Welcome to the Fantasy Zone
This Zone is dedicated to the lesser known elements of anime hosted by the cast of Victory Script.
What weapon is the best?
Who will win in this Death Battle?
Is this costume practical?
You name it, it's all covered here in the Fantasy Zone!
Experimental can often mean taking a franchise out of it's home and into another genre, this was a short trend in the early 00s when Hentai Games were translated into wholesome anime titles, one such title being Happy Lesson.
I see you're into Teachers
The humble school teacher became a popular fixture of fan service at the time as the likes of Azumanga Daioh and to a lesser extent Onegai Teacher were being released to high acclaim, Happy Lesson took five teachers along with a couple of students and adopted sisters to surround you the protagonist, the art style very much designed at a higher quality as is Hentai games of the era.
From nothing Protagonist to misunderstood Delinquent
The anime lead Chitose is a troubled individual who was left with only his parent's house after they pass away, while his oldest adopted sister Hazuki looks after the younger sister Minazuki inbetween tours as a pop star. Seeing him struggle are five teachers beginning with Mutsuki Ichimonji the homeroom and languages teacher who decides that Chitose needs a mother figure in his life to get through high school fearing that Chitose may end up in prison or worse. This is the foundation of a wacky story as each mother brings something to the table, a far cry from simply dating teachers to bed them.
Each Teacher brings a unique character
Each teacher brings a different character to the table.
Mutsuki Ichimonji is sweet, caring and the most pro active but is not afraid to use emotional blackmail or to push an almost dominatrix like approach to both teaching and mothering.
Kisaragi Ninomai is basically Rei Ayanami as a science teacher, her approach is from an experimental side to see if being a mother can give her meaning to her existence as she claims to be not of this world, most of the strange moments in the show revolve around her.
Yayoi Sanzenin is a shrine maiden turned school nurse, her approach is more on the side of trying to heal Chitose's soul which can border on obsession, next to Mutsuki she's the most popular woman in school for many adolescent males.
Uzuki Shitenno the art teacher likes to be the fun mother who expresses herself through cosplay and acts closer to an older sibling, now that I think about it, she's most like a real life Otaku mother.
Satsuki Gokajo is very rambunctious and in your face, she's very much used to large families and being in chaotic loving environments, she basically wants to recreate what she had growing up for Chitose.
Throw in a little sister, a big sister, a tsundere school girl, a reverse trap rival and a strange science girl and you got one of the most impressive harem line-ups in anime until Nisekoi comes out.
Happy Lesson is why I prefer older Anime Women
The fact that the so called harem are mostly adults between 18 and 30 with fleshed out personalities with a mature presence made for an experience that made me appreciate older female characters more than the teenage characters in more popular anime, I mentioned in previous entries about Cat's Eye character Rui Kisugi and Pokemon's Lorelei are sexy women for showcasing a mature aura that many younger female characters lack, the same can be said for Happy Lesson's five teachers.
The everyone wins ending
When Chitose finally graduates at the end of the anime, a predicament is presented to the five teachers/adoptive mothers, seeing as Chitose is now a legal adult, it would become harder to hide the fact that he lives in a house with five unmarried women which became an integral part of the final OVA, the solution after a welcomed heart to heart between Chitose and Mutsuki one of many emotional moments in it's run, all the teachers transform into brides and decide to all marry Chitose, a bizarre ending yet still wholesome in delivery.
Making a comeback
As anime faces the stigma of teenage characters and their less than wholesome appearances and a law change upping the age of consent this year in Japan, there's been a rise in the number of young adult characters in anime making it okay to declare them waifus and husbandos, Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid, The Saint's Magic is Omnipotent and My Senpai is Annoying are just a few notable titles to use working young females as leads, even more extreme examples like Keijo at least makes the entire cast 18 years old by default. I haven't even touched the quiet revolution of the milf and dilf characters.
For Happy Lesson it was way too ahead of it's time, to capture any kind of popularity but had a big enough presence from the short lived Dreamcast era to warrant the game and plenty of heavy promotion with a number of high quality anime art pieces much like the one in this review.
A new approach for these analysis reviews is that I class these as S-Tier anime, as there are at least 50 anime I judge as S-Tier, expect more to grow from this.
Keijo's Origins
Essentially Keijo is an extreme version of a common pool game played all over the world at pool partys, the object of the game is without using arms or legs only your butt and for women breasts as well, is to knock the person into the water or fall over on the land pontoon; Keijo turned it into a high stakes sport battlefield with the same rewards as any other professional sport.
Clever Fan Service
It's easy to look at this and see an anime that only caters to the male gaze, something that a lot of crap reviewers tend to point out but it's much more clever than that.
The extended cast sits at roughly 40 characters, only three of them are male, a reporter, the father of one of the Keijo players and an unseen commentator, none of which impact the story at any point.
It helps that all the girls are doing this sport by choice and treating it as such gives a much more empowering feeling, it's fan service done correctly when I'm more compelled by the action than the skin, and before you ask, all the characters are 18 years old minimum.
If there's anything problematic it's probably the lesbian character pushing her luck with some of her attacks, but I suppose the fan service has to exist somewhere.
No Body Shaming Here
The beauty of Keijo is that all body types are welcome, yes they make it clear that high athletic ability is required and being able to at least swim for a successful career but is not restricted by body type, lead character Nozomi is a gymnast for instance while other characters are anything from Judo, body building, Yoga, dancing and even Sumo, some just have the right desire or just do it because they enjoy it.
It's a Real Sport in Portugal
The Portuguese turned Keijo into an actual sport, the main difference though is that it looks a lot safer compared to it's drunken party origins with life belts and jackets which make it look closer to sumo costume battles, but the real reason is that the human body isn't designed to twist in certain ways.
Don't Try This At Home
I mentioned that Nozomi is a gymnast so her incredible wind ups for doing the Vacuum Butt Cannons are akin to doing floor tumbles in the Olympics, but to actually perform the Vacuum Butt Cannon would require not just a perfect wind up of tumbles on loose slippery pontoons but to twist your hip so violently that it risks a horrible injury, this is true in the Keijo universe as well, I'm also certain that breasts are not designed to take multiple hits either, this is why the real life version has more padding.
Meant for Something Greater
It never lasted more than one season but it had the potential to go much further, as it could easily have become a world wide phenomenon, the fact that one country turned it into a real sport is proof of that but short sighted reviewers and executive meddling ended the show before it could achieve that, it's a shame as it achieved so much more for female viewers than even designated shojo series.
Not done one of these for a while.
"Anime doesn't do women well"
This person is either blind, ignorant, stupid or has only seen ten anime, let's go with ten anime. It's easy to look at the ten most popular anime right now and think there isn't much in the female character department, Naruto definitely hasn't got that development but has improved in Boruto, My Hero Academia isn't much better but at least has a couple of standouts. I think the issue here is watch more than ten anime and don't be afraid to push out of your comfort zone.
"People only remember Macross for the idols"
It's the only thing I remember about Macross.
Real talk, when Macross was released it was up against the more colour friendly Gundam so in order to standout more, they added idols which also coincided with the new craze of idols in the 80s, after seeing Lynn Minmay, it's hard to picture that Macross was indeed a war sci-fi with fighter jet mechs, a lot of 40+ year olds would disagree with me but Lynn Minmay was so popular back then that there was an idol in every series of the show afterwards and that is harder to defend, even Gundam Seed's Lacus Clyne is a nod to Minmay.
"Vegeta is stronger than Goku"
Not really but Vegeta is the better man. Ego aside, his background makes him very well versed in being a leader and knowing what's important.
"Taiga from Toradora is a dumb character"
I've not seen Toradora but given how I feel about tsunderes recently, I don't think I'll like her, hardly a dumb character though, she's better written than most tsunderes, in fact the best written tsundere of all time isn't even an anime character, it's Hey Arnold's Helga Pataki.
"Bleach is overhated"
It's balanced and the criticism it gets is justified considering how much of it's own universal laws it had to break to make the story work.
The early 2000s was a new frontier for fandom as the internet gave fans a new way to access anime, but before meme culture began, anime gained their popularity through the Anime Music Video, in some cases, this is the only way they've gained any kind of name.
10. Any Magical Girl Show in the 2000s
Any amateur AMV designer has used a magical transformation sequence at some point, Tokyo Mew Mew and Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch two of the most common next to of course Sailor Moon.
9. Bleach
Difficult to judge whether this is an AMV or the first million views anime Meme, Ieva's Polka of Orihime spinning the leek on loop.
8. Golden Boy
The unique story of a hard worker with the ability to attract any woman with unseen charisma alone; It's legend began in AMVs.
7. El Hazard
Haba Haba Zot Zot! El Hazard's ego fuelled enemy Jinnai proves to be the highlight of an otherwise forgotten anime.
6. Battle Athletes
Some of the earliest popular AMVs started with Battle Athletes, yeah I bet you didn't know this was an anime at all, expect a review soon.
5. Kodocha
Known as Kodomo no Omacha or Child's Toy, the high octane energetic adventures of a child actress set to William Tell Overture was one of AMV's first million viewers.
4. Kaleido Star
Like the magical girl transformations, the spectacular scenes were easy bait for AMVs, especially using Eurobeat.
3. Neon Genesis Evangelion
Every meme Evangelion ever had, started from AMVs thanks to a little compilation called AMV Hell.
2. Azumanga Daioh
But the real star of the mentioned AMV Hell is Osaka from Azumanga Daioh, her unusual personality is just a breeding ground for all Anime memes.
1. Princess Tutu
Half the reason anime get forgotten is because they were not advertised particularly well, while ADV Films offers a standard ballet anime with all the music associated with it, the AMV titled Hold Ne Now gave us this.
Not only will you not forget this anime, you'll want to seek it out, it perfectly encapsulates the experience of viewing AMVs as it let's you discover anime you never knew you wanted.
Ten years ago, Rooster Teeth dropped a trailer for an animated series on Youtube mysteriously known as RWBY, were introduced to a riding hood dressed girl slaughtering a pack of malevolent wolves, ten years later, despite the death of it's creator, it remains a household name in pop culture but how do the main four girls compare from their trailers to now?
Let's find out.
Ruby Rose
Trailer: Seen as mysterious and comes across as a brooder but a light smile suggests she's not emotionless and confirmed to be alot more bubbly in Yang's trailer, her fight against the wolves is phenomenal and Crescent Rose is the greatest weapon ever created.
Now: Somewhere between genki girl and bubbly fan girl and ultimately learns the most through the many seasons and is able to keep some sense of optimism.
Weiss Schnee
Trailer: Her trailer is an opera performance played over her battle against a large white knight, comes across as being part of high society but hides a loneliness, were looking at a lonely rich girl.
Now: Goes from stuck up to being a genuinely great character who now fights to prove to her family that dis-inheriting her was a mistake. Lonely rich girl averted.
Blake Belladonna
Trailer: Feel bad for her as Adam Taurus stole alot of her thunder, probably why her trailer has the lowest view numbers, comes across as quiet, would rather keep to herself, doesn't really feel that what she's doing is the right thing.
Now: Blake's only real change is the acceptance knowing that she's turned the faunus away from a path of self destruction other than that the trailer pretty much nails Blake's entire character.
Yang Xiao Long
Trailer: Walks casually into a nightclub and proceeds to beat everyone up, bad ass, playful, impatient, cocky, bad tempered, easily triggered, eager to fight, has a past to resolve.
Now: Ultimately gets punished for her impatience and bad temper and is forced to confront the truth about her mother as well as losing her arm in battle. Yang had to rebuild herself from the ground up just to fight again making her the most developed character in the series.
There will be a few more posts on RWBY look forward to it.
