I wasn't really expecting to like Suzuka very much at all. Most anime series that deal with romance either go overboard with the comedic slapstick (often employing the ridiculous "harem" formula, as with Love Hina), are annoyingly unrealistic (as with the "magical girlfriend" formula), or take themselves so deadly seriously that they aren't any fun to watch. Prior to seeing Suzuka, the only really good romantic anime series I could think of that managed to completely avoid these elements was Kare Kano (His and Her Circumstances in the U.S.), which was able to maintain its realism and rein in its comedic side through strong characterization. Fortunately, my expectation that Suzuka would be another hokey magical girlfriend harem series turned out to be totally wrong: it's not as wildly inventive as Kare Kano, but it's a similarly careful series, one that aims to tell a simple tale of a burgeoning romance between two likable, believable characters without relying on cheap gags or fantastical situations.





The story takes place in contemporary Tokyo. Yamato Akitsuki, a fairly typical guy, moves there to attend high school (taking advantage of the fact that his aunt is the landlady of an apartment complex and was able to get him a place). While there he meets Asahina Suzuka, a pretty track-and-field star who excels at the high jump, and who, he soon learns, lives right next door to him. Although put off early on by her standoffish attitude and condescension towards him (she immediately pegs him as an irresponsible loafer, which, compared to her, he probably is), he slowly begins to realize that her standoffishness is a cover for a more vulnerable side, and after a while he develops a crush on her. His feelings are not immediately reciprocated, but hey, what fun would a story like this be if everything instantly worked out? The twists and turns are part of the fun.

And there are a few twists. Although not appearing in this first episode, a sweet, timid girl named Honoko Sakurai shows up later on, and becomes infatuated with Yamato within about five seconds of seeing him (she remembers that he once helped her out when they were kids and he was visiting the city, and she's never forgotten his kindness). Though inexperienced, she pursues him as best she can, and is such a sweet and sympathetic character that the viewer actually ends up rooting for her at times. (Shows like this sometimes take the easy way out by featuring rivals who are not sympathetic at all; part of what makes Suzuka such a surprising series is that the show is not afraid to go beyond the archetypes and give its characters genuine emotional depth. Case in point: another character who appears later, Yamato's friend Yasunobu Hattori, is first presented as an opportunistic lech who seems to exist mainly to get our hero into trouble, but within the space of a few episodes we realize that he's not as callous and uncaring, nor even as lecherous, as we've been led to believe).

It's this believability that really endeared the series to me, in fact: Yamato is not a naif or a nerd, as is the typical depiction of anime guys in these sorts of shows, and he seldom has trouble expressing himself, while Asahina is neither passively demure nor prone to irrational outbursts. The relationship between them develops at a pitch-perfect pace, with the two of them not really liking each other very much at first (although they maintain a good rapport, and never go overboard with it), but eventually becoming friends as they get to know each other a little better over the course of several episodes. The overtly romantic moments are never too cheesy, and tend to aim for a sort of cute realism: for example, Asahina visiting Yamato's apartment during a thunderstorm after the power has gone out. The show is very good at getting the awkwardness of these situations just right.





But that's a few episodes down the road. This first episode is, of course, concerned mostly with introductions, and with the sports element of the series: Asahina pushing herself too hard in her track-and-field pursuits. The sports stuff is not an insignificant part of the series, but it's much more romance than sports drama, and the sports stuff doesn't show up again in any meaningful way for a while. We also meet Yuuka and Megumi, a pair of often-drunk college students who show up regularly at Yamato's apartment to bother him...like so many characters on this show, the duo seem shallow and stereotypical at first, but they, too, are eventually treated like real people with real backgrounds.

The show's animation is not the best (in fact, it sometimes looks awfully low-budget), but the character designs are clean and attractive, and the directors are very good at getting the most out of what they have, and of drawing the viewer into the story so much that you simply don't notice the limitations (it didn't occur me until much later that I wasn't seeing a lot of sophisticated animation in the series).

All in all: an impressive, low-key little series with good characters and a good narrative flow. If this sort of thing floats your boat, you might want to check it out.

---

back to trenchman.com