Kotoura-san

Title:Kotoura-san
琴浦さん (Japanese)
Overall:Rent
Keywords: , , , , ,
Notables: FUKUSHIMA Jun
KANEMOTO Hisako
R1 License - NIS America
R1 License - Subtitled Only
Haruka Kotoura is a teenage esper whose ability to read the minds of anyone at ease is a curse which has resulted in her parents breaking up and deserting her. She is friendless because fellow teens are frightened and angered by her. One day, at a new school, she encounters something she hasn't seen yet: a guy, Manabe, who is intrigued rather than repulsed by her.

A Winter 2013 series

12 episodes

Episode Details 
1893
OverallArtAnimationCharacter Design MusicSeries StoryEpisode StoryReviewer
Rent 7 7 7 6 7 8 Ggultra2764 [series:2670#1552]
Kotoura-san is a comedy-drama focused on our teenage female lead, Haruka Kotura, having the power to read minds and trying to recover from a rather traumatic past where her abilities resulted in being abandoned by her parents, being an outcast all the way up to high school and being emotionally broken from the harsh experiences. She befriends several high school students who accept her psychic ability and she learns to gradually move on from the scars of her past, including settling tensions with her mother.

Kotoura-san as a whole is kind of a mixed bag for me. On the one hand, the character development within the series is rather solid as Kotoura's character gradually changes for the better as she learns to move on from her traumatic past, reconnect with her mother and others among her new circle of friends also get fleshed out. ESP Club President Yuriko has her own parallels to Kotoura in both share a tragic past due to psychic abilities leading them to be ostracized by others and negatively have their family relationships affected. There's also a solid arc in the second half of the series where the ESP Club gets entangled in a mystery involving a series of assaults being committed on high school girls by a mysterious assailant.

On the other hand, the show's comedy and elements to its storytelling do have their bumps for me. For the most part, the comedy to Kotoura-san is used to lighten the mood on the show's more serious themes. While I don't mind the comedy being used to lighten the mood, much of it misses its mark for me since it relies on some of the more obnoxious quirks of the major characters (the perversion of Kotoura's grandpa and Manabe, Daichi's indifference, Yuriko's obsession of using Kotoura's powers for her club's gain) to carry it along at many points and I did feel there were points where it disrupted the serious mood that complimented the show's more dramatic points.

Even the show's serious side does have some issues. Kotoura-san is rather blatant in depicting the serious moments it portrays throughout its run with little in the way of subtlety in doing so. This is rather apparent in the opening half of the show's first episode where it depicts the growing problems in Kotoura's life that lead her to become an outcast due to her psychic powers. The prolonged time focused on building up on her problems is a bit overboard and does make it kind of hard to take seriously in spite of any intentions that the show's creators had to make it a serious one. The blatant approach Kotoura-san takes to exploring the pathos of its cast won't be for everyone, especially for those that prefer drama that is a bit more subdued.

In spite of its flaws, Kotoura-san was still a mostly solid series exploring our female lead's recovery from a traumatic past she had no control over through making friends who accepted her and moving on from the past she suffered from. It is still worth a look if you are into high school dramedy.

Last updated Saturday, December 19 2015. Created Saturday, December 19 2015.
Unevaluated Stretch [series:2670#628]
(Four episodes watched):

Here's an interesting premise: how do you deal with people if they cannot keep anything they are thinking secret from you? Are you offended, and become sort of jaded towards human nature, as Haruka is at the start of the story? This show provokes ideas from me about where it might go if I had been the one writing it. Maybe Kotoura will agree to honestly tell Manabe whatever thought is on her mind whenever he asks her to. It might be an essay on the workings of the human mind, and just how good of an expression of a person's true soul the thoughts that happen to cross his or her mind are; or it might be somewhat less ambitious. For now, the basic premise has been established and we will have to wait for episode two to get much of an idea of what will be done with it. Somehow, Haruka cannot get it through her head that other people do not like her reading their minds, and it might be a good idea to pretend that she wasn't doing so. The hints are that a sort of 'Esper club' will be formed in future episodes.

After three episodes I feel that the characters don't seem to be developing much and the plot doesn't seem to be going much of anywhere. Does that short guy with glasses have any paranormal powers of his own? Nobody has bothered to ask. More importantly, it seems that not much is being done with Haruka's mind reading ability. It is used for lame jokes as she occasionally reads Manabe's perverted thoughts, but will it really play a major part in the long-term plot? Will it get her into major trouble but also get her out of it? Can a girl with this ability ever have a happy and healthy relationship with a guy? So far, the potential of such an unusual capability just seems to be going unused. Episode four wasn't any better. I guess I will abandon this show.

Last updated Wednesday, February 13 2013. Created Saturday, January 12 2013.

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