Yuru Yuri Nachuyachumi!+

How does it feel when you’re still on Nachuyachumi?
Just watch Yuru Yuri!

BUCKINGHAM! WORRY NOT, ANGKOR WAT! FAI FAI BEACH! NO WAY NIAGARA! - Ayano Sugira Puns

For a show that will be airing in Fall 2015, which we all know would be “San-Hai!” TYO animations did air us two special episodes, just for the sake of better review from everyone. I, myself enjoyed watching Yuru Yuri series from Dogakobo and now the TYO, which they made a good effort on the Nachuyachumi, one year ago. So now I will be reviewing on this anime before making my way to the 3rd season of Yuru Yuri.

This ... story basically picked up from where they left from Nachuyachumi, continuing their everyday lives in summer, playing water fights and etc, while the second episode is more like friends bonding before summer ends. So yeah basically slice of life. On other hand, Akari Akaza has more screen time than the previous seasons where the staff love to troll her even though she is "the supposedly to be main protagonist", but for this staff, I wonder if they will troll her or not. Well, we shall see how it goes for Akari in season 3, hopefully she won't get trolled too much. xD Overall, the story is understandable, not too complex since it's a slice of life.

The animations aren't so bad, no weird or akward animations, nicely done, the new character designs are also quite appealing though i prefer more on season 1 and 2. Not too saturated or too bland, so good job TYO Animations.

The OP song is really catchy, did enjoy listening it. I'm glad that most of the original seiyuus are still voice acting all the four main characters just like season 1 and 2, well if everything change, then i would feel meh... But for now, I'm happy to still hear their voices especially Akari and Kyouko.

I love Akari in this series, since she get to have more screen time before and Sugira Ayano, how i miss her with her puns even though she didn't use much puns on this occasion but hopefully the third season, her puns would come back xD. Kyouko on the other hand, always give a comedic scenes which make us laugh and also how stealthy she is when she takes pictures of the girls sleeping.

Anyway, with two specials finished airing. It was fun and enjoyable to watch, TYO animations did good job here, still maintains all the genres back from season 1 and season 2, but they are more focused on slice of life genre, but still it's enjoyable to watch, i can't wait for the third season which would begin airing in October, so hopefully TYO can make Yuru Yuri San Hai, a splendid season.

With that the overall result would be 8/10

The Cute Girls Doing Cute Things (CGDCT) formula reportedly found its roots in shows such as Azumanga Daioh. The concept was simple enough: Introduce a group of girls that are going to some school and give them all unique character traits, using their day-to-day interaction as the basis for light-hearted hilarity and possibly some drama. After noticing the warm reception some of these prototypical CGDCT shows were receiving, many studios decided to make their own tweaks to the formula. Some ideas included marrying the Slice of life (SOL) style of show with another concept, giving rise to such variations as Cute Girls in Pop Band, ... and Cute girls in Purgatory. Another idea was to tweak the aesthetic, further popularising the ‘moe’ art style. Over time, the formula was further refined, as each trope and character trait which initially reflected some aspect of the human condition was slowly twisted into something artificial and sinister. Shortcuts to human emotions were found and exploited, and soon the CGDCT formula hit critical mass: Yuru Yuri was born.

‘Nachuyachumi! +’ is a pair of extra episodes for the Yuru Yuri addicts; a bone thrown to those eagerly waiting for a third season of the franchise, made to follow up from the movie (Nachuyachumi!). Suffice to say, if you want an introduction to the series, there’s no real reason for you to start with this couple of episodes instead of with the first season: it comes across in the writing that it’s generally expected you have seen the series up to this point, such as when characters reference past gags.

The plot is straightforward enough. True to its title, a significant portion of ‘Nachuyachumi! +’ is spent reflecting on and building upon the events in Nachuyachumi! Now back from their camping trip, the main four cast members spend the remainder of the summer vacation creating fun memories. After an impromptu session taking funny pictures of each other, the main cast spend time looking over photos they had taken during their camping trip. Misunderstandings, physical comedy, and hints of romance between characters make up the bulk of the content. Kyoko is as mischievous and arrogant as ever, Yui cracks a smile, and Chinatsu is at least half as scary as you’d expect her to be.

The opening and ending songs are light hearted and energetic, but stand out entirely differently from each other. The opening is a strange and arguably corny slap-bass mishmash, while the ending is a very well balanced composition that totally fits the mood of the show.

There is a simple joy that can be found in the achievement of simple goals, and a theme that makes itself known through ‘Nachuyachumi! +’ is just that: the creation of something tangible from the summation of many trivial things, or to put it another way, the achievement of many seemingly irrelevant and simple goals leads to the creation of a joyful memory: a personal piece of history that can be looked back upon with nostalgia. The cast set out to have fun and create good memories, and they achieve this through the completion of many simple and arbitrary tasks, whether it’s staging a sumo wrestling match, playing catch with water balloons, or even conspiring to take a picture of Kyoko while she’s asleep.

One disappointment was that too much of the second episode was spent watching the cast play various video games with each other, which wound up feeling stale almost immediately. Seeing the characters interact with each other in person is a strong suit of the show, so having them sitting still in a room only virtually interacting meant there was an even stronger reliance of previously established relations between the characters for such events to be engaging.

N!+ is not profound. It’s not a leap forward or change of direction for the Yuru Yuri universe. What it is, is a cute and enjoyable stocking filler fit to tide over Yuru Yuri fans as they wait for the third season, and at the end of the day, a worthy addition to the franchise.

Aren't we a spoiled bunch. Tokyo T.V. once again gives us two more OVAs. That's 40 more minutes of Yuru Yuri and the cute cast. Were the cookies put into the oven for too long this time? Let's find out.

JAPANESE LEARNERS (2/5 Easy to Understand)

Do I ... even need to explain this anymore since I've reviewed Yuru Yuri three separate times already. Honestly, if you are at the intermediate or advanced level, then you should have no problem watching this anime without subtitles. Once again, you newbies can use this OVA as an excellent resource for your studies as the phrases and vocabulary are easy to learn.

STORY

It's summer time again which means we must be going to the beach, right? No. Okay, maybe we will go camping again. No. You said water balloons. Oh my, there is nothing better than cute Yuru Yuri chicks wearing bikini's throwing water balloons at each other. Wrong! They are still wearing their clothes. Okay, that was my ecchi side. Let me get straight to the point. Over 13 minutes of the first OVA episode took place in the club room where they looked at pictures from the camping trip and there were no parodies present at all. It was dreadful, and had I not been an anime reviewer I would have turned off my computer right away, but I must bring you anime otakus high-quality reviews.

The second OVA had a much better story. The girls haves a sleepover together in two separate groups. The group with Kyouko wanted to get a picture of her negao (sleeping face). The nice thing about the second OVA was the Super Smash Bros. and Animal Crossing parodies, which were a welcome treat. Unlike the first OVA, this OVA was much funnier and entertaining.

ANIMATION

If there was one thing that went well with the OVAs, it was the animation. Once again, I loved how the characters were presented and how the environments looked, even if that time was short. Don't let me forget that you can see Kyouko's......
SOUND

Let me just say that Yuru Yuri doesn't exactly have the greatest OST in the anime universe. Even while writing this review just after 5 minutes of watching the OVAs, I can't even remember any music. The opening and ending songs are also not that great either.

CHARACTERS

There really isn't much to say about the characters since they all maintain their previous personalities from the original anime. No new characters are added. Kyouko and Akari still are my favorite characters.

FINAL VERDICT/ENJOYMENT

We all like cookies when they first come out of the oven. They are sweet and chewy. That is how the first and second season of Yuru Yuri are presented. Unfortunately, the first OVA was left in the oven for too darn long and it left a burnt taste in my mouth. The second OVA was much better. Here is the gist of it, skip the first OVA and watch the second OVA unless you have some kind of OCD where you have to watch every anime episode (like me).

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