Customer Reviews

Azumanga Daioh: The Complete

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Do I have qualifications for this review?? Well Yes I think so, I have seen a LOT of Anime!
If you have not seen this series yet I recommend it to you. If you are an "Action" fan then it may be a bit slow so have a peek on UTube first! then rush out and buy it!
Thats where I saw it first, it gained my immediate interest and soon I had seen all the episodes, and loved the whole lot.

I believe I have this edition, as I live in anaother country than the USA, It was released here as the six disks, in fat packs with the translator/character art booklets and all the extras on disk. Also a special "father" or "Chiyo-Dad" broach. There are 6 disks of episodes and the last disk has several "extras" including a "mini movie". I LOVE this boxset.

Like many, I have watched the English and Japanese versions, Both are great but I do enjoy the Japanese version more, it is cuter and seems more natural.

So you havent seen it? well simply put it is the story of 7 student girls, 2 female teachers and the leacherous Mr. Kimura! We follow them through 3 years of high school, to their graduation. The humor is light but enjoyable, animation is very good, the characters are drawn as not to appear 15-17 years old, but that is their supposed age. There are times their characters turn to almost exagerated stick figures as necesitated by the "moment".

The cast is: (no particular order)
Chiyo-Chan, the 10 year old prodigy, Cuteness is her fortay!,
Kagura, The not to studious but very sporty type, alway wants to compete with Sakaki
Koyomi, (Yomi) studious, smart and tends to worry about her weight.
Sakaki, Tall, clever, athletic and loves cats.
Kaorin, regular student infatuated with Sakaki.
Osaka, The space cadet! renown for her off beat non relevent statements, is good at puzzles and is a horror/ghost story fan.
Tomo, the exuberant, competiative dunce, does everything but her homework,
Miss Yukari, The home room teacher, very competative, and has to be first!
Miss Minamo the PE Teacher, the more sensible of the 2 female tachers, and Miss Yukaris friend and rival.
Mr. Kimura, the Math teacher and has self confesed "loves school girls" and is a bit of a pervert.

Quote an Osaka-ism: "You believe in ghosts when you are alone, and you smell a fart that is not yours!!"

Well this is a good view, light, entertaining and humourous and in the end a bit sad when the girls all graduate, why sad? well thats the end of the series, and you want it to keep going!! wheres episode 27?? AAAHHHHH!!

The set is now reasonably priced if you find the right retailer, the set is in large boxes, and so takes a bit of space on the shelf, but heck! it deserves heaps of real estate in my book! Has all the features of the single episode boxes, with a few extras to boot! Great value and a great Anime!

As far as the show goes I have no complaints the main problem with this set is the way the disk are packaged. Basically all six disk are stacked on top of each other which can make it a serious pain if you wanna watch later episodes because you have to take all the disk out put them to the side until you get the one you want put them back and then repeat the process if you want to put them away in order.

Episodic? Sort of. Similar to Lucky Star, the Azumanga Daioh anime is compiled from 4-panel gag manga comics of the same name; either you get the joke, or you don't. The manga is wonderful, to see it in anime is exceptional. Azumanga Daioh has also been compared to, strangely enough, the U.S. sitcom "Seinfeld", because of the episodic feel... supposedly a non-story arc affair. But realistically, the character development and day-to-day life (in this case, three years of Japanese high school) IS the story arc. The repetition of comic relief is quite intentional, this stems from the characters personalities... which makes you grow closer and founder to them. Also, like Lucky Star (and Seinfeld), what makes this series extra special is the reviewable opportunities... you don't feel weighed down by a series that is story-arc driven, this is all about the characters. No matter how many times I hear Elaine bust out "Get OUT!" on Seinfeld, it does not get old; either does this anime.

I would highly recommend viewing the anime with Japanese DUB and English subtitles... mainly because of Osaka's character. The character is from Osaka, which regionally, would be considered "down south" for us in the States. And like the English translated manga, the character is obnoxiously portrayed as being from Boston, which is a far cry... the joke in the manga, is that even though the nicknamed transfer student Osaka is from Osaka, she's expected to be cutting-edge and city-slick cool by the other students when they first meet her... but in actuality, she's quite spacey and slow on the uptake which does NOT come across in either the English translated manga or the English dubbed anime. You'll get and understand the true identity and hilariousness of Osaka by listening to the Japanese DUB with English subtitles... the original dialogue is always portrayed/delivered correctly... dub is often... lost in translation as they say.

Another treat, on a personal level, is that the characters are all Japanese girls, with dark hair and dark eyes... none of the westernized and often whitewashed look or feel of other anime character design... with bright hair and eyes of every color of the rainbow... which is still quite enjoyable, but a breath of fresh air for this anime. If you enjoy this series, I would also highly recommend Lucky Star; although much more in your face fun, it's also derived from the same 4-panel gag-style of manga and isn't story-arc necessary.

I love this anime it is one of the best anime ever. Azumanga Daioh is a very cute and happy anime and along with Lucky Star are my two favorite slice-of-life anime series. The manga (sold seperatly) is also amazing and is available in a single omnibus eddition.
My only complaint is regarding the DVD box: All six DVD's are stacked on top of each other on a single spindle, but thats OK it just makes it harder to change discs.
One of the best anime ever - In my opinion.

I'm a big fan of the Azumanga Daioh manga so I had high hopes for this show. Truth be told, I was a bit disappointed. The show had its moments, but I found that many of the jokes from the manga simply did not transfer that well from print to animation. The Azumanga Daioh anime seems to be focused on the slice-of-life aspect of the concept more than the humor. Also, many jokes are drawn out without moving on, which gets a bit annoying.

Now, this is not a bad show per se, and it certainly wasn't painful to watch. It simply fails to capture much of the charm that made the manga so great.

You know how you watch Star Wars or something else that gets your imagination going and says 'yeah, I want to be Han Solo, or Captain Kirk, or The Man With No Name, or an awesome samurai in a big robot fighting the big alien monster thing'? Perhaps this is like that, only from the other direction. Instead of getting your imagination going, it gets your heart going, and it says 'yeah, I would totally want to be friends with these girls and go on their adventures and live this kind of happy life'.

That's what this show is to me. It's like stumbling across the blog of someone who happens to be a little quirky and nerdy and funny and generally just a really good person, and you get sucked in for a few hours and learn more about them. And it's awesome. It's funny. It's worthwhile to watch, and you feel better and happier for having done so.

This is perhaps my favorite shows so far, and I've seen my fair share of anime. But I said this is one of my favorite shows, period, not just anime, but across all genres of the visual medium. It may say something that my favorite show is Fraiser. It's odd, as much as I love science fiction and superheroes and the like, when I want to sit down and just enjoy something, I turn to comedies about kind-of-everyday people in comedies. But only the exceptional ones. Azumanga Daioh is exceptional.

I absolutely love Azumanga Daioh! This was my first Splice of Life (I consider it Splice of Life) anime and my favorite. Right now I'm watching it a second time and its as funny as ever.

The show basically follows 6 unusual high school girls through thier everyday lives. What seperates Azu from most Splice of life is that the characters aren't actually cliche. Theres no Otaku, twins, or the usual formula for a Splice of Life anime. Instead you have an extremely adorable, but intellegent 10 year old girl in high school named Chiyo Chan, a energetic, knucklehead named Tomo, the absent-minded and insane Osaka, the athletic, quiet, but obsessed with cats Sakaki, the slways fighting with Tomo girl Koyomo, and last Kagura whos always rivaling the noncaring Sakaki. Don't even get me started on thier insane Teachers like Yukari whos debatingly the funniest character in the show.

I know not everyone will agree but I actually prefer the English dub from the Japenese dub. I really think they were clever when they gave Osaka a country voice because shes from the Japenese equivalent of Texas (metaphorically speaking) in this anime, so giving her the accent helps American audiences distinguesh why they treat her so weird in the beginning of the series. It was also clever when they changed some dialogue languages in the dub, for example: In one episode Chio Chans father (the biggest WTF in this show) introduces himself in Spanish instead of in English like the Japenese dub did so it'll make more sense with the English dub. I know alot of peaple love to b**** and moan about any anime being dubbed, but sometimes expecially with comedy or action anime I don't feel like rewinding to look at the visuals I missed while trying to read the dialogue and watch whats going on at the same time. It gets confusing. I also think peaple tend to over exagerate on how bad dubs are (except 4kids. Horrible-shivers-). I think Azu has a really good dub. I don't know who did the score for this show, but thier evil! I mean I can guarentee if you hear anything from this anywhere you'll instantly think Azumanga Daioh because its just that damn catchy! AHHH! I find it interesting that the opening is sung by the same girls who sung one of my favorite ending themes; the Scrapped Princess ending themes, another good anime.

Azu is extremely funny. Its strange. This show from my knowledge began as a comic strip in Japan and somehow was changed into this gem here. The show is filled with gag after gag and its done with perfect timing. Spoiler: One of my favorites, and probably the most famous scene in the show is when the girls are on vacation to Chios summer home and one of the teachers Minamo gets drunk and starts telling the ever curious girls, including the oblivious Chio Chan about the birds and the bees! LOL I think they call it the Ero-ero (naughty-naughty) scene. Its frickin hillarious! I remember I could barely breathe when it happened.

Azu also has many funny "WTF" moments. One of these is Chiyo Chans "Cookin is so Fun song". MAN!!!! I'm gonna hear that song in my sleep. Warning: Be careful. This scene is so sweet and adorible it'll give you diabetes! Anyway Azumanga Daioh is an anime well worth checking. I must warn its not for everyone, but you can tellif you like it or not by watching the first episode alone. Definately check it out.

This is a great manga/anime! If you ever need something to just pop in and laugh at, this is a great choice. All the stories are cute and enjoyable with characters you'll never forget. A great buy!

A very funny anime. The girls all have distinct personalities and are well written. The English dubbing is fine, but we like it better with Japanese voice acting and English subtitiles. A whole lot of anime at a great price.

I absolutely love this series, I loved it the first time I watched it, and I loved it just as much when I rewatched it recently. This one was one I absolutely had to add to my collection. Its quite cute but don't be fooled by appearances Id be careful watching this around children as there are quite a few more adult oriented jokes in it. Fantastic series, I would recommend it to any diehard anime fan. But if you're all about action anime this one isn't for you.