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REVIEW: Chio's School Road BD/DVD/Digital




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meiam



Joined: 23 Jun 2013
Posts: 3442
PostPosted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 2:03 pm Reply with quote
Even if you're okay with the kabbadi segment, they just weren't that funny, which get painful since they're repeat a bunch of a time without really any variation.

Otherwise the show is pretty fun but nothing amazing, the segment with Yuki (Chio crappy but long time friend) are generally the funniest, a few of the segments go a bit too long with too many suffering from over explanation.
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fathomlessblue



Joined: 28 Mar 2012
Posts: 340
Location: Manchester, UK
PostPosted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 3:14 pm Reply with quote
For the most part I really did enjoy the show, with it superbly capturing that teenage in-between period of innocence and cynical world-weariness. Chio and Manama are lovable dirt-bags, whose constant attempts at dragging the other down makes them perfect company, even if I suspect the former will have more luck eventually bettering themselves in life than the latter. The whole western-gaming fan angle was also quite charming and authentic, and while I tend not to be too impressed by meta or referential humour, the way Chio's hobbies inflect on her various schemes and adventures was always a delight to see.

It's just a shame other elements of the author creep into the show at times. The kabbadi/predatory lesbian trope were as unimaginative as they were long, while this also appears to be a world where every adult male goes gaga at being brushed by schoolgirls, like they're the most desirable beings in existence. Once you find out that the author has a history as a doujin writer, apparently focusing on fairly young characters, a lot of the strange subtext in the show suddenly clicks into place and emits a slightly unwholesome and gross atmosphere that doesn't come from the cast itself. Of course like, say, Made in Abyss, it's not enough to sink the show, but once you know it's there, it's hard remove that understanding from many scenes in the show. I still think the high points outshine the lows, but like several of the comedies that came out in the same season, there's definitely some caveats that are worth mentioning to potential new viewers.


EDIT- Oh god, I didn't realise that the term SJ.... gets auto corrected to things like Shounen Weekly Jump and 'person who cares about social issues. That's brilliant!


Last edited by fathomlessblue on Mon Dec 02, 2019 3:17 pm; edited 2 times in total
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Unknow0059



Joined: 23 Mar 2019
Posts: 26
PostPosted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 3:16 pm Reply with quote
It was a ton of fun watching it. I hope it gets a second season but I'm not holding my breath Crying or Very sad
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TarsTarkas



Joined: 20 Dec 2007
Posts: 5821
Location: Virginia, United States
PostPosted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 3:20 pm Reply with quote
Good and funny show. Manga was good to.
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Cardcaptor Takato



Joined: 27 Jan 2018
Posts: 4787
PostPosted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 6:29 pm Reply with quote
This was one of my favorite comedies from last year. I’ll never forget the Bloody Butterfly which was one of the best jokes in the show.
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Lizuka



Joined: 27 Jul 2018
Posts: 257
PostPosted: Mon Dec 02, 2019 7:21 pm Reply with quote
I know the show had kind of a shaky reception while it was airing but I super enjoyed it. Not every joke landed certainly but a lot of them did for me.

As for the Kushitori stuff... I'm mixed on it. I do think it has some pretty poor implications and a lot of her jokes aren't funny, but I think some of the stuff within those segments is, like the bit with Chio just rapidly jumping back and forth yelling, "Kabaddi!" over and over.
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Sailor Sedna





PostPosted: Tue Dec 03, 2019 12:26 am Reply with quote
Kushitori and Chiharu were unfortunately the biggest setbacks of this anime (don't even get me started when Kushitori holds up the little girl, I couldn't finish section B of episode 7), and some of the jokes that basically showed some grown male creepers was a little overdone to where I'm thinking, what kind of prefecture is this where there's one of those guys on every block in the daylight? Though to be fair, shows like Family Guy have shown a lot of cruder stuff.

But aside from that, I still liked what I've seen of this series, and not gonna lie, at some points, during the BL magazine segment, Chio basically came off like an anime schoolgirl version of Angry Video Game Nerd to me. Laughing

I think they actually did reference Shounen Jump also, but they bleeped out the "Jump" as "J**p" so as not to get sued for copyright, from what I heard.
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Greed1914



Joined: 28 Oct 2007
Posts: 4410
PostPosted: Tue Dec 03, 2019 9:52 am Reply with quote
This was a fun show overall. The low points mentioned in the review were definitely eye-roll moments, but otherwise it was good. It's fun to see those video game fantasies play out.
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phia_one



Joined: 15 Jan 2012
Posts: 1654
Location: Pennsylvania
PostPosted: Tue Dec 03, 2019 11:21 am Reply with quote
I really enjoyed this show much more than I thought I would. Aside from crazy lesbian and Chiharu, most of the jokes landed for me. Asobi Asobase from the same season got more buzz out of the two, but I couldn't even make it through the first episode of Asobi.
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UltimateEye



Joined: 07 Jul 2008
Posts: 34
PostPosted: Tue Dec 03, 2019 1:09 pm Reply with quote
What is with all the criticism directed at Kabbadi Girl and Chiharu? I felt their level of ridiculousness/perversion was a welcome addition to the cast of characters, and they fit right in with all the other jokes. If anything, those two had some of the funniest moments outside of Chio just being herself. I think the initial Bloody Butterfly confusion with Andou dragged a bit too long, but that's not too much of a complaint. Watching Chio's School Road is the hardest I've ever laughed while watching anime, and it's consistently funny in large part due to the dub VAs' talents.
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zrdb





PostPosted: Tue Dec 03, 2019 9:23 pm Reply with quote
This review inspired me to start watching it last night. I'm up to episode 3 and it seems to be a ton of fun so far-the dub is really good.
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harminia



Joined: 24 Aug 2015
Posts: 1987
Location: australia
PostPosted: Wed Dec 04, 2019 12:25 am Reply with quote
Agreed with the Kabbadi bits being pretty dodgy, but that said the repeated muttering of "kabbadi kabbadi kabbadi" has stuck with me, to the point that if I see kabbadi written/hear it mentioned at all my brain just goes into a loop of "kabbadi kabbadi kabbadi kabbadi".
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Kadmos1



Joined: 08 May 2014
Posts: 13540
Location: In Phoenix but has an 85308 ZIP
PostPosted: Wed Dec 04, 2019 2:01 am Reply with quote
Chio was 1 of the most WTF female leads I have ever seen in anime and that was what made her funny!
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Spastic Minnow
Bargain Hunter
Exempt from Grammar Rules


Joined: 02 May 2006
Posts: 4595
Location: Gainesville, FL
PostPosted: Wed Dec 04, 2019 11:05 am Reply with quote
fathomlessblue wrote:

...Once you find out that the author has a history as a doujin writer, apparently focusing on fairly young characters, a lot of the strange subtext in the show suddenly clicks into place and emits a slightly unwholesome and gross atmosphere that doesn't come from the cast itself. Of course like, say, Made in Abyss, it's not enough to sink the show, but once you know it's there, it's hard remove that understanding from many scenes in the show. I still think the high points outshine the lows, but like several of the comedies that came out in the same season, there's definitely some caveats that are worth mentioning to potential new viewers.


Being curious and not completely averse to such things I looked some of his earlier stuff up.
And actually, Chio's School Road obviously originates partially from material he developed in his hentai manga.

There's even a comic where the Chio looking character has to run through an alley as a shortcut to school. If you read it, it will haunt you for the rest of your life and you'll never be able to see that first episode the same way ever again. You may not even be willing to watch that episode ever again.
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Cain Highwind



Joined: 08 May 2006
Posts: 313
PostPosted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 4:10 am Reply with quote
Oh wow, all this time. I thought the game was called “comedy” and was just a weird translation. Made no sense. Thanks for the info!

UltimateEye wrote:
What is with all the criticism directed at Kabbadi Girl and Chiharu? I felt their level of ridiculousness/perversion was a welcome addition to the cast of characters, and they fit right in with all the other jokes. If anything, those two had some of the funniest moments outside of Chio just being herself. I think the initial Bloody Butterfly confusion with Andou dragged a bit too long, but that's not too much of a complaint. Watching Chio's School Road is the hardest I've ever laughed while watching anime, and it's consistently funny in large part due to the dub VAs' talents.


I won’t get into it much, on it’s own it might not seem like a big deal, but it’s just a harmful homophobic stereotype a lot of anime has used way too much. A lot of anti-gay stuff out there likes to reason that homosexuality is a perversion and just a form of icky pedophilia and stuff like Kushitori “supports” that. It’s like, the old racial stereotypes in shows like Jonny Quest. It’s easy to see bad depictions of a minority on screen and associate them with real people.

Also, yikes at that last post, definitely won’t go looking into the mangaka’s previous work!
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