Yuru Yuri San☆Hai! – Series Review
It’s the return of the animal pajamas!
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Sometimes you watch through a show and just feel like you want to say something about it, even if you haven’t really said anything about it before. That’s me with this third season of Yuru Yuri: Yuru Yuri San☆Hai! |
Taking a Different Feel
Kyouko and Ayano had a lot more nice moments this season
When Foshizzel wrote the FI back at the beginning of the season for this 3rd series, one of the things a lot of people commented on (including me) was the seemingly lower key feel that they seemed to be going for. This was in keeping with the OVA episodes that came out before San☆Hai!, amusingly subtitled “Nachuyachumi”. I really enjoyed those OVA’s, and was hoping that this series would have that feel, because I really felt that the second series of Yuru Yuri had really overemphasized the wacky, the yelling, the over-the-top, and just didn’t seem funny as much as it seemed like it was yelling at me.
Sometimes you just need the right motivation
That’s not to say that this series didn’t have silly and wacky moments, but what I think the biggest difference was was in the reactions to those moments. There was less freaking out, less of the yelling and shouting, and less explosions. Another big issues I had with the second series was that they ran a lot of the jokes into the ground: Chitose’s nosebleeds while imagining Kyouko and Ayano together, Kyouko’s harassment of Chizuru, Chinatsu’s horrible drawings, Nishigaki’s blowing things up, and most of all, Sakurako. Just everything about her. Now, I say all that stuff about the second season, but I have to give it credit for a tremendously great and funny wrapup with the second half of the finale, playing everyone’s character quirks in a production of Snow White. But ultimately, the series left me disappointed, and I wasn’t sure about this third series.
The trauma her classmate had to go through…
So in what I think the biggest difference was in the presentation of San☆Hai! may have been that they trusted the audience to know these characters, to know the traits that they had, just like the other characters know them. For instance, Chinatsu scared everyone multiple times with threats of her drawings, but the show never felt like it had to show us until the very last bit, and even then it wasn’t the kindergarten fever dream that they went to again and again before. Similarly, Akari ended up with a lot more respect from the show, even as she realized how immature she is compared to how she wants to be. And they used Sakurako a lot better as well, not with her constant sniping at Himawari’s oppai or her general idiocy, but in her being just a bit unthinking, but almost becoming Kyouko’s protege.
Finally Making Progress
Yes, we know, Kyouko
The other main thing that seemed to happen was that some characters who were somewhat broken in particular aspects seemed to make a lot more progress toward the things they wanted. From Chizuru trying to smile and make friends, and actually having success even though she doesn’t actually smile, to Ayano trying to get over her inability to be comfortable with her crush Kyouko, characters seemed to actually grow up, as 13 and 14 year olds are wont to do.
Nothing she does is particularly surprising
The show also had a few good recurring jokes, with my favorite being the repeated appearances of A&W Root Beer… or as the show called it “Masochist Cola”. I hadn’t known that Japanese people generally don’t like Root Beer, but the way that they used it as a joke 3 times reflected both on the cultural aspect and the personality of the characters, with Kyouko’s favor of it contrasting with Akari getting stuck with it. And perhaps my favorite aspect of the new flavor of the show was its reliance on the slow burn of setups making things funnier. The setups weren’t nearly as over the top, instead getting their laughs from the continuation, like Chinatsu’s teacher and classmates looking at her drawing, or Akari passed out after Chinatsu flicked a spider on her nose.
These two really care for each other
Going into this season, I wasn’t sure about a third series of Yuru Yuri. But the switch from Doga Kobo to TYO Animations really brought this crew’s antics into the right place for me, making this season funnier and much more enjoyable than the previous series. I don’t know if there are any plans for yet another series, but I sure wouldn’t mind another that was like this one.
Thanks for making Mondays fun!
About Highway
Proving that you don't have to be young to love anime, I enjoy all genres and styles of shows. If it's not hurting anyone else, you should never be ashamed of what you like!
POWUH: and LOLi Defender with 10998 comments
Yep, it was the show to look forward to come Mondays…
I generally feel the same way you do about San☆Hai!, that the characters, and thus the approach it takes, can mature if only just a bit. We’ve gotten to know them, so they don’t have to try all that hard to make an impression.
I especially love the root beer brick joke when it came around to Kyouko. It was not only a fun gag to have her make a deliberate choice for that drink, but also shows that this character has a layer we might not readily appreciate due to her constant wacky nature. She tries new things. She not afraid to discard what doesn’t work, and hold on to what does…
POWUH: iLurker with 1 comments
I really enjoyed this season. The second season was a repeat of the first, and they even make a joke about it on their school overnight trip to Kyoto. This third season there was a lot of character development as you pointed out. I think that’s what really made the show for me. Now let’s all hope they fix that awful animation of episode 3.
POWUH: Meta Team and Spammy Tamer with 7115 comments
I’ll be honest that the quality of animation has to be really really bad in a show like Yuru Yuri for me to notice it and a lot worse than that for me to complain about it. It’s just not what I notice and could probably be best described as a blind spot. Heck, I watched Tesagure and didn’t complain. 🙂
So the character focus really is the key for me, and because they didn’t spend so much time on wacky antics, it was more about the characters and how they reacted to what happened.
Thanks for watching and commenting!