Quoted For Truth.

Today we will have a mini-review of an anime that I have been hoarding for quite a while, Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei. Any anime will do, as long as I can delay watching Myself, Yourself as long as possible. Oh, and BTW, this is a 2007 anime, but from the looks of it, Nodame can rest easy.

Our hero Nozomu Itoshiki.

Story:-
Nozomu “Mr. Despair” Itoshiki, a high school teacher, has a tendency to try and commit suicide everytime he fall into despair for various reasons. His (mainly female) students have to work hard at preventing him from dying. And that’s about it.

The story by itself is a roller-coaster, with some good episodes and others that are meh. Just like Lucky Star and Cromartie Koukou, this anime makes lots of references to other anime/manga/TV shows. Particularly, I really like the parody for the OP of Alias (yeah, the one with Jennifer Gartner).

The second feature that makes this anime “different” despite its ordinary storyline is the unorthodox “presentation”. The first thing I notice about this anime is the pacing. They are almost perpetually in fast-forward mode, even faster than Lucky Star. Kudos to a.f.k. group, because this anime is surely a hellish series to sub. The <space> and CRTL + left/right button combos in Media Player Classic is my greatest friend here. They are needed or else you will miss a lot of things. I wonder how the Japanese who only watched this series on TV can enjoy this without taping it first.

Character development focused more on the students than on the main protagonist, and that’s probably a good thing. Although I may have noticed that his suicidal tendencies seems to peter out towards the end. The second season is now underway and I hope the series can be better, preferably story wise.

She is the best character in the series. She is totally awesome and need more airtime.

Character Design:-
A plus point of the anime, this is the first time for quite some time where I can see black hair (the default hair color for real Japanese) on many (if not majority) of the characters. Plus, the characters are beautifully designed too.

Voice acting:-
Another plus point of the anime, the voice acting in this series is excellent all-around. The main protagonist is good, but his female students are even better. The only “drawback” is that the best character in this series rarely uses her voice.

One of the things that can cause our hero to hang himself.

Music:-
This anime has good character design and voice acting, but the music is a letdown. There is virtually nothing I can say about the OST or the OP/ED themes.

Animation/Direction:-
Another big letdown of this series, the animation quality in this series is not up to par with other 2007 anime I have reviewed here in the past. This is despite the text-heavy presentation that should not complicate matters even if it was faster. Meanwhile the directing is great, mainly because of the unique presentation. That for sure is hard to do.

Conclusion:-
8 out of 10. Has a lot of room to do better in the second season.

You may not allow your child(ren) to watch this series.

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