I probably gave it away in my review of Suzuka, but when it comes to anime, I'm a big fan of the down-to-earth variety. Giant robots and monsters and ninjas and superheroes and whatever are fine, but let's face it: Western animation is pretty rife with that sort of stuff, too, and has been from the beginning. What we don't often get in the West are quiet, subdued, mature animated shows that tell engaging stories about ordinary people, ala the aforementioned Suzuka (this is mostly because of the slowly-crumbling but still widely-held perception in the West that animation is either for kids or for goofy, over-the-top comedy shows like Family Guy or Futurama or South Park). As a result, animation aficionados who occasionally like to see well-drawn, serious-minded animated shows (like me) pretty much have to turn to Japanese anime to find them -- and even there, the pickings are sometimes slim.





Thus, what I found most appealing about the twelve-episode series Genshiken (subtitled The Society for the Study of Modern Visual Culture) was its relaxed setting and realism: it takes place mostly at a typical Japanese college, and though essentially a comedy, the series is low-key and blessedly free of maids and cat-girls and alien conspiracies and other zany annoying nonsense of that sort. The characters, too, are more than one-line jokes; they are all given some important depth.

Basically, the series follows the ups and downs of a small group of college students who belong to a nerdish otaku club. The series doesn't really have a main character; this first episode focuses on the freshman Kanji Sasahara and his decision to give into his otaku impulses and join the club, but later episodes tend to place more emphasis on Saki Kasukabe, the deadpan girlfriend of club member Makoto Kohsaka. Saki attends club meetings only for the sake of her boyfriend -- who despite being an otaku is also good-looking and not at all socially inept -- and has some difficulty wrapping her brain around the otaku lifestyle, which she detests (at least at first). Through her eyes, viewers are introduced to key aspects of otaku culture -- video games, doujinshi, model-building, cosplay, and near-incomprehensible nitpicky chatter about anime and manga and the people who produce it. Much of the humor derives from this -- Saki often reacts incredulously to the club's exploits, although eventually she comes to understand the enjoyment they get out of their activities.

The show is pretty thorough in its examination of the otaku lifestyle, and gets a lot of obvious laughs out of it...but sometimes the humor is more subtle and character-driven. The ninth episode is a great example of this: in it, we find super-nerd Madarame alone in the clubroom with Saki, trying desperately to make small-talk. We're treated to his entire neurotic inner monologue, as he frets about what to say and overanalyzes the situation to an incredible degree (he can't get over how he should react to the decidedly unladylike nose hair protruding from Saki's nostril -- life isn't like a bishojo game, he laments defeatedly, where you only have to decide between two choices of what to say).





This first episode is largely about Sasahara, though, and his coming to terms with his inner otaku: he is reluctant, at first, to join the group, but eventually relents (the club members play an amusing sort of prank on him, leaving him in the clubroom with a big locker full of hentai doujinshi and catching him as he rifles through it). The episode also showcases Saki's and Kohsaka's first meeting (since they were children, anyway), and her dismay in learning that he's become such a nerd. None of the rest of the characters get much screen-time (Sasahara, Kohsaka, Saki, Madarame, and later the female cosplayer Onho comprise the main cast; other club members, such as the stuttering Kugayama and cosplay-costume-designer Tanaka, appear more in the background).

Genshiken is a great series, a clever comedy that doesn't go crazy with off-the-wall, overly-exaggerated characters or situations. The only downside here is how few episodes were produced: there are only twelve in total, and although it comes close, the twelfth episode doesn't really feel like a proper ending. Nevertheless, Media Blasters felt compelled to release the series in North America over three relatively high-priced DVD's, which I know is pretty much par for the course when it comes to domestic anime releases (and which certainly isn't the worst example of fleecing I've ever seen) but which still rankles.

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