cheerleading – Page 2

Love Knows No Gender – ‘Anima Yell!’ Episode 3 Review

Love Knows No Gender – An Anime QandA Review of ‘Anima Yell!’ Episode 3

What’s the show? Anima Yell! Episode 3.

So how’s this episode? I was almost ready to relegate this show to the ‘Watched But Not Reviewed’ pile when the second-half of the episode did one of my favourite low-key awesome things an anime can do.

Was it a beach, or a pool, or a bath or a hot springs episode? I know it’s gotta be something fan-service related since it’s ~you~ we’re talking about… Nope! None of the above!

Well what then? So after our three protagonists form a ‘Cheer Association’ (they can’t be a club until they get five total members but they’re allowed to be an ‘association’) Kohane puts some flyers up around the school to advertise the group. They get their first interested party in the form of Kon, who wants the ‘Cheer Association’ to help “cheer her on” so she gets the confidence in order to confess her feelings to college-aged private tutor who she’s fallen for. Even though it’s not ~technically~ the point of the cheer club Kohane and the others can’t refuse this girl in need and give her some advice on how to confess to a boy. It’s then that Kon reveals that her private tutor isn’t a boy but another girl. There’s a brief pause and then the three girls smile and Kohane says “I think the fact that you can fall in love with anyone is great!” There’s not the least bit of ~weirdness~ or judgment or fetishizing of the moment—it’s just all about love, no matter the gender of either involved party.

It’s good the show is so progressive in that respect. Glad to hear it. And what’s more her confession works, granted its off-screen because Kon is a minor side-character, but still happy that this show is normalising something that should already be considered normal the world over!

But other than that part of the episode, is the show any good? It’s still about the same as it was in Episode 1 & 2, like obviously the aforementioned moment skews my bias more positively towards this episode being ‘better’, but objectively speaking this show’s still a bit too slow for my liking. Or maybe I’m just not connecting with the subject matter of the girls’ interest as much as I did in shows like Comic Girls, New Game or Is The Order A Rabbit?

So more of the same huh? Yeah pretty much, I’m still enjoying the show and I’ve endeared to it a little bit more because of its positive attitude towards same-sex relationships but I’m still not 100% into it. There were some funny jokes to do with cheerleading ghosts and they’ve hinted at a couple of extra new members but I’m still waiting for that moment for the show to ~click~ with me the way other CGDCT shows do. Usually it happens quickly, most of the time within an episode or two, but maybe this one’s a slow blooming love story.

Some ghosts have legs, just look at Yuuna!

Previous Anima Yell! Reviews:

The Cutest Sports Anime Ever? – Episode 1 Review
An Echoing Cheer – Episode 2 Review

If you liked my post and want to support my content, please consider supporting my Patreon page, or donating by buying me a coffee on Ko-fi!

An Echoing Cheer – ‘Anima Yell!’ Episode 2 Review

An Echoing Cheer – An Anime QandA Review of ‘Anima Yell!’ Episode 2

What’s the show? Anima Yell! Episode 2.

So how’s this episode? Its good—bit samey, but still good!

You’re complaining about a cute girl show being samey? How very dare you! Ignoring that rude comment, yes this episode is essentially the same as the first episode just dealing with a different character. So while episode one dealt with Kohane trying to convince Hizume to return to cheerleading, episode 2 is about Kohane trying to convince Uki to start cheerleading in the first place.

I love a good ‘misunderstanding’ joke like this, and I liked that everyone in ear shot reacted to it too.

I see… so you’ll have to forgive me if this review is a bit shorter than normal as there’s really not all that much to talk about. Maybe I’ve been spoilt by CGDCT of past seasons like Slow Start and Comic Girls both of which really had interesting components, and deeper character development beneath the cute girl sheen. There’s nothing wrong with this show—it’s just not as interesting by comparison—not as unique.

Right. Fair enough. So I’m guessing Kohane convinces Uki to start cheerleading? Funnily (or rather appropriately) enough it’s actually Hizume who manages to do so by putting on the same cheer routine that managed to convince Kohane in a millisecond that cheerleading is “amazing”. I don’t know if that girl is like a sleeper agent with the military possessing mind-controlling cheer abilities but likewise she convinces Uki in literally a second that cheerleading is “cute and cool”.

So thoughts on the episode, if you can manage to contribute any more words to this review? Much like the first episode it’s perfectly fine, perfectly fun cute girls doing vaguely sports-like things. All the good things about the first episode carry over to this one and likewise the things I had problems with. Hopefully we get something more substantially ~different~ in the third episode or I might have to move this into the ‘Watched But Not Reviewed’ pile!

Are you asking me to ‘fight’ your butt? Well alright…

Previous Anima Yell! Reviews:

The Cutest Sports Anime Ever? – Episode 1 Review

If you liked my post and want to support my content, please consider supporting my Patreon page, or donating by buying me a coffee on Ko-fi!

The Cutest Sports Anime Ever? – ‘Anima Yell!’ Episode 1 Review

The Cutest Sports Anime Ever? – An Anime QandA Review of ‘Anima Yell!’ Episode 1

What’s the show? Anima Yell! Episode 1.

And what’s it about? Apparently this is a sports anime about cheerleading.

Why do you say “apparently”? Don’t tell me you don’t consider cheerleading a sport?! Professional cheerleading is absolutely a sport, no I more meant that according to Wikipedia this is a ~sports~ anime—feels more CGDCT to me but maybe we live in a post ‘calling things CGDCT’-era. Maybe every anime with a cast of cute girls is implied to be CGDCT by default and so we go to the next applicable genre. Or maybe they were just busy setting things up for Episode 1 and it will become more ~sports~ in future episodes!

Kohane and her best friend Uki discuss the perks of cheerleading. Cute outfits of course!

Anything’s possible I suppose, so who are all ‘cute girls’ and what do they do? Our protagonist is Kohane Hatoya who probably has the single quickest, ‘falls in love with something they’ve seen while out walking and it changes their life’ moment I’ve ever seen in an anime. It literally occurs 5 seconds into the anime and happens within 60 seconds, but you know what I actually thought it was kind of refreshing, it didn’t spend the whole episode getting to the point. It knew the audience knew what was going to happen and it cut through the rest! What it does spend the whole episode doing is having Kohane trying to convince Hizume Arima to return to the sport and help her from a ‘Cheer Club’ in the school.

Oh? Why’d the other girl stop doing cheerleading? She got two good at the sport and was outshining her teammates who basically gave her an ultimatum—come down to our level, or quit. And good on Hizume she chose the road of keeping one’s honour in tact—also the road of no friends, but that’s all in the past now!

So she joins? Eventually, after much badgering—at first I was a bit ~annoyed~ at how persistent Kohane was being, basically stalking her until Hizume called her out on it. If someone doesn’t want to do something, you leave them alone and stop bothering them. And she did stop, well kind of—she actually decided to find a different approach, which was sweeter and showed that Kohane actually cared about Hizume’s feelings enough to show that she’s committed to getting better at the sport rather than just saying.

What’s she do? Kohane, with the help of her best friend Uki begins training in private to conquer her fear of heights (since a fear of heights is going to be a problem, what with all the throwing of people in the air). And so Kohane climbs a tree and jumps out of it, Hizume catches her, call her an idiot but realises how much cheerleading must mean for her to conquer a life long fear and she decides to join the club!

What a thing to be asked, and so earnestly to!

Fantastic. So, uh, I take it you like this show, what with the cute girls and all that… Am I that predictable? While I haven’t warmed up to it as a series as quickly as I usually do with these kinds of shows, nor the characters, it is very wholesome and adorable and it was just what I needed after an emotionally hard day. It’s also got a decent sense of humour, even Kohane mispronouncing “cheer” as “chair” and everyone’s reactions to it didn’t get old—even after the tenth time—so that’s gotta show you the quality of what we’re dealing with here! Very cute, very fun, very happy—more please!

If you liked my post and want to support my content, please consider supporting my Patreon page, or donating by buying me a coffee on Ko-fi!