Recap: Hachiman and the gang have to pitch in to help the Athletics Festival. It is largely uneventful.

There’s been enough of these, can I just start calling them Brains Base episodes from now on? The episodes in an ongoing series that BB decides to stick in on the end even though they contribute nothing to character development and simply serve to dampen the gravitas of the last plot arc? I honestly don’t understand why they do them. I had this same feeling of anticlimax from that horrible anime-only last episode of My Little Monster and here we are again, pissing away time because we can.

I suppose at least they know what’s funny at this point, as they wasted no time bringing Hachiman’s snark level to a maximum, as well as bringing in Yoshiteru and Hina for a one-two punch of crazy. It’s a good thing I never get tired of Hina’s constant homosexual subtext because good lord it was on display this week. I also like the clearly ripoff-Saber costumes Yoshiteru made for his contribution. I can’t begin to imagine where they got the materials to replicate plate armor, unless that’s really just metal coated cardboard or something.

Still, I’m just really disappointed that this was another by-the-numbers assistance. There wasn’t even any clever social commentary, it was just “We need to help them, but we’re inadequate. CALL IN THE WEIRDOS.” There wasn’t even much of any romantic teasing. I know given the flow of the japanese school year they couldn’t have done this episode earlier, but I really don’t see why they had to include it at all.

Final Impressions

Coming out of this finale has definitely left me with some mixed feelings on SNAFU. This is not a show I hated. Not by a long shot. Still, there were so many tiny problems that just slowly added up until the entire experience was slightly tainted.

For a romantic comedy, one of its weaker points by far was its attempt at a natural romance. It would appear our author knows way more about social moors and trappings than romantic cues, as every attempt seemed ham-fisted into the plot for the sheer reason of having a romance. Not helping matters, there really wasn’t very much romantic development outside of a few isolated episodes. It also seemed to be trying its hardest to maintain a status quo, the thing I really hate most about rom-coms. I know it’s a lot to expect considering leading the viewer on means they can make more of the show, but even for that this just felt stretched out.

It goes without saying that the worst part about this show was the absolutely dismal effort Brains Base put into animating it. Many animations were either lazy or horrible. Characters would be locked into place unless it was their turn to speak, which just didn’t look natural. The art was the worst offender. More than just bad, it made the show nigh unwatchable, as horrible stills were allowed to stay on screen for several seconds at a time. I know BB isn’t the richest studio, but after the absolute beauty that was My Little Monster I was understandably disappointed.

On the comedy end, I actually had a good time with SNAFU. Cynical snark was ever-present and worked so well with a protagonist like Hachiman.  A good ensemble cast of wackos and bishounen provided some great physical comedy.  After a certain point only a few characters, namely Hachiman and Hina, could consistently get me laughing, but the jokes were good enough from the two of them that I didn’t mind the lackluster performance from the rest of the cast. Not the strongest part of SNAFU, but definitely something I enjoyed.

What this show did best by far was its handling of social commentary. Not a whole lot of high school shows like to get down into the nitty gritty of cliques and social pitfalls that is the high school experience. Even fewer do it as well as SNAFU managed in its one-cour run. Each week brought new problems that arise from the various relationships in High School, and each time I was surprised how well I could relate to what they were experiencing. It’s really what kept me coming back week after week despite my other issues.

In the end, SNAFU is not a show that will be missed. It had its moments, but it was marred by so many problems that there’s no way to use it as any kind of good example. I enjoyed myself, but that’s about it. I can only hope that other shows can take away from SNAFU‘s more in-depth way of treating high school kids for the way they really are. Maybe one day we’ll finally have the kind of show with these themes that we can finally call a classic.