Ranked #1207

Sasameki Koto

Falling for someone is always rough. Especially when they have absolutely no clue about it. Worse is when they turn out to be a dear friend. And you might as well get out the rope if that person is the same gender as you.

Sumika seems to have a spot of trouble.

She is crazily, idiotically, and hopelessly gone for her best friend, the oblivious but sweet-natured Ushio, who is also a girl. Sasameki Koto seems to follow the traditions of the rom-com where the jokes all lie in the business of unrequited love and one-sided yuri relationships. But... what if the dilemma is a bit different?

What if fate decided to be funny? The girl you love likes girls too... she just doesn't like YOU.

In an interesting twist, Ushio is an open, self-proclaimed "girl who loves girls". The problem is that she only likes cute girls; Sumi is far from "cute" in the conventional sense. She's taller than all the girls in her school (even taller than most of the boys), she's loud, rough, not girly at all and is pretty cool and athletic. That is not the kind of girl that Ushio likes-- she prefers the quiet, clumsy, bookish types, and it's all Sumi can do but endure watching her best friend fall for girls who are not her.

Sasameki Koto is both a comedy and a drama. Its major problem is that sometimes you cannot tell which one it wants to be. There is slapstick, goofball and silly humour aplenty, but the series sometimes dives into intensely dramatic scenes that are quite downers. The problem is not that a comedy could be dramatic or that a drama could be comedic; the anime's problem is that it does not blend in the genres so much. It switches back and forth between them.

Pacing issues aside, the story itself is not winning awards for ingenuity. It follows the basic route of most high school rom-coms, and you get episodes with aprons and cooking, beach episodes (which is rather interestingly lamp-shaded; we get a pool episode as compensation), and other shenanigans.

Possibly the biggest weakness of the series is the animation. It is generally weak and clearly the anime was working with a budget. The art style is pleasant, and the characters have nice designs, but it does not translate well into animated sequences. Lots of backgrounds tend to get recycled and there are not major but lots of minor inconsistencies here and there. Probably the best thing about the art style is whenever Sumi goes into "super-deformed mode" for the results are generally hilarious. Probably the best thing about the art is the atmosphere it creates with the time of day; lots of pivotal scenes occur during the night time or around sunset, and the tones used for this moments make them look rather pretty.

Sasameki Koto has a very lovely score, though sometimes appropriateness and timing seems to be a problem with how it is utilised. The background music is very, very unusual and very noticeable. It uses things like choral arrangements and is loaded with lots of piano-driven compositions. It is a very soothing score, and it is nice to just listen to it on its own. But back to the problem: it is used during some comical scenes that just ruin the effect of the humour. The score is melancholy and pensive. Then the anime is loud and funny. The sound and the action do not coincide. Another problem is the OP and ED themes. They are not bad themes-- they just should have been reversed. The anime opens with a slow, sad song and closes with an upbeat song. It would have worked better if it went the opposite way.

The only thing really keeping you coming back to this series are its characters. Sumi is an awesome protagonist. She is not good with words but expresses herself better with action. Sumi is generally amusing as well, as her sensible, sarcastic side usually comes into conflict when she starts going gaga over Ushio. Gradually, Sumika's outward self melts and she reveals that she is not some unfeeling violent giant of a girl, but truly an unsure, shy, and loveable person who is trying to come into her own. That sweetly stumbling inner self in direct contrast with her aloof, cool exterior is what makes her such an interesting character. And she proves to be a pervert just as much as anyone else.

Ushio is the "oblivious to love" kind of character, but she is not ingratiatingly so. We can understand why she does not return Sumi's feelings-- Sumi never really made a move in the first place. She is the typical embodiment of the "blonde ditz" character, but she cleverly goes against this. She reads a lot and she proves not to be an idiot at all. She sometimes slips into the "pedestal position" since Sumi spends so much time admiring everything about her. She is not flawless, but Sumi generally tends to paint the picture that she is.

The supporting cast is pretty good and rather eclectic. There is a lesbian couple consisting of two rather humorously manipulative (though not vindictive) and outgoing girls. Probably the best side character in the anime is Akemiya, a very small and effeminate, cowardly boy who is brave enough to tell the scary, tough, un-cute girl that he loves that he thinks she is cute despite what anyone else might tell her. The problem is, he is also pretty stupid, because when he realises that the girl he loves is a lesbian, the solution he comes up with induces a facepalm or two. Then there is Aoi, and she might be the one character a viewer might immediately dislike or immediately empathise with, since she is naive, a bit selfish and very awkward. And the supporting character that steals every scene she is in is Kiyori, a straight girl who is always eating and who doesn't mind that all her friends are gay. There is not a scene that she appears in where she does not make you grin, smile or laugh out loud. Perhaps her comic timing can be attributed to her seiyuu, who also played Kagami in the mega-comedy Lucky Star.

Generally, Sasameki Koto is a good yuri anime. A great drama or a great comedy? Not really. If it made up its mind which it would rather be, then perhaps it could have been one of those series that you just call "awesome". As it stands, it is an amusing and nice series, though not one that might revolutionise the anime world in any way at all. Also, the story is not over despite the anime's end; the manga continues Sumi and Ushio's story, and frankly, the manga presents this a lot better, knowing how to shift between the genres and deliver. Actually, seeing how inevitable it is to say, it shall just be said: the manga is better. If you are interested in learning any more, it is recommended that you give it a shot. It is funnier, sweeter, and generally much more entertaining than its anime counterpart.

All in all, Sasameki Koto still very pleasant and enjoyable. For any yuri fan, this is exactly the sort of series you should not miss. For any fan of comedy and romance, it proves to be fairly good viewing as well.

It really makes you think about or laugh about all those words that we cannot say aloud and just have to let them whisper within our hearts. read more

First of all i want to say that "Sasameki koto" was my first Shoujo-ai anime and because of that it kind of changed my view on Shoujo-ai series and all that girl+girl thing.

Story: "sasameki koto" tells us a story about love which seems strange to many of us and that love is between girls no that love which we call "friends" but real love , feelings and wanting to be with some one. The story revolves around few girls Kazama, Ushio and Murasame, Sumika also their many friends which they encounter. Murasame Sumika feel in love with her best Friend Kazama Ushio who falls in love with all the "cute" girls she see, for Murasame its the worst thing that can happen because she isn't the "cute" type if you think about it shes more like guy shes tall , strong and also knows karate ... well in other words the opposite of the type that Kazama likes because of that Murasama suffers alot. She also suffers because of seeing Kazama always getting hurt by other girls ... and getting her heart broken. Story goes into many misunderstandings and alot more sufferings but only to be relieved by some humor and joy of main characters "after bad things happens there are always something good awaiting". When going further into story we see some development of feelings from both sides still that was a mystery for me because it was my first Shoujo-ai anime ... with that i got into it and wanted to see more. Because of that i came across even more changes in their characteristics after some time i noticed Jealousy coming from Kazama who i thought had no interests in Murasame. With that i will end my review.

Art: Well art is beautiful all the characters are beautifully drawn and all the atmosphere is warm.

Characters: It was a wonderful character development and characteristics of each protagonist every moment of jealousy and such was shown nicely.

Enjoyment: well i enjoyed these series alot because it was my first shoujo-ai anime.

Overall: its a great love story which makes some difference from these plain every day anime romances which we see happening and after 4 eps you can already tell what will happen in the end ... I would suggest to watch this if you ain't against girls love!.
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