KAGUYA-SAMA WA KOKURASETAI: TENSAITACHI NO RENAI ZUNOUSEN

DESCRIPTION

CAST

MANGA ComedyKaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai: Tensaitachi no Renai Zunousen
ANIME ComedyKaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai?: Tensaitachi no Renai Zunousen

REVIEWS

• 

  CodeBlazeFate

  85/100
  If you want your fix of romcoms or shows starring manipulative egotists, this is almost certainly the anime for you.

  “See, this show's what having a good director can do for your fuckin' show. You can make A-1 Pictures look like a competent studio. That's fucked up!” -DEEsidia from REVEL HOUSE, 2019

  Pride is cruel and ignorance is bliss, and when love is war, feelings are the casualties. Kaguya-sama is this concept taken to a hilarious extreme, with two teenage egotists trying to manipulate each other into confessing their feelings as every idea they ever had gets trampled on. This show thrives off its comedic timing, with tons of audiovisual flair, character chemistry, and wild ideas for our main leads to plan around and exploit. With A-1 being listed as the studio behind this, I’m sure some alarms were triggered, but thanks to Rakugo director Shinichi Omata, everything listed prior is utilized spectacularly.

  Shinichi Omata brings a ton of life to this anime with his stylistic flourishes. A lot of the time, backgrounds and camera movements are incredibly stylized, adding to scenes of characters overthinking things. Whenever a character starts freaking out or shouting in an over the top fashion, several grainy motion lines consume either the characters or the backgrounds. The ED themes have some creative visuals as well. These and more all add so much character to the visuals, which is a blessing since despite the fun character designs and facial expressions, the artwork dips a surprising amount early on, and the sparse CGI models can be pretty terrible. Thankfully, the visual inconsistencies and blemishes are so infrequent that the expressive visual flourishes and amazing shots more than make up for them.

  On top of the great visual comedy is the actual character comedy, relying on bombastic personalities and their chemistry with one another, including the narrator of the show, who provides a healthy dose of both on his own whilst poking fun of our main leads. Shirogane’s an over-the-top serious character, constantly shouting despite always maintaining a sense of authority, combining the general style of Gendo Ikari from Eva with the ridiculously dorky yet serious nature of someone like Yamamoto from Tylor or Sora from NGNL. It makes things all the funnier when he’s undermined by love interest Kaguya Shinomiya, who constantly wants to retain her air of refinement and superiority despite being a sheltered, jealous dork who gets flustered at the drop of a hat. However, the character that steals the show for me is Chika Fujiwara, the busty wildcard cloudcuckoolander --think Mayuri from Steins;Gate but probably evil-- who’s constantly making Kaguya jealous and single-handedly dismantling everyone around her and whatever they try to do. This doesn’t include the times when Chika has to teach Shirogane how to do things, which brings her immense pain. A close contender for best character is Ishigami, who appears halfway into the show, and is as paranoid and ridiculous as he is sensitive and adorable. It takes half the show to introduce him, but some of the show’s most gut-busting moments come from him, especially when he reaches critical sass levels. Lastly, there’s our helpful deadpan character in Kaguya’s maid, Ai Hayasaka, who has particularly great chemistry with Kaguya as she attempts to help her earn Shirogane’s heart. Somehow, she has the most surprises up her sleeves. The random tertiary characters are all entertaining as well, thanks to the comedic and sometimes emotionally resonant writing of a well-balanced and vibrant main and supporting cast. Each skit tells us something new about these characters. Combine that with their chemistry and the sheer number of skits, it leaves these characters feeling incredibly rich, on top of being varied and colorful. You can honestly make a case for any of the 5 major characters being the best, which is a great sign.

  Kei Haneoka’s music does a good job complimenting the show’s calculated absurdity. The OST often cycles between being as bombastic as the scenarios they support and being whimsical, meme tracks that play over sequences such as a comedic explanation of the game 20 Questions. The OP "Love Dramatic feat. Rikka Ihara" by Masayuki Suzuki is one of the standouts of the season, boasting a jazzy, almost James Bond-like feel with the sneaky and sometimes psychedelic visuals to match once the song reaches its chorus. It matches the personalities of the main duo quite well and how they treat these scenarios like mind games. Sadly, the EDs don’t live up outside of the visuals and the meme factor of Chika’s ED. That, however, is a small loss.

  Kaguya-sama is one of the funniest and most well-directed shows I have seen in a long time. This outrageous premise certainly won’t appeal to everyone, especially to those who hate the concept of two main characters pussyfooting around confessing to each other. However, the wonderful cast, humor, and visual direction more than make up for any possible annoyance that otherwise may have caused me. Nearly every skit and episode build upon the last. If you want your fix of romcoms or shows starring manipulative egotists, this is almost certainly the anime for you. It’ll probably stay in my holy trinity of comedy anime for quite some time.

  Written and Edited by: CodeBlazeFate
  Proofread by: Peregrine

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• 

  codyashi

  95/100
  You thought this was just another silly Rom-Com? How cute...

  I am very saddened today as I write this because a show that has slowly crept its way into being one of my favorite anime's has had its first season come to an end with no second season yet announced.

  What can I say about this show other than from top to bottom the show was well polished. You could tell that everyone working on this project had a passion for this show. From the art to the animation to the sound design to the voice acting, it seemed like everyone was giving it their best and felt like they were genuinely enjoying themselves while working on this project. And that TLC they gave certainly showed through from beginning to end.

  The charm to this shows comedy is how relatable the situations could be but then taken to the extreme to the point of craziness. It was funny watching these characters trying to outwit each other with one ridiculous scheme after another and for the most part it never gets old or stale. Each character in this show gets their time to shine which allows them to showcase their unique quirks and ways of thinking. From Kaguya, who we get to see her brilliant tactical mind despite who social flaws, down to even her hand maid Hayasaka, who basically acts as the voice of the viewer as well as the voice of reason. What I enjoyed is how each character brought their own style of humor and how each character pretty much stayed true to themselves.

  This being labeled a comedy and all, of course there is a lot of humor. But what surprised me the most were the times when this show decided to get serious. I will just say that when this show started out, I would have never expected that it would make me shed a tear. Kaguya goes from someone who is a bit overshadowed by the other characters, to where at the end of the season you are full on rooting for her to get what she wants. Kaguya is a deep character where her flaws that could be quite frustrating at the beginning of the series becomes painfully clear by the end of the season. You feel sympathetic/empathetic toward her and her situation while people who come from overbearing and strict family upbringings may be able to relate to her. I feel like I could get more into that but I don't want to go off on a tangent. The way the show subtlety transitions from a comedy show with romantic aspects to a romantic show with comedy aspects is great and doesn't hit you too hard with it. Nothing ever feels like it wasn't earned.

  Another thing is the sound track. The music throughout the series is phenomenal and knows exactly what notes to hit at what time to be able to depict the current situation and emotions of the characters. Whether it be silly stereotypical romance music during moments of comedy or a somber piano melody during moments of seriousness, this show's music is well done and used perfectly. The OP that slowly grows on you over time becomes a sing-worthy song that can get stuck in your head and the ED is beautiful and emotional with a meaning that fits well with the ideas of the show.

  There is still so much about this show that I could talk about (especially the brilliance of the ED and the amazing symbolism in it, but that's for another time) but I don't want to make this too long. Overall this show is fantastic and a good example of what rom-coms should try for. A proper mix of romance and comedy rolled into a show that could also be seen as a show about friendship and understanding. Definitely a favorite show of mine and I would highly recommend anyone to check it out.

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• 

  MetaThPr4h

  100/100
  Romantic mindgames that won't let you stop laughing.

  A random day back in December 2015 had me giving a chance to at that point very recent manga called Kaguya-sama after the cover grabbed my attention, not too many chapters after I already fell in love with it and it eventually became my favorite work ever and the one that I was waiting like crazy for an adaptation to happen, and when that time came… oh god, they couldn't have delivered harder!

  The main duo of this story are Kaguya and Miyuki, the two students at the top of a highly renowned academy and the two most lovable tsunderes out there, consistently trying to outplay the other into confessing their love to hilarious results. These two characters come from very different perspectives (she is from a very rich and influential family with questionable raising standards and has been sheltered from the outside in the process, while he has to work part-time together with all the stuff he does to help his family, this man needs to sleep) and this is so, so nicely used for both comedic elements and also for the more dramatic parts that this work has, that give fantastic character development and make us understand and love them even more than before.

  Together with those two, the student council also has two more (and equally awesome) members that bring extra dynamics to the interactions and comedy. Chika is a completely chaotic element to the tactics of the main duo, with her personality completely clashing with all the strategies they might have prepared. Lastly, we have ourguy Ishigami, the man, the legend, this man is so lovable and the perfect mix of “dude, wtf” and “stop being relatable”, protect at all costs.

  A-1 Pictures is a studio that gets a lot of hate that I can't agree with at all, the way they work with different staffs leads to very different results, but any studio is pretty hit or miss anyways, and when this one goes all in very few deliver as hard, so I was very optimistic towards them getting this anime, and yet they surpassed my expectations, hard. The directing of the series is just fantastic, with so many great shots, camera movements, perfectly executed timing on the character reactions to add to the comedy, lots of extra details… just wow.

  Another thing I want to praise is the voice actors, who did such an outstanding work in the way that makes you think “man, they sure had fun recording this!” I have nothing but good things to say about them, and I especially want to mention Yutaka Aoyama, the narrator of the series (such a key element of Kaguya and he did it flawlessly, so many laughs!) and Aoi Koga, who I already had the fortune to hear about thanks to her secondary role in the also fantastic Aikatsu Stars, which made me see before this anime started that she was the perfect fit for Kaguya's character, who gives a hard work with her switches between absurdly adorable and quite terrifying due to her way to be and that she did so well.

  I'm so happy that this anime got the popularity it deserved (thanks Chika dance for helping with that) and I hope that this is just the first from a lot of seasons that this work needs so badly, I 100% recommend you to give this anime a chance if you haven't yet, you won't regret it!

  
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