Isshuukan Friends.

This is not a romantic comedy or a romance. Instead, you get a groundhog day adaption on young relationships in high school with a small amount of generic slice of life. We can sum up this anime as heartwarming but uneventful. This anime is adapted from a manga (partial 4 koma) by the same name and covers 4 of 6 volumes. Also, the manga is better than the adaption as much of the interesting dialogue that gives characters personality is absent in the anime.

Watch this if you like sickeningly yet bland sweet slice of life that moves at a snail's pace and enjoy fictional relationships. ... Do not watch this if you enjoy dramas, are looking for romance in your anime, or want to punch weak characters in the face.

Story/Plot/Summary

The anime about a young boy (Yuuki Hase) who tries to befriend (and romance) a young girl (Kaori Fujimiya). The twist here is that Kaori's memory of anyone she's friends with disappears at the start of every Monday. The twist makes for a interesting anime but the plot, dialogue, and writing fails realize the full potential of the twist. Any semblance of friendship or romance is weak, and the interaction between characters is simplistic, fragile, and boring.

The plot twist should have provided many unique events that could lead to interesting developments but it fails to do so. Instead, the author decided to insert random events (deus ex machina) and provide forgettable drama between Hase and Kaori. Also, you get immersion breaking actions either when characters break character or the author uses deus ex machina to revert any progress making you wonder why anything happened at all. These also seem to be decisions the production studio made over the author's original work. Anyone who steps back and thinks about their own relationships will be frustrated at the simplistic nature of how the characters interact with the plot.

In the latter half of the anime spirals into the slice of life category until the end. There is even an episodic half episode mixed in which was questionable. Some of the episodes are also entirely devoted to developing Kaori's character just a tiny bit. A new character is introduced to help bring closure to Kaori's non-medical related amnesia twist. In fact, the last 3 episodes can be watched as a summary of everything this anime has to offer. Sadly there is no major resolution at the end of the anime.

Characters

Kids are as complex as adults and should not dumbed down as it only hurts the potential of this anime. The pacing of the anime could kill a corgi and the characters and anime studio are partly to blame.

There are four characters. Hase and Kaori who are the protagonists. Kiryuu and Yamagishi's who are supporting characters. All the characters are weak in this anime because the supporting characters are the author's portrayal of the "better half" of Hase and Kaori due to how shallow Hase and Kaori are as characters by themselves. Perhaps if the author spent much more time fleshing out Hase and Kaori, this anime would be great with just two characters. Instead its clear that you need supporting characters so that you get the "whole" Hase and Kaori experience.

Kaori in the first half of the anime flip flops between different personalities much to the viewers chagrin. Then halfway through she abruptly starts to develop her character and become more human which is a positive change. Yet prior to that her interactions with her classmates (who were trash talking her) she comes off as meek and unwilling to confront or defend herself. It is difficult to understand who she really is which makes it hard to care. The result is a unwieldy heroine who's difficult to take seriously but unfortunately she's a better character than Hase. Why is this? She shows the most depth and development out of all the characters which is the most important aspect of an anime that revolves solely around people. Due to her amnesia trait and plot, she was bound to develop the most anyways. Despite all this, in the latter half you keep thinking she's going to say something of interest but it always ends up as fluff.

Hase is a forgettable and weak male lead. He has a standard male sheepish personality who jumps to conclusions and makes assumptions rather than approaching an issue with reason. While this is an attribute many people may have and is seen as normal, the author forces his character to behave in a way which drags the plot down instead of adding to it. Worse, every time he starts getting weepy on the audience he seeks out Kiryuu who then, like clockwork, offers him the most simplest of rational advice. This really speaks volumes about Hase as a character. Kiryuu ultimately manifests as Hase' other half. If Kiryuu was removed and Hase was given character development to seek understanding of his own emotions and follow the exact same rational advice, he would have the potential to outshine Kaori in the anime by far. As a side note, it seems the author cast Hase in a extremely naive and idealistic nature which isn't a bad thing except she (the author) combines this with unlikely events leading to breaks in immersion which again, is not good for an anime trying to deliver a strong story based on relationships. Also, author seems to be channeling her ex-boyfriend's jealously into this character because daaaaaamn, hes green, if you know what I mean.

The supporting characters are what make this anime even bearable.

Kiryuu basically acts as the more mature, more laid back, less excitable, more logical, better half of Hase and Kaori. If Hase ever showed a bit of self consciousness or intelligence, it is manifested in Kiryuu. Or Kiryuu will play the third wheel and provide advice to Kaori if there's a problem with Hase. People like Kiryuu in this anime because hes grounded, not because he's a good character though. Also due to the weakness of characters/plot, even he gets shipped with Yamagishi rather subtly in an effort to add development. This development is tacked on towards the end, probably because the author is attempting to salvage readership.

Yamagishi, the female counterpart to Kiryuu, is one of those light headed possibly lesbian (to attract more viewers) girls who wears her heart on her sleeve (unlike crazy Kaori's split personality). Yamagishi also has a "forgetful" problem but unlike the twist that Kaori has, its closer to absentmindedness, a standard anime character trait. Her role in this anime is to act as a counterpart to Kaori, and fill in the void that Kaori's character fails to do (provide comic relief). She also enters the anime halfway through, at a time when the anime is starting to suffer from a lack of "things happening". In other words, this character's value is unable to stand alone and who's purpose is to prop up the plot itself at the same time while providing contrast to Kaori. Again, if Yamagishi was merged into Kaori, I think this anime would have had much stronger protagonists and a much more creative outcome rather than relying on happenstance. Then again, if they merged, their laugh would be "Teehee ehehehue", creepy.

Art: Pastel colors and fits the anime well, perhaps to complement how bland it is.

Sound: Not bad but not memorable. Fits the anime well however.

Want something that has relationships, romance, and a great deal more done better? Nodame Cantabile. Or a number of other anime I could easily recommend over One Week Friends for the relationship category.

A good plot which lasted for a few episodes and was then ruined by a complete wimp and unintelligent main character. The series started out good but with every episode fell lower and lower.

The forced teenage drama devalued this series hugely. I hesitate to even call it teenage drama since it was seemingly just pulled out of nowhere and didn't really make any sense at all. At the start I didn't really have anything to complain about but as mentioned, the further on in the series, the more problems arose.

A very weak 6, given only because I liked a certain side character and the idea ... for the story was unique and interesting.

Story
The plot of Isshuukan Friends is about a young boy (Hase) who is in love with a beautiful but strange girl (Kaori). Kaori has a condition in which on a weekly biases the memory of her friends are erased. This means that the plot is about Hase, trying to befriend Kaori and is required to introduce himself to her every week on Monday just to keep up their friendship and ultimately for her to remember him for more than just a week. This unfortunately gives the anime a very frustrating and repetitive story.

Art
It somewhat improves the boring and bland nature of this anime ...

Sound
Its fine but theirs nothing really that memorable

Characters
First off i would say Kaori a better character than Hase (not a compliment), as if anything she is able to get some development unlike the other characters because of her condition and for the sake of the plot she needed some development for there to even be a story. However even with the development she never really does anything much apart from making the main male character confront her every week and writing a diary.

Hase is a forgettable and weak male lead (maybe thats the real reason Kaori couldn't remember him) as he just relies on Kiryuu who just offers him advice to move the plot forward.I believe Kiryuu would have probably been a more interesting main character.

My overall opinion
I unfortunately couldn't stand one week friends having the two main characters relationship build in every episode to then just take a step back became soooooo tiresome after like the third time of the main female character (who was just forgetable) forgetting the main male character. After dragging myself through every episode just to see how it ended i was just left frustrated and disappointed, i may as well have just watched the first episode and stopped because that in the end is where the anime leaves you, after finishing the final episode you just get looped strait back to episode 1. In my opinion i wouldn't recommend this anime as putting my hate aside the story is incomplete so instead of wasting your time watching one week friends find a good romance anime that actually has a conclusion e.g. Your lie in April, Toradora! or Kokoro Connect

I think that neither beginning nor the end are important as long as the middle part is good.

Unfortunately it wasn't so good for "One Week Friends"

What really destroyed this anime is pointles amount of filler episodes that bring nothing interesting to the plot, really, episodes are like watching the same tv movie etc. Another downside of OWF is that character development is dead, yes it is, Fujimaya loosess her memory in the end and she remembers nothing, main character is in friendzone (as he was throughout the series)

Damn, I don't want to waste any more time on this crap.

6/10, only because of few ... cute romance settings ( wasted in the end)