No matter what university or college you attend nowadays, it is hard to not find an Anime Society existing on campus. While it usually comes down to just a group sitting down to watch the latest anime (Boosted by video-on-demand sites like CrunchyRoll, Anime Network and AnimeLab) and going out for lunch/dinner to discuss anime, it is a great place for fans of the niche to meet up and associated with others from the ever growing fandom.
While it can be hard to associate with some of the characters and events if you haven’t watched the first set of Genshiken seasons published by Media Blasters many years ago, Genshiken Second Season offers another look into the happenings of the ‘Society for the Study of Modern Visual Culture’. With many of the earlier members having now graduated and moved on with their lives (Although struggle to avoid the club or the otaku subculture in general), viewers are granted a mixed bag of new and old characters. These characters include Chika Ogiue returning to serve as president of the club, Susanna Hopkins being promoted to a primary club member and three new characters (Rika Yoshitake, Mirei Yajima and Kenjiro Hato) joining the club and being introduced to viewers for the first time.
While each main character gets their chance to shine in this latest season, the storyline primarily shifts the focus to newcomer Kenjiro Hato. Hato is a fudanshi (A male fan of yaoi) who is quickly identified by other club members as a crossdresser, rather than the alternate persona he portrays. While this does tend to be first-and-foremost a comedy slice-of-life comedy which looks at the otaku subculture and events associated with it, they do handle Hato’s interactions, development and backstory with a bit more sophistication and maturity than one might first expect – even if he isn’t completely exempt for the comedic happenings that occur each episode.
From working towards goals for the Campus Festival to having the group work towards producing Ogiue’s doujinshi for the Comifest, the events that take place across these 13-episodes are generally what you would expect. While it didn’t push creative boundaries, the events which took place were satisfying to watch, with strong implementation of the main characters and the writing team deciding not to induce too much nostalgia by bringing most former club members into the spotlight for more than a few cameo appearances. However, despite all the interesting characters presented to the viewer, the character development tends to be slow-paced and unsatisfying. More episodes would be needed to be able to truly appreciate each character. If you were looking at just Genshiken Second Generation alone, only Kenjiro Hato received an ample amount of character development.
Between 2007 when Genshiken 2 was first aired and 2013 when Genshiken Second Generation was aired in Japan, the animation studio responsible for the series shifted from Arms to Production I.G., a studio with some big names behind it including Attack on Titan and Eden of the East. With this being a slice-of-life comedy series, the design and animation quality isn’t an element I would consider being all that important given there is no fast paced action or unearthly vistas to portray. Overall, there are better designed anime series on the market, but the visual quality is still very high. One highlight of this series was seeing how many other anime series and video game franchises received small cameo appearances in the form of posters or character cosplay. Some of the many series receiving a small cameo appearance include Bakemonogatari, Atelier Meruru: The Apprentice of Arland and Puella Magi Madoka Magica. Although it isn’t as promiment as earlier seasons, the in-universe anime series Kujibiki Unbalance also receives the odd reference.
As with all bar one (soon to be two) anime releases from Nippon Ichi Software America, Genshiken Second Season features only the original Japanese dub – compared to earlier anime releases by Media Blasters which featured both the original Japanese and a newly commissioned English dub. This doesn’t come as a surprise however, and the Japanese voice acting itself is pretty good, providing a bit more authenticity given the setting. For some reason however, the returning characters have all received new voice actors and actresses. The new voice cast handles their respective characters well, with no complaints from myself.
Continuing with Nippon Ichi Software America trends, Genshiken Second Generation is currently only available as a Premium Edition set. This pricier set comes with a number of the usual goodies including a hardcover artbox to store everything in and a 64-page colour artbook, which features not only concept/promotional/finalized artwork, but also interviews and various other translated pieces. It is a fascinating read which I highly encourage everyone to check out AFTER watching the series. While I am not sure how this would go in terms of rights, but given that NIS America have begun publishing Genshiken three seasons in, it wouldn’t have been a bad idea including an overview of what has happened in the series so far…. so newcomers could have at least some idea of each returning character’s backstory. This is in addition to a small compilation of on-disc goodies including clean OP and ED sequences, and a set of “Genshiken Discussion Topics” shorts. Those looking to pick up this series at a reduced price may have to wait a while, with NIS America having not yet confirmed plans for a Standard Edition set.
When all is said and done, Genshiken Second Season could have been a better series would it have better used and developed its characters. Putting that one nagging issue aside however, this is a highly enjoyable anime series which provides plenty of laughs and builds off the otaku lifestyle and subculture effectively. Although newcomers may want to track themselves down copies of the first two seasons prior to checking this season out, this should prove an entertaining watch for series veterans and newcomers alike.
