Special A is a high school comedy series from Gonzo based on the original manga by Maki Minami. Which centres around Hikari Hanazono the number two ranked student within the prestigious Special A class. Her long time rival is Kei Takishima the top ranked student in the school, who excels at everything. No matter how hard Hikari tries she will always end up second best, of course unbeknownst to Hikari she will always be number one in Kei’s eyes. The only person who seems completely blind to Kei’s affection is Hikari herself who, since losing a wrestling match when they were children, has always sworn that she will one day beat Kei. Of course that has never actually happened since she must put up with always being ranked second.
The series itself revolves around the exploits of the S.A class, who are the top seven students within the elite Hakusenkan school. They have special uniforms, special classes and they spend their days often conversing over tea in their private green house communal area. As you can guess they‘re meant to be special.
The S.A consists of the twins Jun and Megami Yamamoto who hold positions 3rd and 4th respectively. Jun is very shy and due to this has actually developed a split personality. His second personality is referred to as ‘Inner Jun’ created to be able to charm women with little effort unlike Jun’s usual persona. His sister Megami refuses to speak to ‘protect’ her singing voice and only communicates via a note pad, which adds to many a comical scenario. When she does actually sing her voice is incredibly powerful and is often known to deafen those unaware of her vocal ‘talents’. Both the twins are very possessive of Ryuu Tsuji who ranks 7th in the school, he is an animal lover and often brings his vast menagerie of pets to school. He also takes care of the twins and spends most of his time worrying about them. Tadashi Karino is ranked 5th and is the son of the schools director. He’s known for being very reckless and is often teased by Akira Toudou, ranked 6th who is actually secretly in love with him. Akira is the tomboy of the group, she’s very close to Hikari and is often very protective of her especially when it comes to Kei. She also makes afternoon tea for the group. Plus, of course, Hikari and Kei who are ranked 2nd and 1st within this class. As the series unfolds we learn more about the students and how their prestigious lives don’t always seem to go to plan. The main plot of course is Hikari discovering her feelings for Kei as she gradually stops being quite so dense.
Sadly, this series was nothing ‘special’ and in my eyes it didn’t warrant a 24 episode run, but I am aware of how popular the manga is so maybe that’s why. This was yet another series where episodes felt like filler so the studio could complete the run as opposed to every week feeling like it had an actual point. The animation wasn’t that great. Personally, I don’t like the overly bold lines and elongated bodies but it was visually pleasing enough to not get in the way of the pretty sparse plot. The characters themselves were likable but nothing terribly original which is expected from a pretty run of the mill anime. Nothing spectacular, but it worked well as a season filler and I’m sure those who are fans of shoujo would enjoy it. Comical, light-hearted fun but not terribly memorable.
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