GA Geijutsuka Art Design Class – 09

I’m still amazed at how much the creators are able to cram into just one episode for this series, and still continue to be fresh, original, varied, interesting, charming, and quite a few more adjectives that I’m too lazy to think of. The episode starts at the beginning of classes on a particular day of bad weather, so everyone arrives with a bad hair day. We also see the members of the Art Club battling the weather in this way, in which Awara is having a bit too much fun and hits Uozumi when he tries to calm her down, and Tomokane’s brother becomes a bit too exhausted from the weather, so he moves to the infirmary to rest. The next sketch is about a bunch of bottles of very good paint that Yamaguchi has kept with her ever since elementary school (or whatever it’s called in English). Typical of her, she’s never used it because she figured that it’s just be a waste. Next up are a bunch of short sketches about the bad weather, including Yamaguchi getting blown away and a role play in which Awara and a new character are trying to imagine what the sun and the clouds must be thinking when they cause weather like this. Next up we see the characters sharpening their pencils the old-fashioned way: I never realized it, but it is indeed ideal if you want to determine the shape of your pencils, and what kind of stroke they’ll leave. Tomokane however, takes this way too serious and nearly cuts off her entire pencil. We then learn that Noda also has a sibling, who apparently works part-time as a model, and sometimes appears on the cover of some fashion magazines. She’s in the same class as Uozumi, and for some reason we never get to see her face. A running gag of this episode is also that Oomichi seems to have just about everything along with her that people might need, including some sort of dye colour (yeah, the focus is all over the place in this episode: you’ll never know what the next scene is going to focus on) and a cold drink, which turns out is something that she just bought with Nozaki. Yamaguchi then collapses and gets brought to the infirmary. Interestingly enough, Tomokane is so busy with other things that she doesn’t even recognize her own brother, and they leave. As it turns out, Yamaguchi didn’t eat enough and therefore collapsed, but she turns out to be fine after a bunch of cookies. She then comments on how sturdy the box of the cookies turns out to be. The next sketch is just… crazy. While taking out the trash with Yamaguchi, Tomokane hears Uomichi and Yasumura complain about how bothersome taking care of the chickens is. What follows is an epic battle between the super sentai version of the five leads, versus a giant GAR chicken in what I presume to be Tomokane’s head. It made no sense at all, but it was absolutely hilarious. Next up: rain, and a quiet couple of scenes involving characters who forgot their umbrella. As usual with this show when it comes back to topics it used to talk about, it doesn’t just milk these topics, but instead it builds further upon them, including a surprisingly charming scene between Awara and Uomichi. They then talk about rainbows, and confuse Newton to be its discoverer (“Why is this apple red? Yes, because of its spectrum!”). If I had to give this series a criticism, then it’s that they overplay Oomichi’s weirdness a bit too often, especially in this episode. Her quirks are often too stereotypical, as opposed to the other four characters who still remain characters when they make jokes about their quirks. In any case, what this episode was really good at is bringing the school alive: it focused on many different characters spending this day at school at which the weather happened to be rather bad and there was always something going on. I’m really not much of a fan of most moe comedies, but I’m glad that exceptions as this one exist. Rating: ** (Excellent)]]>