More than a decade ago when this site was known as Sam’s Anime Study and featured what I would argue to be pretty bad episodic anime summaries as was popular at the time, one of the first TV anime to be covered on it was Ufotable’s Gakuen Utopia Manabi Straight!. Given the nicheness and growing age of the series, I long gave up any expectation that it would receive an official English release – yet was left surprised earlier this year when Discotek Media (The US anime publisher known for releasing older anime works) published this series on Blu-ray.
Now more than a decade after first watching the show, I had the opportunity to sit down and determine whether this is worth the purchase, provides that nostalgic feeling or an anime that should have been lost in time.
In the year 2035, birth rates in Japan have declined. Coupled with a growing interest by current students to maintain part-time jobs and training over-focusing on education, it has meant that schools are lacking in student numbers and an overall comradery among those still attending. Seioh Private High School is no exception, with poor attendance at the remaining school festivals, a student council with only the secretary Mika “Mikan” Inamori remaining, and a poor outlook for the school going forward.
But the appearance of a hyperactive transfer student Manami “Manabi” Amamiya, who arrives on her first day by crashing into the school pool, marks a change. Taking on the role of Student Council president, herself along with a growing group of other council members begin working on improving student morale, from small wins up to the annual student festival.
Gakuen Utopia Manabi Straight! is at its core a simple, no-frills school life series which even today stands out from among the crowd. While a lot of similar shows either try too hard with the fanservice or to go overboard with the comedy – this one wins over with a lot of charm, cuteness and favouring character development over another quirky idea. It is a very light-hearted show for the most part and makes for easy mindless watching. However, there is still much on offer for those who want something a bit heavier – with drama and characters facing their own issues across the episodes.
The five main characters of Manabi Straight each fit a standard anime archetype, each receiving an appropriate amount of development and matching their personality well. Ultimately it is the characters that make this show rather than the setting. Leading the cast is “Genki girl” Manami Amamiya with a heart of gold and a lot of energy to accomplish her goals and the “shy sidekick” Mika Inamori who I would argue has the most prominence in the story and is a downright likeable character. They are eventually joined by the “athletic tomboy” Mutsuki Uehara, the “No Nonsense and Studious” Mei Etoh and “Journalism Club Member” Momoha Odori – all three of whom bring their own charm, and except for the latter who sadly receives too little attention, receives ample attention in the story. The Japanese voice actors for these characters all embody their respective personalities, particularly Yui Horie as Manami and Marina Inoue as Mutsuki. Not surprisingly, no English dub was commissioned for this anime.
Manabi Straight was the first anime project for composer Yasuhiro Misawa, who more recently has worked on series including Kokoro Connect, UzaMaid!, Gabriel DropOut and Love Lab. His musical backing is quite subtle but suits the school environment and overall tone of the series well, adding an extra layer to any scene thrown at viewers. One of the things I still remember more than a decade later is the opening and ending themes.
The opening theme A Happy Life by Megumi Hayashibara is, in my opinion, an earworm which I will still hum once or twice every year, and ultimately is a fun opening set at different locations around Seioh Private High School. While the ending theme Lucky & Happy also performed by Megumi Hayashibara isn’t as enjoyable to me, I do appreciate the stop motion animation that went into it. Given that ending sequences are usually quite simple, it is always refreshing to see an animation studio try something a bit more substantial.
All episodes in this collection are presented in the original 4×3 aspect ratio, and honestly having not watched an anime in this ratio for some time, it did take a little bit of getting used to. That said, the quality of the masters used were good, making this fitting for inclusion on a Blu-ray disc over a typically cheaper DVD. Outside the usual comment of the characters looking more like elementary school students than final year high school students, I found the visual charm and animation quality to both be of a high standard and has aged reasonably well over the last decade.
In terms of extra content included on-disc, there are a few nice goodies in addition to the standard content. A majority of the extra content consists of promotional videos (Promo Videos, CD Release Spots, DVD Release Spots and TV Premiere Spots) in addition to clean opening and ending sequence videos. The most notable addition is Karaoke Clips for the five main character theme songs. I like this inclusion as character songs are more or less always excluded from English releases. Unfortunately all tracks, despite having lyrics written on the screen, are instrumental. Therefore if you don’t know how the song goes, it makes it much harder to sing along to the song. I would have rather had the character song videos without the karaoke elements. This collection also includes the OVA episode, which is placed in the episode chronology rather than separately listed.
Final Words on Gakuen Utopia Manabi Straight!
Having aged quite well in my opinion and constituting what I would consider an actual good school life “school life” anime with none of the added “features” of more modern series like excessive comedy or fanservice, Gakuen Utopia Manabi Straight is a fun series that was fun rewatching after all this time. Exuding a lot of sucrose-laden cuteness, some enjoyable theme songs and complemented by a warming tale of the characters trying to support both their peers and themselves – I would recommend picking this up if the genre is of interest.
