I'm really not a fan of K-ON!. The anime, not the manga.
Don't get me wrong. I love the manga. It's ridiculous and fast-paced- K-ON!, like Lucky Star, has its origin in a series of 4-koma strips. So what baffles me is... How, in the name of all that is good and holy, did the anime manage to go so wrong?
Now, normally, I hate making comparison from anime to manga. I hate, hate, HATE people who complain that "TEH MANGA IZ SO MUCH BETTER!!1!!1!1". However, in this case, I have to step in and agree. The anime is... not good. K-ON! focuses on the (mis)adventures of four girls- Cute cloudcuckoolander Yui, hyperactive Ritsu, easily-overwhelmed Mio, and stupidly crazily rich Tsumugi, who make up their school's Light Music Club (a fifth joins later, but we're not concerned about that yet). That's... pretty much it. K-ON! is a slice of life about these four(/five). Whether trying to get a guitar for the blockheaded Yui, practicing for an upcoming concert, or just enjoying afternoon tea time, the manga manages to keep it interesting, funny, and above all, entertaining. After watching the first (and a half) episodes, I was reluctant to even pick up the manga (though I'm honestly glad I did). The show moves at a sluggish pace, the jokes fall flat- I think it has to do with the fact that they focused less on rapidfire humor and more on making it intolerably cute. Going back to Lucky Star: it seriously crackled. Jokes came fast enough that even if one fell flat, another would be along shortly, and those who had done their geek homework could spot all kinds of hilarious tributes and parodies in the show's background (notably, there were a LOT of Haruhi shoutouts, but that was because both were produced by Kadokawa). K-ON!, as a show, doesn't have any such thing holding it up, and that's probably why it fails (in my mind). Too much moe fluff, not enough humor.
My advice: Check out the original 4komas. I know the first two volumes, at least, are out- I've read them in Barnes and Noble. As for the anime?
...Meh. I really don't want to go back to this one.
Though, I'll probably have to revisit it just to hear what they did with Love is a Stapler and the series' other absurdly-titled songs...
Rating: Depends on version.
Pass/Fail: Also depends on version.
EDIT: It has just come to my attention that there are TWO K-ON! anime series out there, of different quality. I don't know which I reviewed, since I only knew about just the one- But this of course means that now I have to track down the second and watch it for the sake of figuring it out...
Don't get me wrong. I love the manga. It's ridiculous and fast-paced- K-ON!, like Lucky Star, has its origin in a series of 4-koma strips. So what baffles me is... How, in the name of all that is good and holy, did the anime manage to go so wrong?
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| Mugi-chan: Cute. Polite. Rich. Terrifying. |
My advice: Check out the original 4komas. I know the first two volumes, at least, are out- I've read them in Barnes and Noble. As for the anime?
...Meh. I really don't want to go back to this one.
Though, I'll probably have to revisit it just to hear what they did with Love is a Stapler and the series' other absurdly-titled songs...
Rating: Depends on version.
Pass/Fail: Also depends on version.
EDIT: It has just come to my attention that there are TWO K-ON! anime series out there, of different quality. I don't know which I reviewed, since I only knew about just the one- But this of course means that now I have to track down the second and watch it for the sake of figuring it out...
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