Fuuka

Title:Fuuka
Overall:Watch
Keywords: , , , , , , ,
Notables: Animation - Diomedea
HAYAMI Saori
KOBAYASHI Yusuke
LYNN
After moving to the city, Yuu, a guy whose social life had previously consisted almost entirely of sending and receiving Tweets, finds himself in a romantic triangle with Fuuka, a new classmate of his, and Koyuki, a girl he hasn't seen in years but is now a famous idol.

12 episodes
OverallArtAnimationCharacter Design MusicSeries StoryEpisode StoryReviewer
Watch 8 7 8 8 5 5 Ggultra2764 [series:3295#1552]
For a series meant to serve as the sequel to Suzuka, this is rather underwhelming. Fuuka largely is pretty by-the-numbers with its story developments involving its generic male lead gaining purpose for himself through his interactions with our titular female lead in forming a music band. The inclusion of the three other members include giving them some sort of back story in a superficial attempt to give them purpose and depth, though are largely irrelevant to the story since Yuu and Fuuka are the title's main focus. Adding to things in a superficial attempt at drama is a childhood friend of Yuu's being a musician herself and having romantic interest in our male lead to create a love triangle and the series having random scenes of female characters nude or in states of undress that seem to only exist to arouse the audience. And not to spoil things, I'm aware of a certain infamous plot twist from Fuuka's manga source material that got changed for the anime that presents its own issues with how parts of the story play out as a result of the change. The only noteworthy thing I could praise for Fuuka is the title's music, which I must admit is pleasant on the ears and have good lyrics. Beyond that, Fuuka's largely pretty generic as far as its storytelling goes and not sure I'd want to dabble into it again anytime soon.

Last updated Tuesday, April 05 2022. Created Tuesday, April 05 2022.
Unevaluated Stretch [series:3295#628]
(Four episodes watched):

'Let me guess', I said to myself after a reserved guy and a rambunctious girl had an embarrassing run-in on the street; 'I bet they'll turn out to be in the same class at this guy's new school'. And sure enough, that's what happened. Was it the unsurprising, predictable plot which put me off of Fuuka? Or was it the lack of originality within the characters? At one point I found myself wondering if the reason why manga artists might use sharply pointed chins on characters' faces was to help line up their mouths, noses and eyes, because there seemed to be little worth wondering about within the show itself. Yuu's personality consists of his tendency to fixate on Twitter, and Fuuka's consists of her adoration for a certain idol and her tendency to get pissed after she gets herself into embarrassing situations. The thought occurred to me that I wish Yuu had just been shown Twittering too much and we had been allowed to draw the obvious conclusion ourselves, rather than one of his sisters declaring him to have a problem. The fact that he lives with three sisters and no parents might be fun; and also the fact that he once knew a girl who is today the idol that Yuuka adores. Another problem is that the show makes far too much use of fanservice, and I can't help thinking that maybe the only reason Yuu's sisters were included was so that they could be unashamed exhibitionists. The change from Fuuka considering Yuu to be a hentai and hating him to hinting that she'd like him to be her boyfriend was abrupt and irrational. You would think from the OP sequence that this show will be about forming a band, but there's been no hint of that and I have little idea where this story is going after one episode. Nothing about Fuuka really grabbed my attention, but the couple of twists made me feel that maybe I would watch episode two to see if things would turn around.

It's in episode two that the premise comes together: Yes, Fuuka, who had been agonizing about what sort of career to pursue, decides to become a singer and drafts Yuu and another (possibly gay) classmate to form a 'Light Music Club'. It was kind of fun how the perfect line of work for her was hidden in plain sight and somebody just had to point it out to her, I must admit that I was curious what course their ambitions would take, and how Yuu would use the fact that he knows the singer who Fuuka adores. The cheesy fanservice (of which there is more in episode two) diminishes the show, but not by all that much. I was a little wary of unlikely coincidences playing too large a part in the plot. Fuuka seemed like one of those shows which take two episodes for you to decide if you will watch it or not, but for now I thought I would.

Or not. Several things bugged me about this show in episodes three and four. Highly unlikely coincidences happen too often. The owner of the shop that Fuuka and Yuu work in to make some money to buy instruments turns out to be a fairly well known rock musician himself. And several fellow band members drop by as well. And Yuu can somehow play a guitar with finesse even though he's never touched one before. And somehow it never occurred to him to tell Fuuka that he knows the singer that she adores. This just seems hackneyed and implausible. And, to add insult to injury, the show manages to slip in a T&A scene to each episode. I don't think this is ever going to go anywhere. I was still watching week four episodes as the week ten ones become available, so I needed to trim my anime schedule and Fuuka was an obvious target. If it had been a little more believable, and hadn't been cheapened by fanservice, I might have continued to watch. But that was not to be.

Last updated Tuesday, August 28 2018. Created Tuesday, January 10 2017.

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