GRAND BLUE

DESCRIPTION

CAST

MANGA ComedyGrand Blue
ANIME ComedyGrand Blue Season 2

REVIEWS

• 

  AndoCommando

  35/100
  When you take a dive, sometimes you break your neck. That almost happened with this show.

  Every season of anime always has that one show. You know the one. From the start it receives constant praise and love by the masses, unrelenting in their desire to make their short-lived adoration known to any that will hear. For weeks it leads the figurative hype-train that has every seasonal watcher on board in anticipation to see where it will end up. Its the show you stay up late at night each week just to catch the latest episode on Kis-Crunchyroll.com. While every other show with potential may and probably will squander around the half-way point, this show – THIS SHOW – is the only one to matter, for it holds the embodiment of why weeaboos traded their social life to solely watch Japanese cartoons.

  Newsflash: This ain’t it.

  To be honest, this season as a whole has been remarkably unremarkable given the obvious trends that take place in the anime community. Although it may not be so surprising given that the season prior was coined by many as ‘The Greatest Season of Anime’, even the most popular shows airing currently have made little more than a murmur throughout their runtime. Attack on Titan, Overlord, the “final” season of Gintama, all well-known series that have all fallen silent amongst the public. But when it comes to new series airing, Grand Blue had to have been a main attraction; based on one of the most popular manga serialized today that features Shinji Takamatsu as director – the same director for successful comedies School Rumble and Daily Lives of High School Boys. Yet… something’s seriously off about this show, and since it seems to have slapped the tactfulness out of me, I’m just gonna go ahead and say it: This show fucking blows.

  I was planning to say something along the lines of “Let’s dive into this”, but whilst being the most cliché cringe-inducing pun I could have possibly made, there’s not very much at all to “dive” into here. Grand Blue follows 20-year-old Iori Kitahara who has moved to his uncle’s seaside town for college, where he is almost immediately roped into joining a male-dominated diving club. But if you thought this show was about diving, it’s a trap! Instead the club activities more or less revolve around drinking, stripping and getting hammered. Essentially, it is a comedy anime focused on the college life so a basic plot such as this is harmless so long as the comedy hits its mark. However, that simply is not the case. Instead Grand Blue comes off as an American frat house flick turned into a gag anime, except with nearly all the effort sucked out.

  Now I understand that comedy in general is heavily subjective so what personally may not land well with me could very well come off as a massive hit to someone else. Nevertheless, I have so many issues with how the show handles humour. One of the first instances of this come from the running joke where every other character tries tricking Iori into getting drunk. Conceptually, this does not strike me as humorous, but the ridiculous ways this is tried alongside dysmorphic character faces utilized certainly add to the punchline and made me laugh the first few times. But a cardinal problem with Grand Blue is that a joke which becomes par runs the risk of growing dull, and while using different scenarios can keep things fresh, Grand Blue instead drives them into the ground as fast as possible. Sure, the joke earned a few chuckles the first couple times, but then they use it once more, and again, and again… and again. Numerous times the overabundance of these quips was akin to beating a dead horse, and if at that point it does not feel overdone then I just do not know what to say. Clearly Grand Blue is a comedy show that lends itself to multiple running gags throughout the 12 episodes, but the way they are used is what inevitably ceases the series to deliver the same results on viewers like myself.

  Another issue with the comedy presented here more often than not is the timing. Timing is obviously a key factor for basically any form of comedy, especially with the kind of jokes Grand Blue exploits that rely heavily on the punchline. Yet here poor timing is so apparent that it comes off almost amateurish by the staff. Maybe this is a limitation when adapting the source material. I have not read the manga, but due to anime being… animated, it limits the way one can interpret a scene compared to a series of still pictures; the anime ends up much more restricting on the imagination. The punchlines themselves are also somewhat confusing at first if you had high expectations of Grand Blue without having read the manga. The series seems to treat comedy at a fairly lowbrow level where majority of the time punchlines were aimed between the more innocent characters being coerced or embarrassed by other club members. Sure, lowbrow humour can be funny and even I find it hilarious sometimes, but considering this is also a light-hearted comedy, makes Grand Blue’s task of making someone like myself laugh incredulously difficult. What also works in their disfavour are the more heartfelt moments mainly centred around Iori gaining appreciation for diving as a whole. These moments COULD have been useful as far as getting better invested in his character, except there is one serious problem: he has no character. You should not expect much in the way of development or characterization presented as there are only a handful of character worth remembering just to remember the plot meanwhile everyone else, despite their own “plot” are flat as a pancake. Again, due to Grand Blue being primarily comedy, there is barely any expectations as far as the narrative or characters go, yet the show continues to spread itself thin that I, as a viewer, am left with barely anything to truly grasp onto. Maybe I'm just an old fa[n] :(

  Perhaps the key problem I have with Grand Blue is not with the comedy or even the characters, but the subject matter. There has been an increasing amount of anime set in higher education as of late, each with their own take on a core aspect of college life. But before Grand Blue I had never been exposed to one that focuses primarily on the parts where the main characters get blasted off one’s face, and after watching this, it really does makes sense why. As a student myself I can tell you with assurance that there is not much fun getting shit-faced and even then, it does not last long. To those reading this that have experienced a hangover probably understand this most and, perhaps more importantly, the after-effects. Headaches, drowsiness, poor concentration and nausea are just a mere few of the symptoms that coincidentally are also felt when watching these moments every week. One of the most common appraisals about Grand Blue is how relatable the show is. I’m sorry but the main aspects that are relatable to real life here are not things that I would be celebrating as much and like those who have had poor hangovers, is something I would rather forget about. Although when it comes to alcohol in Grand Blue, there is nothing more depressing than seeing each episode open with a disclaimer about legal alcohol usage. Now, they were probably necessary to even have the series airing in the first place but way to present the exact opposite of comedy at the beginning of each episode. Of course nothing is mentioned about the nudity seemingly ever-present here; I see Japan has their priorities straight here.

  Speaking of; yes, I am a straight cis-male with no interest in the male nudity displayed in Grand Blue, but holy hell do they have the least creative way of censoring dicks. As aforementioned I have not read the manga, so I do not know how scenes were drawn but it is such a lazy way of going about it, though it does match the effort that arguably went to the overall visuals of Grand Blue. It looks absolutely lacklustre. Below average animation for practically every scene. Poor designs, even for the male supporting cast (no homo). This is not a series to watch for its technical appeal, because there practically is none. However, I find this fact to somehow work in its favour as far as the entertainment goes. Seeing comedic scenes with laughable animation effects certainly has a charm to it; perhaps a “so bad it’s good” quality, but not enough to warrant slogging through it all. Even fanservice for the male demographic was at a minimum. As far as the sound, both the soundtrack and voice acting are very forgettable. The opening and endings, whilst memorable, I personally found cringeworthy. Never will I not skip either if they ever happen to come up on a playlist. Just listen to these lyrics:

  ♫♫ Be passionate my friend
  Shine bright with the sun
  Dive into the blue sky
  And let summer take it all ♫♫

  And that is all there is to say about Grand Blue. It’s clear that not many people will agree with my statements as it appears to be a strong fan-favourite of whatever is left of the community still interested in seasonal anime. If you like it then I’m glad you enjoyed it, but there’s probably better comedies this season. Watch them; I thought this sucked. Grand Blue was the equivalent of a grand disaster in my eyes and stands a reminder that “in every age, in every place, the taste of weeaboos remain the same.” I guess I’m just not a fan of watching something akin to what the Fairy Tail guild would be like when knocked off their rocker. Anyways thank you to everyone who read my review. Be sure to leave a like if you liked-hell even if you disliked I’ll still take a like! Send a message for what I should review next. 99% unlikely to actually do it but who knows. Au revoir.

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• 

  CaninnTurtle

  79/100
  Grand Blue is an example of slapstick comedy done right, even if it does drag here and there.

  I remember it well, three or so weeks into the Summer anime season and thinking that Grand Blue Dreaming would end up being my anime of the season, if not of the year. I'm kind of nostalgic about those days, there was so much hope for these new shows and everything was shiny and interesting. So what happened? What made me lose interest or, if not losing my interest, what made me start to sour on Grand Blue? I think the answer has a few parts, most of them pretty subjective so bear with me as we go through them here.

  Getting started with the groundwork of any anime, Grand Blue's visuals are certainly solid for a comedy. Notice I said visuals and not animation, which certainly isn't anything to write home about in Grand Blue, as it's as simple as the come animation-wise. Aesthetically speaking, however, Grand Blue just pops off the screen with its bright colors, making the ocean scenes radiate beauty and excitement and keeping the air of youth and joy even when we're not on the ocean. I usually talk about sound design and such too, but I'm going to just mention the fantastic opening, because the rest of the sound design is just somewhat run of the mill, nothing standing out which is a good thing for Grand Blue.

  Favorite Character: Azusa Hamaoka

  

  I have to admit, I was a total Chisa fanboy at first, but then Azusa just stole my heart as the show went on, mostly due to her being a non-frustrating character. It's one of the reasons I soured a little bit on Grand Blue, characters just being frustrating at times. The only ones who really managed to avoid this pitfall were Azusa and Kouhei. Even Iori managed to frustrate me in certain episodes with his talent to always make the scummiest decision possible. Maybe I'm missing the point of Grand Blue with its scummy character interactions, but to me, I just don't like that kind of interaction, especially when it happens all the time. It gets rather tiring when the characters always end up trying to stab each other in the back in new ways with every episode.

  My issues with Grand Blue mostly boil down to the same things, which, in my opinion, plague the comedy genre in general. Those things would be the tiredness of the tropes involved. In anime, rarely do you get a fresh comedy and even Grand Blue doesn't really hit that target. Sometimes, it has a really fresh comedy scene, but I found quickly that I was watching for the more serious scenes, like when Nanaka took Iori to the aquarium. Those scenes were just magical to me, far outstripping many of the comedy scenes. I understand that I shouldn't be looking for those moments in a comedy, especially one of Grand Blue's reputation, but somehow, I just couldn't help it, I just really connected to the gangs friendships.

  That leads me into my next point, which is that there's no progress to the characters for the vast majority of the show's relationships. You see Iori and Chisa's relationship progress and Iori's and Kohei's friendship grow deeper, but it doesn't really happen anywhere else. Maybe you could say that Aina and Chisa's friendship, but that's not really focused on at all, they're just kind of friends all of the sudden. Again, maybe I'm wrong looking for this kind of thing in Grand Blue, but why is it wrong to be looking for development?

  Though I've been harping on it, Grand Blue Dreaming is legitimately a good show. It just didn't live up to my early hype for it. It got bogged down somewhere in the middle with its one-shot episodes with Iori's scum squad friends, which are easily the worst episodes in the series. And, even though it has its lows, you can almost always find at least one or two jokes that make you laugh out loud every episode, which is quite the feat for a comedy, in my opinion. Grand Blue falls prey to the same issues that most comedies end up falling into and that would be repetitiveness in its material. In Grand Blue's case, it's the absurd drinking jokes, which are funny at times, but sometimes its nice to have a break from the monotony. Obviously, this all boils down to my personal grievances with Grand Blue and why it dropped down my Summer season rankings quite a bit, but nonetheless, Grand Blue remains a great slapstick comedy.

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• 

  RTCanada

  80/100
  A wonderful ensemble of characters that never takes themselves too seriously, and when watching it, neither should you.

  Grand Blue takes the simple formula of providing a setting, an aspiring student trying to dip his feet in the adult world and completely turns it on its heel. This is a diving anime for all intensive purposes.

  …well maybe 20 minutes total of the 12 episodes. And for all that is said and done, it works beautifully. Anyone that is looking forward to university, beginning or has already experienced it, this show is a fantastic example of what that really is. One of the selling points of this slice of life comedy is that it’s real. Social group of comradry, laughs and anguish, it’s there in full view. There’s a lot more freedom compared to high school and the first couple of episodes definitely show that diversion. Iori makes it his goal to have fun in his first year of classes, and the comedy that comes with that goal is definitely not one to miss out on. He’s half naked going to his first class. The foundation is set, you know what you’re in for.

  While the stereotypes are there, the jokes and gags never grow stale. The Grand Blue diving club is a hysterical cast of misfits just trying to enjoy themselves parent-free. It’s a refreshing take on comedies that take themselves too seriously. These characters know fully well of their actions, and the show never attempts to disguise it otherwise. The ongoing gags of nakedness, alcoholism, complete lack of academic prowess in lectures, it panders to those who have lived it, and it’ll relate to everyone that is lucky enough to experience it. A college life in every sense of the word.

  The dynamic duo of Iori and Kouhei never missteps in its absurdity. Complete opposites when it comes to interests, the two provide incredible chemistry in their ability to screw everything up. Within their own friend group, the Grand Blue club and even their futile attempt at picking up women, we see throughout the 12 episode season that their relationship, while hostile at first glance, grows into a brother-like bond that shines in its final episodes. Supporting cast of Asuza, Chisa, Nanaka, the power duo of Ryuujirou and Shinji, they all have their moments in the spotlight. The chemistry is one of the best I’ve seen in an assemble of characters. The quick jabs after a heated argument, out of no where curve-balls that send you on the floor in laughter, its a group that sets itself up for disaster, but always turns out into a hilarious outcome that leaves both you, and the characters themselves in a better mood afterwards. In particular, the tennis match, and alcohol tasting scenes are wonderful, and are regarded by many as the funniest scenes in the comedy genre.

  The story itself isn’t something spectacular, and in retrospect, it falls quite short in that aspect of character development and cohesion. We really get nowhere by the final episode, and I can almost argue we didn’t even move an inch from the initial introduction. As a comedy though, it lends itself as a true patron of the genre. You can’t take any of this seriously and as an enjoyment factor, this is a definite strong suit of the show. Going in line with the manga, the show did feel a bit rushed at some points, leaving out some scenes, and the ones that were kept, some did not capture the same magic when converted in the adaptation.

  

  Animation is spectacular. On the handful of diving scenes you do encounter here, the artistic backgrounds and animation is top tier, and definitely amounted in Zero-G’s commitment to give this manga justice when converting it. Cool easter eggs and nods to the studios’ admiration of other anime works really show their heart was in this piece. I can safely say this is one of the studio’s finest works. Voice acting is just as good, and each character fits their voices in very nuance ways. The soft voice of Nanaka to the vibrant, but cold voice of Chisa, the VA’s have perfectly put their emotion in each character. Azusa’s in particular is fantastic and fits her upbeat and cheerful attitude perfectly.

  Grand Blue is not for everyone, but it definitely can be if you go into the show with a open mindset. While it boasts the real world characteristics of the post high school life, it should be enjoyed as exactly what it is, a comedic hit of the ages that absolutely never takes itself to seriously. Would I recommend you watch it? Yeah I would, but only if this immediately caught your interest on the premise. For me at least, it is the epitome of comedy anime, and will be one of the pieces that measures all others after it.

  ---

  

  (+) - Top tier ensemble of characters
  (+) - Character chemistry is immaculate
  (+) - Visual animations & voice acting

  (-) - No story driven plot at all
  (-) - Running gags may not be for everyone, especially nudity and excessive use of alcohol
  (-) - Typical troupes are present here: Siscon, relative-love interest plot

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