I almost feel weird for laughing at this show sometimes.
What They Say:
Atushi’s friends are helping him ride his bike without training wheels. It should be easy, right?
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Atsushi’s growth over the years certainly has to be problematic in many ways, and we’ve seen a few of them over its run so far that have been okay at best and often just creepy at worst. This episode gives us Atsushi dealing with a problem that makes sense mentally and control wise as he’s got a bike like all the other kids, but his adult bike has training wheels attached to it. Even the other kids his age don’t have that. The problem comes in how do you teach someone nearly twice your height how to ride a bike? Peer pressure is the key since he wants to impress Hina who can’t believe that he still has training wheels. Sadly, as cute as this could be with all the damage, it’s cheaped out on by being done almost entirely off screen. You do have to feel for Atsushi as he goes through this though since he desperately wants to be like everyone else and many times can’t seem to understand why he’s different.
In Summary:
Atsushi’s side of the equation is one that could certainly be fun and engaging in a lot of ways but the series has unfortunately dropped the ball a lot. Atsumi can be handled easier and we’ve seen it in many other shows so it’s not much of a stretch. The focus on Atsushi here does have some good material, something I haven’t seen too often at times, but it falls short in really capitalizing on it. They had that opportunity here with Atushi learning to ride but they failed on it by taking it mostly off screen. The social pressures the kid has to face would make for an engaging show, especially through humor, but it feels like they just don’t know how to work it and are too constrained by the source material.
Grade: C-
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Sony KDS-R70XBR2 70″ LCoS 1080P HDTV, Dell 10.1 Netbook via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.
