shounen manga of the same name. It's not in any way complete, and a second season has just been confirmed. This first season served mainly as an introduction to the characters and setting. Secondly, if you haven't read the manga already, I suggest doing so. It's nearly exactly the same as this anime has been so far, so you won't be missing out on much if you skip over this in favor of the manga. Alright,on to the actual review!
Medaka Box starts out as a typical school life story with supernatural/shounen elements. It's interesting to see a shounen series with the main fighting protagonist a female, although some may argue that Zenkichi is the true protagonist here.
The premise of this series is about a student council with an unbeatable president, Kurokami Medaka. Right off the bat, everything about this series seems like it should be completely unlikable. We've got a useless male lead, an overpowered big-breasted female lead, and a bunch of other seemingly annoying characters. But somehow, after just watching a few minutes of the first episode, I began to actually like them.
Honestly, by itself, this anime is not very good. It just doesn't make sense unless you know what the manga will eventually be about, and that's never a good idea. My enjoyment came from the way this show made me laugh, and I really did like the characters a lot. Despite the fact that all the characters are overpowered archetypes, Medaka Box presents them in a way that is rather satirical. This show doesn't take itself seriously, which makes it very enjoyable to watch.
Overall, I liked Medaka Box. The pacing was strange, but the ending left room for all of the events that have yet unfolded in this anime adaptation.
Monjoex
Oddly enough, I found myself enjoying this show more than I thought I would. Far from perfect, it still has it where it counts with its witty humor and “out there” characters. According to fans of the manga, the anime really didn’t cover a lot of ground. More or less the majority of it was introducing the characters and developing them as they interact with each other in a case by case sort of way. The last, oh let’s say, third of the series is the first story arc.This character, Medaka, is too perfect. She has a way with getting anyone to see things her way and uses this to “convert” delinquents into upstanding people. Her methods are a little less than ideal as there tends to be violence involved at some point. In the end, however, she succeeds in accomplishing her goal, one way or another. While it is for the good of things, she’s a love/hate kind of character.
The comedic value of the show overall isn’t the best. But it has its moments. The general consensus says that it may be a better option to read the manga if you’re really looking to get into this series. I cannot confirm or deny that, as I have not read the manga.
Overall I give this show 6/10 , its a Decent for what it was, but nothing award winning. Sort of became an after thought when I was finished watching it. For a slice of life style anime, with decent humor and all around fun characters, it’s good to give a shot if you’re bored and need some comedy.
MikeOnHighway61
Your typical shounen hero is a saint. No doubt about it. Whether they are challenging the strongest guys in the universe on planet Namek, traveling the endless oceans on their way to become the pirate king or gathering the most exquisite ingredients to complete their full course menu, these perfect human beings will overcome any challenge by propagating the three golden principles of the Shounen Jump Magazine: friendship, effort and victory. The main question is: do you really buy it? - The Story: Although it may at first glance look like a blatant Suzumiya Haruhi rip-off, Medaka Box actually deals with the afore-mentioned question. We follow the adventuresof the abnormally perfect Kurokami Medaka fulfilling her duties as the student council president. Accompanied by her more than sceptical childhoodfriend Zenkichi Hitoyoshi, Medaka dashes off to help every student on campus, whether they are really in need or not. There are no boundaries for this student council president as she resocializes even the most notorious delinquents.
The storytelling is more or less character-centered and engages the consumer with its many humourous moments and crazy situations. The numerous student requests lead the student council to join wacky escapades while the audience discovers layer neath layer of what can be assumed to be Kurokami Medaka's psychological profile. Is she a saint or a monster...?
- The Characters:
To be honest, this is probably the most striking element of Medaka Box. While the scenario, as described above, the concept of an energetic girl forcing a cynical boy to join a club against his will, is not new, the characters that fill the roles of Suzumiya Haruhi, Kyon, Koizumi etc are very well written and invite you to actually understand their competing world views as well as their fascination with the main heroine. And that fascination is not without cause.
This show stands and falls with its main character. Kurokami Medaka, the saint-like student council president, knows how to get what she wants, which is most likely something for the good of everyone. She definitely is one of the toughest female main characters in a Shounen franchise that I have ever seen. Talking personally here, after seeing countless of these pseudo-strong heroines fall to being protected by their male counterparts revealing themselves to be the actual strongest in the end (talking about Saber, Shana, etc), it was completely refreshing to see a female character taking the lead role in a Shounen Jump series, actually being in charge of most of the butt-kicking action while her male partners rather support than supress her power.
- The Design:
Although its scenario appears as your typical highschool setting, the character design already underlines its actual focus. Most of the students are weird looking, starting by their unusual school uniform look and ending in their crazy hairstyles or extreme body shapes. Those differ from certain elementary school kid sized students to brawny muscle guys or girls like Kurokami Medaka herself being overly sexy. This style adds a more than trashy vibe to the already weird contents of the Medaka Box adventures and gives you an idea of how to really handle the show.
- The Final Conclusion:
Although the first season of Medaka Box only covers a small percentage of the actual Shounen Jump Manga series, it really appears to be more or less complete within itself dealing with the simple matter of constructing and introducing Kurokami Medaka's saint-like character and posing the question of whether we trust our perfect Shounen heroes or not.
If you are sick of your typical pseudo-strong heroine please feel free to experience something different within this student council.
Ecchiha
I want to say that this anime is good I love it but, I disappointed when listen tha only have 12 episodes and say Oh My God Why? Because is a good anime and in the manga have a long history. However, I wait more of this anime xDD I want more and I hope a excelent second season and all the members tha apper in the manga :3 Gainax thanks for your good work.
LionHeart2
I want to start off by saying that this review is for both series of Medaka Box. This anime had very much so it's strong points and it's weak points. For the strong points my three favorite things in anime: the characters were amazing, Medaka and Zenkichi, I can't spell so do not get mad, there was contrast to the characters such as the overall change in how Medaka changed over the period of the series, and finally, the comedic relief was out of this world I liked that probably the most. It definitely lacked in art because of the fact thatif the character had long hair, their eyes would go through the hair and in my opinion was tacky and also the soundtrack was not bad, but not memorable by any means. Overall though I loved this anime and I was contemplating on giving it a nine until the last episode which got way off topic. Definitely a great watch and I encourage anyone who would want to watch the anime, you need to watch it really great.
RFShahrear
Medaka Box is one of the anime that has greatly let me down. Being a fan of Nisio Isin, I hoped it to be a good anime. But it was nowhere near what I had hoped it to be. Please note that I didn't read the manga, so i am NOT gonna compare. Honestly the anime had a good potential, but unfortunately it ended up with more flaws then perks. The first flaw of the anime is it's story. Story without any continuity is not that uncommon. In fact, it has become quite common it recently. To barely cover the setup and then burst offto some random events - I like that type since it's good refreshment from deep, complex storyline. But unfortunately it didn't work quite well for Medaka Box. The short 12 episodes tried to do a lot, yet did nothing than merely gathering the characters. I do realize that this acted as a mere setting before the second season, where it will hopefully get into the real story. However, even so, it could've tried to be not so boring.
The second, and the biggest problem of this series - is it's lack of character development. Honestly, the other members of the Student Council then Medaka got around as much screen time as a decorative foot soldier of a war movie. They did almost nothing. Zenkichi spent most of his time explaining Medaka's forte. they got episode 12 for themselves, that's all. Thinking about it, they didn't do much except speaking about Medaka. So, in the end, Medaka got all the spotlight. Even if she is the protagonist, it's overdoing it.
The third flaw would be its grandeur and exaggerations. Well, it's anime, so that is forgivable. But the "pretentious appeal to innate goodness" - well, it gets old. Things like that goes well once or twice in one anime, not one per episode.
As for the good sides, the art is quite good. The grandeur becomes quite bearable, in fact, it becomes normal looking thanks to the art. And I have no complaints in the sound department either.
Overall, it's not a failure of an anime, but neither is one that may be considered very good. If you're not used to exaggerating actions and somewhat pointless stories, you're better off not seeing it.
Oh, and also, if you're familiar with Nisio Isin's works, then you might understand - this anime has that signature style of his. Honestly that was the only reason I ever started this anime.
FlyingLasso
I really enjoyed watching Medaka Box and I will review it for you in an easy to - read way. I seriously suggest watching it for a funny and entertaining anime! Story (no spoilers) - Medaka Box is about a nice yet bossy student council president who is OBSESSED with helping strangers when they're in need. She tries to get her childhood friend in the student council but he is totally against it. She tries to reform everybody who has done a bad deed and eventually comes up against difficult challenges. Characters - The characters throughout the show are good with some great background stories. Thereare a lot of unique fighting styles between the characters and some interesting personalities. My favourite character would have to be Unzen, Myouri because I love his fighting style and bossy - childish personality.
Overall the anime is great to watch when your bored or if your into a comedy, action and school anime.
Mikame-
Going into this I thought it would be a usual Ecchi anime, just fan service and not much story line at all. But as soon as it starts, there's a story unfolding. Even if it is small, and not necessarily a proper story straight away, it's there which is what matters. The plot lined out in the synopsis shows a pretty common way for Ecchi, but it has a twist that makes it interesting. It isn't the main focus so there's been effort put into other parts of the anime for people to enjoy if fan service isn't just what they want. There isn't reallymuch of it either, so if you're just looking for Ecchi, this isn't a good choice.
If you like romance, there's some of that and good comedy too. Little bits of action are put in as well. The anime has a nice feeling to it. The balance between genres and what happens in each episode has a nice flow.
Watching the dub, the voice to mouth sync is a little off at some points but it's not a big deal.
Over all it's worth watching. It's entertaining and enjoyable. The action and plot quickly kicks in at the end, though in a bit of a weird way but it makes you excited to see what happens in the next season.
sorata861
[This review contains minor spoilers.] [This is a review of both seasons, together.] I am glad that I watched this. I probably wouldn't recommend this to others. I have watched this once, subtitled. Before watching the anime, I had read all the chapters of the manga, translated. I probably won't watch this again. ---- Positives ---- The series does a relatively good job exploring special power strengths, weaknesses, and match-ups. Although there are too many special powers to be painstakingly explored, for the number of special powers that are encountered in the series, we learn a lot about each of them, of which their weaknesses and how they fair against other special powersare the most important and well-handled.
This series focuses on the intellectual aspect of battles.
Characters win battles by outsmarting their opponents - discovering who their opponents are and using that to gain the upper hand, analyzing their opponents' abilities and finding a weakness, etc. Although every series that handles the meshing of different special powers is eventually doomed to trip on inconsistencies and not-quite-thought-through and overlooked applications of special powers, this series does a considerably good job at balancing powers and making sure that characters have a good grasp of their own limits. There really aren't any instances where you see the author in the characters - characters don't spontaneously apply their abilities in new ways as an afterthought. There seems to have been a large amount of thought that went into each character and their power beforehand.
Characters in this series have good chemistry within their groups.
When characters are grouped together in this series, such as being in a club, their personalities mesh really well despite being very different, generally.
Kurokami Medaka is voiced very well.
Her voice and dialect match her character.
The art looks particularly good, in bursts.
Certain scenes look really detailed and vibrant, mainly the early episodes before it turns into a battle series. Art is decent throughout.
There's a girl who's worried that her head is going to roll off unless she's constantly holding it in place.
Because those scenes are adorable.
Good Loser Kumagawa breaks the mold, so the negatives written below don't apply during that episode.
The final episode of season 2 is a side story that conveys the general feel of the entire [manga] series better than the main episodes did. Kumagawa is the most interesting and complex character in Medaka Box, so at least the production staff threw him a bone even if only for a moment. On a basic level, the ways in which Kumagawa does and doesn't use his special power are central to his character, all the other characters, and why Medaka Box [manga] performs so well as a Special Powers series.
---- Negatives ----
The genre shift is odd.
This series starts out as a Student Council Slice of Life genre and changes into a Special Powers Intellectual Battle genre. This shift was also peculiar in the manga.
Opportunity for cancel: Yes, depending on who you are. If you're okay with both genres, this will be fine and you may not even notice it until someone else points it out for you, but if you don't like one of the genres, you'll definitely notice and you probably won't enjoy the shift.
The series never gets far enough off the ground to delve into the characters' life philosophies as successfully as the manga did.
Yes, it's obvious that an anime series based on a manga series won't quite cover as many scenes. However, the life philosophies of characters, including, if you read into it, whether their views affected how they used their abilities or the way in which their abilities changed their lives changed their views along with it, was an extremely important part of the manga. Building that part of the story up takes a long time though, since you can't stop at simply dedicating a few pages/scenes to a character explaining their life and then expect it to have a profound effect on the viewer. The manga is long and the characters act out their views over a long time, so there's a strong, genuine feeling that develops regarding what types of people they are and how they view life. This is handled superbly in the manga.
Opportunity for cancel: Yes. For one, Kurokami Medaka gets decent coverage. Kumagawa gets a surprising amount of this sort of coverage even though he only has one-and-a-partial episode spent on him. Other characters such as Miyakonojou get decent coverage, though it's still slightly lacking.
The series didn't receive enough episodes in order to communicate its focus.
[This is related to the above negative, but examines how this aspect practically impacts viewers who haven't and won't read the manga.] As far as my opinion goes, the manga's focus is really on differing life philosophies coming together and enjoying both the positives and negatives of the result. Instead, based on how far the anime got, it appears to the viewer that Medaka Box is about inter-club battles and the Flask Plan and ... and actually, I'm not sure that there is any overarching focus. The series doesn't get far enough along. Someone who only watches the anime and doesn't read the manga will walk away with a very different impression of this series.
Opportunity for cancel: Yes, because the production team did a good job with the episode count that they had. There simply wasn't enough time to focus on what the manga focused on. I don't mean that there weren't enough scenes for monologue - there were. --but monologues wouldn't have cut it here. What I mean is that you'd need enough scenes that demonstrate the characters' views in order to properly cement those views in the story, but there just weren't enough minutes to show all those scenes without unacceptably rushing. So, the team focused on all the right things for a brief anime series.
ROBO-D
Medaka Box is an anime I stumbled upon while just browsing around on YouTube at some parodies and abridged series. Little did I know I was in for a great experience. I have seen both this and the Abnormal Sequel Series and yes my score is based around both as with this review. I won't spoil anything so go ahead and read the rest of this worry free. Story 9/10 The first series was all about what the anime was titled about: Medaka's Student Council Suggestion Box and her quest to reform the school and everyone around her. It is somewhat more light-hearted than the secondseasons immense amounts of violence and blood because it revolves around most of the school life and Medaka's Student Council. This may not sound all too exciting for the first season but Medaka herself is an abnormal person being physically able to do anything presented to her. After first season, second season picks up and presents a conflict, The Flask Plan which I find relieving since it doesn't remain somewhat of mostly filler. Although, I did not personally enjoy the ending as it really didn't have any relation to the rest of the series except for back story of a character we didn't know about until the second to last episode. But its one of those you may have to read the manga so I somewhat understand the reasoning behind that.
Art 8/10
The art style presents a lot of fan-service but does it in a way you'll still like the way everything is drawn. Its not the most beautiful anime but the way it presents itself is quite nice.
Sound 8/10
I liked all of the tracks except for the first season OP. It just didn't appeal to me and just felt generic. However every other theme in both seasons were very moving and I feel they fit the style and tone very well. I did watch in dub and I was very happy most of the voice actors cast consisted of Clannad actors.
Character 10/10
I loved every character presented in this anime, especially Medaka. She may be abnormal but its a good light hearted abnormal with one goal, help everyone around her be happy. She herself goes through major development mostly occurring in the second season but you can see the seeds of it being planted at the end of this series. As I said above, I really enjoyed the Clannad party here in the dub, it makes them more recognizable to me. I also enjoyed the wide variety of troubled people in the anime.
Overall 10/10
This is not a perfect anime by any means though through it all, I really enjoyed what saw. Every bit was enjoyable to watch and if you are into school with some added effects, give this a watch. You may not feel like I do but I assure you, you will not be disappointed by this anime, except maybe for the ending. But hey, if you can put up with, it still makes an enjoyable experience.
hexashadow13
tl;dr: A show with some potential in terms of smaller aspects, but that is lacking in that it’s a character focused show that only has one particularly interesting character. Medaka Box is an anime that isn’t really bad at anything, but is great at very little as well. It’s the story of the titular character Medaka who is incredibly overpowered. However, she isn’t the protagonist, rather the protagonist is someone that is much more normal and is basically just following along, Zenkichi. Medaka is pretty great. She’s just in general pretty likable due to how positive and powerful she she is and pulls off a lotof pretty amazing feats over the show. She’s also shown to have some depth with her rage form. Still, it never really feels like she gets character development. The protagonist fares even worse, wherein he both doesn’t seem to have much depth, nor does he get any character development. He actually has less to him than most of the characters in the show, including the prominent side characters.
The way the show is structured is essentially that the student council gets a series of requests that each lead them to get involved with one more side characters. Through doing so, Medaka and the rest of the council essentially push these side characters to grow. This is incredibly straightforward and simplistic, but it gives the side characters character arcs and clear character growth. A few of those characters end up becoming main characters and joining the student council, so outside of the main two the main characters do have character development, but this development is entirely frontloaded and there is never any development beyond that after they join the student council. As a result, in what feels incredibly strange, whoever it feels like are the main characters at the time never get any character development. Medaka feels like a strong enough character to power through that and still be interesting and easy to get invested, but none of the other characters are, and thus in terms of characters the cast doesn’t feel very strong.
There’s also nothing like any sort of overarching plot, rather just small stories that focus on characters, so even if these individual stories are mostly decent enough in and of themselves, holistically they don’t add up to all that great of a plot. There’s a lot of good comedy, equally held up by Medaka and the jokester character Shiranui, but it doesn’t quite feel like it’s enough to make the show great. There’s also some pretty exciting action, but it only shows up for an episode near the end of the show, so that isn’t enough to hold the anime up either. Thus while there’s definitely some good there, it overall still feels kind of lacking.
The art and animation were decent enough but not exceptional. There were some pretty interesting designs though. The OP was solid with a decent song and visuals that fit quite well with a bunch of somewhat hidden Medaka’s throughout. The ED was decent enough. The soundtrack wasn’t particularly memorable but it did what it needed to.
OneTrueAce
Hunter X Hunter. Dragon Ball Z. One Piece. Bleach. Attack On Titan. Naruto: Shippuden. These were the anime that everyone was talking about, and for a while, I bought into the hype. Around last year, I had never heard of this series, up until I was browsing around a YouTube playlist on KaggyVA's channel, and saw the abridged series to this show, Medaka MENT. Ever the curious one, I decided to watch this anime, so I looked it up, and I instantly got hooked.Story - 7
The series stars Medaka Kurokami, as she is the 99th Student Council President at Haikoniwa Academy, and she instantly becomes a staple of the school, with her abnormal superhuman feats, and abilities to 'show the right path' to other students in order to make them better people. Accompanying her is her childhood friend, Zenkichi Hitoyoshi, who is basically, Medaka's very own errand boy. Among the others are Mogana Kikaijima, a member of the swim club obsessed with money, and Kouki Akune, who is a judo prodigy.
Characters - 7
I've been browsing around the internet, and hearing things like 'Medaka a complete Mary Sue!' And 'She's too one-dimensional!' To that I say, NOT SO FAST! Medaka is actually a pretty well-rounded character (in more ways than one, you know what I mean?) She's level headed, but is also naive to the simplest things. But she always comes through in a pinch, even when it doesn't help. The rest of the cast is a (literal) colorful bunch. You have Akune, the judo prodigy who's hopelessly in love with Medaka, Kikaijima, who is tough, yet at the same time, shy, and the resident Big-Eater, Hasode Shiranui, who somehow knows everything about everybody, at anyplace or time. The supporting cast is pretty entertaining to watch, too, as they are the ones who get changed without realizing it.
Overall, Medaka Box is a fairly underrated anime, and should have more recognition that it already has.
Grade: A-
Fear_the_Reefer
Faster than several events supposedly taking place at the same time... More powerful than strings that can hold several tons of weight... Able to leap fleeing track team members in a single bound... This strange visitor from class 13... The Super Saiyan of our school... Student Council President Medaka Kurokami! Empowered with athletic superiority, possessing remarkable physical strength, Medaka fights a never-ending battle for truth, justice, and the pretentious appeal to the innate goodness inside of every living being! Disguised as a normal teenage girl, and aided by the friends she’s met along the way, Medaka will stopat nothing to fulfill the hopes and dreams of any student bold enough to leave a request in her suggestion box!
In one of the most shocking upsets and complete landslides in Sandbox Academy history, the newest Student Council president is, surprisingly, a first year student named Medaka Kurokami... Or, if you translate it, Black Spirit. While most high schools would elect a student to each individual spot on their student council, but in this case, Medaka wastes no time occupying every slot herself, handing them out to people she interacts with whenever she meets somebody who she thinks will perform them well. She gives the first spot to her childhood friend Zenkichi Hitoyoshi, and with his help, she immediately pledges to use him in her quest to respond to every request that the student body gives her. But can even the over-powered Medaka stretch herself thin enough to keep to this promise without breaking, or has she broken off more than she can chew?
Medaka Box was animated by... Do I need to say it? I mean, even if you’re not reading this on my blog during Studio Gainax Month, it doesn’t take long to figure out who the studio behind this show is. If the color palette and intense focus on female fanservice don’t tip you off, the visual direction certainly will. While Gainax isn’t normally one to use obscure angles and filters to distract from lengthy dialogue, it does have a nasty habit of using over-the-top, absurd visuals steeped in obvious metaphor to accentuate what’s supposed to be more thrilling dialogue. Medaka’s speeches to people she’s reprimanded can often make her appeal God-like as they shrink away in her presence.
Her power over others is also often expressed through the use of cheesy special effects like light beams and explosions, neither of which are actually happening in real time. These effects are pretty cool looking, but unfortunately, it’s obvious that the bulk of the budget was spent on them. That’s not to say the animation is ever bad, though... Even at it’s worst, it’s at least executed passably. These two elements of the aesthetic stand in stark contrast to each other for the first two thirds of the series, but when they finally collide in the final act, the animation becomes pure spectacle that could rival even Dragonball Z in terms of the presentation and scale of the destruction.
It’s nothing to call home about over-all, but it’s a pretty good looking show, and that last third alone earns serious points from me on the visual side of things. What I can’t speak so highly of is the character designs. The characters look like... And I can’t believe I’m saying this... A cross between Code Geass and Haruhi Suzumiya. They’re over-designed, detailed in the weirdest of ways, and have haircuts that are somehow dull while still being strange-looking enough to rival Yugioh. There’s really only one character in the show who I didn’t have a hard time looking at, but that was back when she had interesting expressions that hinted at inner turmoil, all of which disappeared when she donned some fetish glasses and joined the council.
The music, once again, isn’t really bad, but it’s pretty damn forgettable. The few times I did notice it, it was because it was over-powering and in some cases even distracted from the dialogue. When I try to listen to the individual tracks on youtube, there’s something about the synchronizing and the beat that just gives me a headache. This sentiment is carried through to the opening. Happy Crazy Box by Kuribayashi Minami is a moderately catchy song, but the visuals are so standard and effortless that I only really watched them once or twice. It’s a standard Shounen opening by every possible definition. You get god-like images of the main character, slightly more casual images of her clubmates, and each villain taking their turn to pose and mug for the camera. On the one hand, this opening might spoil who’s going to be joining the council throughout the series, but on the other hand, they’re all fairly easy to spot through attention to the writing alone.
The English dub comes to us straight from Sentai Filmworks, care of ADR Director Stephen Foster... Great! Are we getting an inappropriate rewrite that effectively kills the show, or a faithful-to-the-letter translation that sounds horrible and doesn’t even both matching the characters’ lip flaps? While neither option is particularly inviting, I’m still going to say it’s unfortunately the second one. As I mentioned in my review of Kill Me Baby, Foster had a nasty habit of trying to avoid critics of his writing by not writing at all... Just putting the direct English translations on screen, and letting his actors wing it. Some of them try to make the speech look natural... A few of the side characters manage to pull it off from time to time... And some even try to reword their lines, but these efforts accomplish little and never last long. Foster’s laziness hits in other ways as well, like how the ending credits are never updated in any episode. The five most important actors are listed respectfully, and then every single other name involved is listed below. In every episode.
The acting, for the most part, isn’t much better. I’ve always found Shelley Callene-Black to be a very limited actor, as she’s a really talented performer when she’s playing a few certain types of characters... I’ll spare you the list, but ‘teenage girl’ isn’t on it. She’s even more awkward here than she was in Clannad, if you can believe it. The same sentiment applies to Andrew Love, who does a great job playing adults and tough people... Like, for example, he was awesome in Log Horizon. So was Ms. Black, incidentally. But as the Lego brick male lead of a romantic comedy, he just doesn’t bring anything to the role that a better actor couldn’t trump him on.
Hillary Haag plays a charming third wheel, and is one of the few actors who really seems to be trying to make the awkwardly translated dialogue work. Greg Ayres is the other one, having a great time in his villainous role without even bothering to look for depth or complexity that just isn’t there. Tyler Galindo and Maggie Flecknoe round out the rest of the Student Council, but if I’m being honest, they both did a pretty terrible job. Galindo was stale and lifeless, while Flecknoe was just all over the place. I know that in both cases you could say the same thing about their characters, but still, they should have at least tried to rise above the material they were given, like Ayres, Haag and Monica Rial did.
I actually did listen to a few episodes in Japanese with subtitles, and I highly recommend that track instead of the dub. Yuki Ono and Aki Toyosaki sound a lot more natural and down to earth than Love and Black do, and as much as I enjoyed Greg Ayres as a villain, the legendary Romi Park... You know, the Seiyuu of Edward Elric? Just sounds as slimy and blood-thirsty as a talking snake in the same role. It’s easily sub-over-dub, which is kind of unfortunate because, considering the ridiculous nature of the series, I honestly wish Foster had gone with the first of the two options I listed earlier... Rude, outlandish dialogue that offends everybody while making tongue-in-cheek jokes about it’s own story, especially since this story... Eh-hehm... This story...
Say, who here loves the Rightstuf.com holiday sale? I do! I send Rightstuf obscene amounts of my disposable income in exchange for heavily discounted anime every year. I ordered a bunch of titles last year, most of which I’ve never seen before, and among them was a quaint little title that I quickly realized was part of the eclectic school club genre... A genre that was inspired by Haruhi Suzumiya before getting warped by harem influences. I went in with apprehensions, but was pleasantly surprised by the engaging dialogue, rich characters, and what felt like a genuine attempt to deepen the main relationships and flesh out some of the side characters. It ultimately failed to live up to it’s lofty ambitions and escape the trappings of it’s genre, but I still found it to be a breath of fresh air compared to similar titles like Haganai and Oreshura. That title... Was not Medaka Box. It was My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU. In contrast, Medaka Box didn’t do it’s genre ANY favors.
To start with, one of the first observations I made about this series... That it just refused to try to prove me wrong on... Is that it had, at most, two brain cells, and that they were completely incapable of rubbing up against each other long enough to form a coherent thought. Yes, I’ve called anime stupid before, but this is on an entirely different level. Every single moment in this series, from the plot twists to the decisions the characters make to the occasional details of backstory, is more stupid than the last. To start, let’s take a quick glance at the characters.
The title character Medaka is so perfect at everything she does that it won’t take you very long to start thinking she isn’t really human. She can run faster than the best member of the Track and Field team, jumping dozens of feet in the air while doing it. She can stand on a pair of water wings in the middle of the pool without falling into the water, she won millions of dollars by answering the worlds’ hardest math problem when she was in middle school, and she can even strike multiple kendo opponents at once while a friend insists that she’s human. Almost everything she does is explained to the audience via exposition from Hitoyoshi about why it makes sense according to her backstory. That’s pretty much the only reason he exists, by the way. Oh, and of course, Medaka is such a perfect fantasy girlfriend... Excuse me, main character... that she’s also an exhibitionist who doesn’t mind constantly stripping down to her undies, just for the hell of it.
Even when a character is interesting upon their introduction, they quickly either lose all of their unique qualities, or just fade into the background, but leaving aside the characters and their development, the writing of this series is just unsalvageable. Every single turn of the plot is random, often to the point of being self-contradictory. To be honest, I wasn’t sure what example from the story I would use to demonstrate just how terribly written it is, as every time I thought I’d picked a winner, a new example would pop up, stunning the shit out of me. I could not go a single episode without asking some variety of “What the fuck?” or “Are you kidding me?” or to my ever increasing chagrin, “They can NOT be that stupid.”
You know what? Instead of just picking one example, I’m going to go with three. Yup. I’m giving you some bonus nitpicking, you special people, you. Don’t ever say I don’t love you. To start, let’s examine just how much ADHD went into the thought process behind this show by examining a single episode... No, it was half of an episode, I’m pretty sure. We hear Medaka proclaim that her goal is to fulfill every request she gets, to the letter, without any regard to the consequences, and already, I can’t even tell you how many ways this promise could be abuse, but let’s get back on topic.
A girl hires her to help her write a love letter, claiming she has bad handwriting. Medaka hands this job off to one of her council members, who then writes the entire letter for the client, and when Medaka hears about this, she’s pretty disappointed... Not by the fact that he didn’t go the obvious route of simply dictating the letter, but because the letter was in his words, and thus would be meaningless to the receiver. So how does he rectify his mistake? I am not kidding about this... He teaches the client to have better handwriting. So this entire plot about coming up with your own words that are true to your heart is spawned from a request for HANDWRITING advice. Which is great, because if they performed her request to the letter, there might have been long term consequences... We can’t have that!
Oh, but it gets better. In a later episode, Medaka and her council is trying to figure out how to allocate the school’s club funds to all the various school clubs. Their solution? Instead of analyzing the situation and coming up with a smart plan... Remember, this chick won millions by answering an impossible math problem... They decide to hold an athletics festival in the middle of a fucking swimming pool, while very vaguely stating that the results will decide the budget. Now, some people complain that the swimming club will have an unfair advantage, but that’s okay, because the student council is entering too, just to fight them!
Medaka says she’ll triple the budget of any team that surpasses hers out of her own pocket, but the details don’t matter... You’re supposed to be focusing on the fact that the swim team is using reckless tactics to win, because they all grew up poor and they love money. They chose an unsafe way to swim to the bottom of an over-twenty-foot pool and grabbing balls to throw in the weird sports fest basket thingies? Oh no, they should have been rapidly submerging and resurfacing the safe way! What’s that? During the three-legged race through the shallow pool, they swam, kicking in harmony? That’s just dangerous! And then you have to get used to the idea that this whole debacle was written just to give them an excuse to have Medaka kiss the female swimmer. Oh, and she gets recruited to the council, but don’t worry, we never have to explore her troubled backstory... She loses almost all personality after this.
But you know what? Those examples are just kid stuff. Those aren’t all that bad. Yeah, they’re incredibly freaking stupid and make no recognizeable version of sense, but those ultimately amount to little more than light complaints. If a stupid show that couldn’t stay focused on it’s own plot was an immediate turn-off for me, I wouldn’t have such a big soft spot for Angel Beats. No, to truly earn my fury, this show would have to royally shoot itself in the foot... Which it soundly does. So, we’re coming to the third example, and I have to warn you, it’s a bit of a spoiler, but only a bit. It’s probably the most significant event in the entire series in my opinion, but it isn’t treated as anything more than the springboard for the show’s climax, so I’m not giving too much away by telling you about it. Still, you’ve been warned.
Towards the end of the show, the Student council has a run-in with the disciplinary committee, who are upset about the council’s wardrobe adjustments. She hounds them for a bit, before realizing that she can just use the suggestion box to solve the problem(I won’t tell you what she requests, just know that it’s NOT “I request the Student Council dress more conservatively), and she’s eventually won over. Well, the Chairman of the committee is a lot more hardcore than her. Enter Greg Ayres’ villain, who gets called to the school’s orchestra club to deal with a noise complaint, and... and... He kills them. Yup. That’s all there is to it. He slaughters all but two of them, and the fact that he’s a fucking mass murderer just gets glossed over for the rest of the three episode climax.
There have been plenty of anime that I thought should have, in some way, involved the police. Characters take illegal actions, and I think “Call the police, problem solved.” This is the first character I’ve ever seen that’s gotten away with literally murdering a whole club room full of teenaged boys and girls who have families, and friends, and HOW THE FUCK DOES THIS NOT GET MENTIONED AGAIN?! This was the moment that I went from nitpicking to pass the time to full on hating the show and all it represented, and oh yeah, while we’re here, let’s talk about what it was that it represented.
The over-all message of Medaka box... Yes, there’s a message it’s trying to tell us, and if Medaka constantly getting called pretentious isn’t a good enough clue, let me help you. The message of Medaka box is that there is innate goodness in all people, and no matter what they do... No matter what the crime, no matter what their behavior, no matter how sick and revolting they are... You shouldn’t punish them, because through kindness and understanding, they can be reformed. Scratch that, I know *EXACTLY* why the mass murder is never brought up again... The sooner you forget about it, the less you’ll be compelled to ask if the families of all those slaughtered would be satisfied in knowing that the kid who left them grieving was beaten in battle, reformed, and then recruited to be the new vice president of the student council, instead of somebody’s lovely bunkmate in prison. Oops, that was a spoiler, but you know what? Here’s all you need to know about this show in order to spoil the whole damn thing: Medaka is the mouthpiece of an extremely naive and ignorant worldview, and everything that happens, no matter how unlikely the event or how incomprehensible the decision, is made to support her grandstanding in one way or another. There’s a chance she might get proven wrong in season 2, but I don’t know, and I never will know, because I’m never touching this series again with a sixty foot pole.
Medaka Box is available from Sentai Filmworks in both DVD and Blu-ray formats, both of which are pretty expensive if you don’t find a good sale on them. The manga, by author Nisioisin and illustrator Akira Akatsuki is available stateside through it’s run in Shounen Jump, but has unfortunately not been released in standalone paperback yet. Unless of course you speak Spanish or French. A Second season, which is called Medaka Box Abnormal, is also available from Sentai Filmworks, and from what I’ve heard, it runs on a premise that may actually redeem Medaka’s character... The fact that she’s not human.
I’ve been doing Studio Gainax month for three years now, and in that time, I’ve come across some huge disappointments. I wasn’t a fan of Abenobashi, His and Her circumstances or Stella Women’s Academy, but Medaka Box is easily the worst Gainax show I’ve ever seen. I didn’t enjoy a single second of this shallow excuse for fanservice exploitation. I might have been more lenient on it if it were just stupid, and never left the boundaries of being laughably bad, but it didn’t... It used a pointlessly grimdark tonal shift at the top of it’s third act to suddenly start pretending to take itself seriously just because it felt it had to. I don’t know what it was building to, and I don’t care. I give Medaka Box a 1/10, and the only reason I’m giving it that much is because the animation was decent, and despite that ugly thing they did, the final act did have a lot of neat, enjoyable action in it. Other than that, I’m done with this.
lightningsnow
Medaka Box... Just a small intro.. This is about a girl named Medaka Kurokami who is the newly elected student council president of her school Hakoniwa Academy.. As part of her platform/project she sets up a suggestion box wherein any request that will be placed will be put into motion.. That is the adventure of Medaka and her fellow student council recruits.. This is a kind of anime that will make you say "what the hell".. I mean it.. Why? It's because it presents a plot wherein you can't say if it is shonen anime or just an anime with an episodic format or those animes whereeach episodes differ from one another...
When I first saw the poster, I put it in my to be watch list because it has a good poster.. My rule in watching anime is like this; when the drawing in the poster is good, I'm going to watch it.. Then, the watching starts... And as I watch it, there are times that I was surprised with the flow events.. For me, the whole thing is unpredictable.. I don't know if the scenes are to be considered shonen with awesome action scenes are some normal scenes.. That's my feelings..
Well, to elaborate..
Story (10)
Well.. I said that I was bit mislead at first but the concept that this series presented was good and interesting... First, they showed a concept wherein a student council acts like bounty hunters, gun for hire individuals or individuals that will do anything.. Well.. that's an exaggeration.. What I mean is.. the student council will do anything to help.. If that's what happening in real life student council, I think all of the schools in the whole world will live the best of their school lives...
Second, the structure of the school concept... They have a very huge school grounds, very sophisticated swimming pools.. what else can you say.. It's an awesome school.. It's just like you are entered in a school that surpasses the most awesome school in the world.. HAHAHA.. just saying..
Third, you may not know it but this anime will go into the path of sci-fi/fantasy and pure shonen.. Why? Because the main characters, especially the villain, are monsters... They have supernatural like abilities.. Also, as the story mentioned, there are this special class that have monster like individuals... I don't know yet the exact details but you will definitely sense that the series will be a real shonen..
Art (9)
Uh.. I have no issues with the art... Medaka is beautiful... The other characters are OK.. Very shonen like art..
Sound (7)
I have no issues with the sound... I can say that I enjoyed listening to the Ending theme more compared to the opening..
Character (10)
I can say that the characters presented to us are the ones you can really call "abnormal".. Well their character traits are in the extremes.. Medaka is super good, like a saint.. Unzen is super justice bent, like an obsessed justiceman.. Mogana is super money obsessed... The good thing about this extreme characteristics is that you can clearly see that main conflict.. It is not hard to understand who is right and who is wrong.. The clash of ideas are clear..
I'm going to talk about the character of Zenkichi for a while.. This guy is special... I like the way wherein he is giving bluffs, threats or advice.. If you will watch it, I think you will smile with the message... It's like the message is so badass or the message is very funny.. Just watch..
Another character that caught my attention is Shiranui.. Shiranui is very funny.. Not to mention that she is very cute.. She is like a chibi drawing because she is too small.. But the thing that sparked my interest is her mannerism.. She is like a secret villain that is planning the dirty works in the shadows and then her very cute face is the poker face..
Enjoyment (10)
The first parts of the series shows the different task or request.. It is fun to watch that absolute goodness will prevail in each task that are finished.. It's like you are watching a values show wherein each episode teaches a moral lesson in the end..
Then, here come the other part wherein the series starts to live up in its action genre.. There are opponents and there are action scenes.. DAMN, all of them are awesome... The balance is good.. There is comedy, action sometimes a little bit of drama..
Overall
Well.. watch this.. This is not you ordinary type of school anime or slice of life anime... It had it all... I don't think that I have things that I hate in this one.. It's like I enjoyed the whole series... Take note.. this is a manga series, so I expect more seasons to come..
That's it.. Thank you
LightningSnow...
