I’m usually not a fan of anime which have multiple seasons. For some reason they don’t seem sincere, or necessary. If an anime can’t say what it needs to say in twenty six episodes, it just doesn’t have anything to say. There may be exceptions to this rule, but so far, I personally haven’t come across any.
In picking up School Rumble, Second Semester, I expected to enjoy further laughs and mayhem with a romantic twist, just like I did in Season One. I also expected some answers to the copious amount of questions piled on in Season One.
School Rumble, Season One is all about hopeless teen drama, puppy love and crushed expectations. It’s funny throughout most of the series, and downright dramatic the rest. The first season is authentic and sweet. In short, School Rumble, Season One is a great romantic comedy with heart. School Rumble, Season Two, is, not so much….
School Rumble
School Rumble
Plot Summary
It’s the same ol’ teen drama for Class 2C as they kick off their sophomore year: Tenma is still clueless, and in love with the enigmatic and odd Karasuma. Harima still can’t confess his true feelings for Tenma, and Eri has some unresolved issues for how she feels about Harima.
But Harima has become a rising star in the world of manga, and with his increase in stardom comes an increase in confidence. Will his new found self-esteem help him profess his love to Tenma?
Review
School Rumble, Second Semester was plain bad. It was a serving of more of the same from Season One, but without the zest and freshness. The gags were old, the lines were tired and the characters were stale. I’ve found fresher things at the day old Hostess store.
The writers must have been giddy from their successful run with School Rumble, Season One, and hammered out a formula for what they thought brought in the ha ha’s. Why don’t we say that H (Harima) times (T) Tenma plus F (filler) equals cha ching! So (H)(T) +F 
=$$$. And thus fans are rewarded with a seemingly endless loop of garbage and the studio raked in cash with minimal effort. The only problem is this formula= Hard Fail. Infinity.
Filler episodes and scenes abounded and actual plot was gunned down so that romantic anarchy could rule. I knew when the first episode made me shudder a bit in my critical thinking lobe that trouble wasn’t far behind. My instsincts seldom let me down. Two full episodes were dedicated to a cop-out story arc, and a lame one at that. This series has more dream scenes and dodgy explanations than are allotted for a romantic comedy. It was cute at first, but like a child who doesn’t know that adorable little version of “I’m a Teacup” is getting on Auntie Rae’s nerves, so was School Rumble unaware its gags were frustratingly tired.
I would say there were three episodes worth of progressive plot. But it was a downer since it made less sense than the wacky limit the anime set for itself. It was uninspired and ubiquitously bad. The characters I grew to empathize with were stunted in their growth, though some development managed to to squeak by.
Character Development
Further decent character development was absent, a night-and-day departure for the series. Tenma stayed stupid, Eri stayed rich but Harima had a change in his confidence level. Poor guy can’t catch break, though that’s partially his own fault. I would have ditched chasing after Tenma eons ago. The girl is a waste of air time and ink. Harima has his hang-ups and Tenma is one of them. Guy needs to go to rehab for hopeless infatuations with loser women. Harima was the only saving grace of the anime, but a tiny one.
Character Design
Blah, what can I say about things that don’t change? Nothing visually departed from the first season, but why should it really.
I’m lumping in Animation, Music and Voice Acting with my critique of character designs. There’s something to be said about consistency, so no points are taken off for the average-ness of the rest of the series’ features.
Conclusion
School Rumble, Second semester went nowhere. I might have well just watched Season One and called it a day. I didn’t though, and flushed nine hours of my time down the kamode. It’s a shame that this series took a nose dive in its quality of storytelling.
School Rumble Season One was good. There was no reason for Two to have been so different from the first, none. The ending of Second semester was the real kick in the teeth, though. It sucked harder than all the shifty, cop-out scenes combined, and that’s saying a LOT.
School Rumble has a third season coming up. I really don’t want to take another bullet for School Rumble fans since I’m still digging shrapnel out my funny bone from Second Semester. If you’re a fan of Season One, I recommend you avoid Season Two if you can, you’ll only be let down, and who needs that?
Rating
School Rumble, Second Semester gets 2.5 outta 5 Hammies!
Retail Info
- Publisher: Funimation
- Release Date: October 14, 2008 (Part One) and December 16, 2008 (Part Two)
- Retail Price: $59.98
- Number of discs: 2
- Episodes: 1-13 (Part One) and 14-26 (Part Two)
- Run Time: 305 minutes
- Rating: TV-MA
- Language: English, Japanese
- Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
- Format: Animated, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, NTSC, Subtitled,
Because of the long wait between the seasons my expectations of the 2nd season were higher and I was greatly disappointed
It wasn’t the wait that bothered me as much as the shortcomings of the series. The baffling part of it is that it really didn’t have to suck.
To be fair, Season 2 (up to where I stopped) did almost exactly follow the events of the manga, so really, the critisisms put forth here should be leveled towards the original author. When you create dozens of 1-note side characters that begin to overlap each other, you’ve got problems. A better idea would’ve been to concentrate the story’s focus on the main bunch instead of adding more and more.
This is one of those decisions which is at the discretion of the studio: to faithfully follow the manga or take it in a different direction. I vote for the departure route. Points though to the studio for faithfulness, although it was a bad call.
I agree that the bitsy characters were a major distraction. Unnecessary in a story which has so much going on.
You guys suck. Second season was actually pretty good, followed the manga. Most animes that fail don’t follow the manga, although there are some exceptions.
That’s your opinion (that we suck and that the anime was good). It doesn’t matter if it followed the manga, it was still bad. It would seem then that the burden of Suck is actually on the manga, if the anime indeed followed it.