With just a little push in the right direction, this show could really be something.
At first glance, Kokoro Connect looks like yet another take on the "school club that does nothing" subgenre that's become popular over the last few years, but what makes it different is so far its saving grace. Body switching is definitely not typical fare for high school anime, and it is nice to see an attempt to be different. The way it's presented in this episode is interesting as well; one second you're in your own body, the next you're elsewhere. The blink-or-you'll-miss-it idea of body switching sets up an interesting mystery, and I hope the explanation turns out to be just as compelling.
But while this show seems to want to distinguish itself from the pack, it still falls into some of the usual traps. There are two girls and one boy in the clubroom; let's make sex jokes! Get the boy to say incriminating things by promising pantsu! Two girls are alone in a classroom? Time for lesbians! Kokoro Connect doesn't seem to trust its own premise to carry itself through, or at least not yet. It was disappointing to see a show that seems to want to be engaging on a different level have to resort to pandering. I hope that this changes in the upcoming episodes.
That said, I do like the characters so far, especially the glimpse we got into their home lives and how they compared and contrasted with how they behave at school. We need more of that and less of the pandering jokes. The show describes the club as a random group that was thrown together because of school rules, and we don't really get a feel for how well they know each other in this episode. The body-switching can easily lend itself to a "walk in my shoes" plotline, making it much more character-oriented. Despite using familiar elements, it's hard to predict what kind of show Kokoro Connect will ultimately be, and that curiosity is enough for me to keep watching.
Images from Crunchyroll.com.
For an anime that is about a group of teens switching bodies, it was inevitable that some sex jokes would occur. I think in the first few episodes we may see a bit more of this fanservice, but I'm hoping it'll diminish as the series goes on as well.
ReplyDeleteI really think the home lives vs school lives will definitely play a bigger part in this series. And we may actually have a pretty good anime about characters learning to understand one another on our hands. I definitely agree that this aspect is keeping me interested in seeing more of this anime, but I was already relatively satisfied by what I got in the first episode.
@lostty
ReplyDeleteI think my problem was that some of those jokes happened before the body-switching occurred. For example, I wasn't bothered by the groping scene because it was inevitable at that point, but I hope that this isn't the only thing the show will do with this concept.
I hope so, I think it shows a lot of promise if it's leading up to going down that path. But I agree, it is a satisfying episode anyway.
Hope you're still watching this one, I think it's getting better with each episode (this comment is after watching episode 3). The boys exploring the possibilities of genderswapping are goofy but not excessively so, and the story's getting deeper. This is probably 2nd (behind Natsuyuki) on my list of the new summer shows.
ReplyDelete@sneezl
ReplyDeleteI still am, and I'm really impressed! The jokes are more relevant to the scenario and we're getting surprisingly deep stuff like discussing how a person's "soul" is defined... You're right, it is turning into one of the better shows this season. :)