Yuru Yuri San☆Hai!

The Yuru Yuri series is by far one of the more popular and well-known Shoujo Ai series to exist in Japanese media. Taking the simple concept of a high school comedy and mixing in its own unique characters, the series as a whole has become well known in the anime community. But with it's third season, a lot of that luster seems to have faded over time, and with TYO Animation taking the reins this time in production instead of Doga Kobo leading to some...unexpected results.

Story: The story of Yuru Yuri still maintains the same general plotline, featuring out four main girls, Kyouko, ... Yui, Akari, and Chinatsu spending time in their signature clubhouse as the Amusement Club, spending more time together with all of the other characters in the series and generally creating a lot of wackiness and moments that make the show so memorable and great. That however is not the case this time around.

As a result of the production company change, this season feels a lot more disjointed and watered down from the original. While a great number of the things from the previous seasons when the series was produced by Doga Kobo crossed over, such as Sakurako and Himewari's breast warfare, Chinatsu's fangirling over Yui, and Kyouko's extremely bubbly and Kyouko-like manner, a couple of the more signature things about the series before like some extremely wacky scenarios and most predominantly the lack of the vanishing "Akarin~" gag just don't exist in this season. In fact, I will go as far as to say that the show as a whole lost a lot of its charm and felt a lot more standard and normal than it should've been.

The show does bounce back a little bit by having several characters grow in development in this season, but it's not as noticeable as a lot of the 'development' happens with the side characters that get far less screentime than they deserved. Not to mention some characters feel different than they were previously in previous seasons. (Cue Mari, who feels more child-like to her previously smart appearances.)

All in all, while this season of Yuru Yuri was by no means bad, a lot of what made the Yuru Yuri series great just didn't feel like it was there or was blocked off by Chinatsu's excessive fangirling. (Seriously though, they go overboard with the whole Yui-worshipping thing. Far more than they should've.) It just felt too normal, and normality is not something that I expected from this show.

Overview:
+ Same Yuru Yuri plotline
- A lot of the old format is missing or watered down
- Lack of some iconic gags

Characters: Characters in Yuru Yuri are still present and accounted for. We still have the main four girls, Akari, Kyouko, Yui, and Chinatsu. There's still the student council consisting of Rise (who gets FAR too little screentime. Even less than before), Ayano, Himawari, Sakurako, and Chitose, and the other girls that come in and out of the screen whenever they need to.

One of my complaints about the characters is that there are some that don't really show up or are so pointless to the series that they never show up. This includes Akari's sister, Chitose, who only shows up 3/4 of the way into the series, Nishikagi, and the whole Mirakurun cast. While they were never the most vital characters in the series, it was a bit sad to see already pronounced and known characters be shoved even further into the background. They were a part of what I felt made Yuru Yuri more exciting as a series and as such, contributed to the lack of spark that this season has.

Overview:
+ Main cast is all here and accounted for
- The more side characters get little to no screentime and are mostly absent from the series

Art: As I mentioned before, Yuru Yuri's third season was produced by TYO Animation instead of the two previous seasons' makers, Doga Kobo. As such, the artwork for San Hai is a lot duller in comparison to the brighter and more colorful artwork that the characters had before.

While the characters looks the same in terms of design, the color palette just isn't all the bright, as the normal colors of the characters are muted to look a bit grayer than normal, and the lack of exaggerated comedic effect doesn't really happen here. Akari's buns don't pop off, we don't get too many stylistic changes in order to show off a more comedical moment, or anything like that. It just feels a bit bland and odd.

Overview:
+ Characters look the same
- The different color palette and lack of comedic appearance made the show look more bland.

Sound: The sound for Yuru Yuri isn't really something that I found to ever really be all that exciting. The opening and the ending of this season are both songs that reflect the show's general excitable and energy-filled feel, but don't really have much of a place in anime as a memorable soundtrack. They both pretty much sound the same and while are good, aren't really tracks that I found to be worth remembering.

Overview:
+ Good soundtrack
- Not really all that memorable

Personal Enjoyment: While Yuru Yuri was never really my first go to choice when it came to watching a high school comedy about 4 girls (because lord knows we have plenty of those), this season just felt a bit like a disappointment. Not only because of the lack of Akarin (seriously, what happened to that gag? I want it back!) but because the show didn't feel the same as it did before.

Did I like this anime?

I'll admit, it was still rather fun to watch. Kyouko makes the world go round and all of her antics make up Yuru Yuri, so I'm happy to see that she still takes the spotlight and moves the plot forward as much as she can.

What didn't I like about this anime?

Aside from the lack of appearance for a lot of cast members and a lot of comedic changes since they relied mostly on comedic retorts and Kyouko antics for the majority of the series, the one thing I was not happy about was how much they focused on Chinatsu. As a character, Chinatsu's entire schtick was the fact that she wanted Yui-senpai to notice her. As such, the show focused what I felt like an excessive amount of time on her and her gag and not really on others as much. This created an imbalance that I personally was not too keen on.

Would I recommend this anime?

If you've seen any of Yuru Yuri, I would say tread lightly on this one. Because the production change made so many things different in the series, I'm a bit on the fence as to suggesting this for Yuru Yuri fans, especially those familiar with the anime. While it still is the same base concept and the same characters, there's just something about it that feels off when watching it.

After watching the first two seasons of Yuru Yuri, I was really excited about the third one, and watched it as soon as I finished the second season. The problem turned out to be the show took a very different route, and failed in its purpose.

So the first season established some funny inside jokes and good character description, so it made the show funny and cute, which are a very good combo. The second season continued the things that made the first season a success, but added some relationships to promote the yuri aspect of it, making it all the better. We see relationships form, ... and progress throughout the season.

However, the third season breaks this trend - it is decided that all the inside jokes should stop, and change the pace of the season completely separate to the first two, making it more slice of life, and less Yuru Yuri.

I definitely see why they did it - they decided to focus on the "yuri" aspect of it, which is definitely welcome. However, adding a few extra yuri scenes doesn't really cut it for me, because we see almost no development of the relationship, and instead get frustrated by the encounters. Because it took the serious route, it lost all of the original Yuru Yuri touch, and it failed at being serious with no character development, which caused the whole season to fail. I forced myself to watch it because I really hoped it got better, but except for one episode, it was really boring.

However, the worst part was Chinatsu. I get that some people might like how she loves her senpai Yui, and she does some crazy things to get her attention. Although I find it cringey, I get that some people like it, and it was pretty chill throughout the whole thing, so I largely wrote it off and continued to enjoy the show. However, I felt like most of the time that was the ONLY thing happening, and by god did it get annoying. We just have this girl getting close to raping Yui and being super cringe about it, and basically ruining everybody's day with it. I mean, I was hoping somebody would beat her up or kick her out or something, but alas, it did not happen.

Although the rest of what I said really added to lowering the rating of this show, the Chinatsu thing was just awful. I was dying of boredom and fury at the end for her even existing. If you didn't really like her, you should never watch this season or you will be very disappointed.

My main reason for writing a review for this show is because it is an absolute DISGRACE this got higher ratings than both previous seasons, because it doesn't compare to the enjoyment of the first two. They were funny, cute, and full of yuri. This was boring, completely threw away the idea of Yuru Yuri, and failed at having any significant impacting yuri. You cannot just change the pace of the show like that - it just broke the flow of the show.

If you really liked Yuru Yuri, I would probably recommend because it will keep you awake at night if you don't finish it, but it's something that you can easily skip, especially if you didn't enjoy the series much.

The third season of Yuru Yuri provides the same energetic, light-hearted and comedic elements that the sitcom franchise made itself known for, with the addition of better visual quality compared to previous seasons. The appealing art, uplifting music soundtrack and the clashing of diverse personalities in comic, hyperactive or endearing ways succeed at conveying several common purposes shared by all characters of Yuru Yuri, such as amusement, having fun and happiness itself. The Girls Love elements of Yuru Yuri's third season, along with the primarily female cast, continue to present an aspect of division among the audience, however, it has the potential to provide a ... humorous entertainment for anyone looking for a light-hearted comedy.