"Saki Episode of Side A" has to be among the most lame names for a show I've run into in a hell of a long time. But how's the show?

Well, "shallow" is the first word that comes to mind. The good news is that the girls don't all seem to have tragic pasts.

Ako and Shizuno were in 6th Grade with Haramura Nodoka. Even at that age, Nodoka was already developing nicely -- as a Mahjongg player, and... well... in other ways.

They used to go to a local high school and play in the Mahjongg club room, supervised by a volunteer college student who went to high school there and was the club's star. But she got tromped in the nationals and lost heart, and all the best players in the club graduated at the same time, and the club was shut down.

Anyway, she came back, and helping the local girls (all the way down to grade school) learn the game has reinspired her own interest in the game. She got scouted by a pro team, and left, and the room started collecting dust.

Nodoka had to move because of her mother's work, and as we know from the other series she went on to win the national middle school tournament her third year. And then she started attending Kiyosumi, whence we got to know her in the first series.

Well, the news of her winning the middle school tournament was on TV, and her old friends Shizuno and Ako are electrified. They want to play again, and that means forming a mahjongg club at the high school they attend, which was the one they used to play at when Nodoka was around. Kuro, another player from that time, is also interested, and the three of them were the three strongest players before (not counting Nodoka) but they're going to need at least two more players, because they mean to enter the high school tournament in the same year as the first series.

They're in a different prefecture, which is why we haven't heard of them.

That's the set up for this series. Will it be any good? I have no idea. It's got a lot different feel. For all that Mahjongg is the heart of the show, we didn't really see it getting played much in the first episode.

Shizuno is voiced by Aoi Yuuki, who also did Korone in Daimaou, but they couldn't be more different. Shizuno is a genki-girl and a bit of a jock. Kuro is voiced by Kana Hanazawa, who must be the busiest seiyuu in the business right now. She is also Chiaki in Mouretsu Pirates, but Ako doesn't sound like her at all. In general it seems to have a good cast.

There is one thing which is stylistically the same: short skirts, low camera angles, and no panties to be seen. (Good Lord.)

The first series was begun by Gonzo and finished by Picture Magic. This one's from Studio Gokumi, whoever they are. It's the same director and production team, though, which is probably the reason for the stylistic similarity mentioned above.

Nodoka figured highly in the first episode, but I suspect that she'll only be cameos in the rest of the series -- basically TV appearances seen by Shizuno and Ako. For instance, there was that Action Girl TV interview, or whatever it was called, in the first series. I'm sure that'll show up in this one too.

I'll watch the next ep, at least, just to see where they're going with it.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste in General Anime at 04:25 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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