Seitokai no Ichizon

Name: Seitokai no Ichizon
Genre: Comedy
Released: 2009-10-03T00:00:00+00:00
Rating: 7.3

Student Council's Discretion

生徒会の一存

7.3(86,010)

Rank#3027

#1335

TV12 ep.Finished Airing24 min per ep

Imagine living life as the vice president of the student council, passing the days eating snacks, playing games, and bonding with a harem of beautiful girls. This is exactly the kind of life that high school student Ken Sugisaki leads, or so he thinks! Usually, the officers of Hekiyou Academy's student council are elected by popular vote, but an additional position is granted to the student who scores the highest on the exams. Ken, who historically has had below average grades, worked hard to improve them to be accepted into the student council, with the ultimate goal of surrounding himself with girls who fawn over him. Unfortunately for the vice president, things do not go quite as planned. Not only do the ladies of the council continually rebuff his advances, they also prefer to focus on more important and "boring" activities, such as organizing school events and managing the other clubs. But a few minor hurdles like these won't stop Ken from chasing after his dreams, even if they seem a bit ridiculous. [Written by MAL Rewrite]

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KaminaKai

December 24, 2009

Recommended

*Hekiou Academy Student Council Meeting Log* “… I am Kaicho (president), I am KaichoO! By the way, does the president do anything?” – excerpt from episode 11’s ending theme. What happens when four pretty girls and one handsome guy spend most of their school time everyday in a confined room? Naughty thoughts aside, if you were thinking “oh my god, not another harem” then you were right! Seitokai no Ichizon is NOT a harem, strictly speaking (though our male protagonist tries very hard to make it so). In reality the poor dude gets bully by his female mates more than he ever deserves. So who mightthis anime be good for? If you are looking for a parody that pokes fun at itself and the entire anime industry in general, then Seitokai no Ichizon will surely meet and most likely exceed your expectation! In fact not only does it do a good job with the too-frequent parodies, but with high quality animation, and impressive new ending themes every episode, Seitokai no Ichizon is a great anime for all ages. The story of Seitokai no Ichizon centers around the everyday “adventure” of the student council in Hekiyou Gakuen high school. Its setting primarily consists of one place, the student council room, although exceptions do occur in the show from time to time. Now you must be wondering, what can a show that limits itself to one cramped room has to offer? Surprisingly the answer is, plenty. With plenty of jokes and plenty of parodies targeted at other recent well known anime, there is never one boring moment in the show for viewers to complain about. Even if the story itself does not attract the viewers enough due to its random episodic events, but by combining the story with the character interactions, nice consistent animation, superb voice acting, and addictive soundtracks and theme songs, Seitokai no Ichizon has some of the deadliest combination to make it stand on its own ground. It was interesting for the characters to repeatedly admit that “nothing ever happens” in their show. And yet they never fail to entertain the viewers with what they can do to make the show appealing solely by chatting. In fact, it is hard to judge these characters in any normal anime standard because they are out of the ordinary. As the casts themselves have put it, “This is where we end after airing twelve episodes? … The main character is supposed to mature after a time (but) … nothing changed.”. They poke fun at their own lack of character growth, but in actuality most characters have had their fair share of developments through learning about each others’ past or family problems. The characters certainly made a positive impact to the overall success of Seitokai no Ichizon due to their unpredictability. The animation is nothing but greatness. The characters are very nicely designed and even the one and only classroom is very detailed in design with a large variety of decorations and hidden rooms. Fluid scene to scene transition, consistent high quality animation, and a great choice of “scenery” also made Seitokai no Ichizon very attractive to the eyes. Additionally, comedic-like faces on the characters whenever a random chat start appearing also helps crack people up. The animation definitely is another strong point that makes up for the lack of story. At first I was very skeptical with the seiyu in this show because all the main female leads are apparently voiced by rookies. Yes, they are ALL rookies. New to the anime industry, these female seiyu all tried exceptionally hard to make themselves stand out as a bright star. Unfortunately they were all excellent in voicing their roles so I could not say who seem to be the most talented (unlike in other shows where one can clearly tell some seiyu just don’t go well with the particular role at all). It is, however, quite clear that these voices bring life to the characters in the series and bring entertainment to the viewers. Special honorary mention goes to the ending themes. Whether they are good or not, one must admit it was creative of the producers to make a unique ending song (same rhythm different lyrics) for each episode thus resulting in a total of TWELEVE ending themes. Even without the lyrics (and I strongly urge you not to miss them), the songs in itself is tremendously addictive. In fact, I could dance around my room all day with the song set on repeat in my computer. The opening, while less catchy, is still very pleasant to hear and once again it showed us the talents these new seiyu possess. Seitokai no Ichizon is a wonderful addition to the anime industry and made itself stood out among the mist of millions of other similar anime largely due to its parody at poking fun at itself and everything anime-related. The jokes are never too old or too repetitive throughout the show and the references are relatively simple to grasp (provided you are semi-familiar with recent anime). Keep in mind the show is made in Japan and is intended for Japanese viewers who most likely have a more knowledgeable database of the anime series in Japan than we do. If you don’t seem to be able to spot a parody or two in an episode, chances are, you have already missed out on some of the jokes they are making fun of. In that case, you should reconsider whether to continue watching the series or not. Lastly I would recommend anyone who have trouble at school, whether it is your grade or having trouble making friends, to try playing love simulation games (ie. harem games)!

Skadi

January 31, 2010

Mixed Feelings

Parody and comedy are a staple genre in the anime world and sometimes can be hit or miss. This is because to truly understand parody you have enough experience with the things that are being parodied. As a foreigner to Japan and the majority of its culture, a great deal of this goes over my head as it would a foreigner trying to understand some of the humor from my own country. All of that being said some things are universally funny in comedy and that brings us to Seitokai no Ichizon, an anime that forgets to deliver the most important elementa comedy must have... humor. There isn’t any real story in Ichizon. The episodes are loosely tied together for the most part and center on the exploits of a high school student council. While shows revolving around clubs and student councils are quite common, initially Ichizon appeared to be unique. However the freshness of the series quickly wanes as I found just getting through each new episode was somehow a test of my patience and sanity. I really wanted to like this series as well but as it went on and on I found it more torturous to watch. Is Ichizon bad anime? Not really. It’s just incredibly boring anime. And that is the main problem it has. Let’s begin with the humor. The parody and comedy is way too forced and thus doesn’t have any flow to it. It’s almost as if the writers thought the more anime and culture references they could pile in the funnier people would think it was without any regard to whether or not the jokes were actually, well funny. Just because I can recognize that something is being lampooned or a joke is being told doesn’t mean it’s funny. Sure there were many things I did find amusing and a few that I actually did laugh out loud at, but for the most part Ichizon is humorless and clichéd. The other main issue with the series as a whole is its claustrophobic setting. 90% of the series takes place in the student council room. Even when they do leave the confines of that room then they soon seal themselves up in yet another small room. Had the jokes and parody actually been funny, this might not have been such a problem but each episode is mostly just the five of them sitting around a table screaming, talking at the speed of light, or spouting whatever cliché or stereotype their personality type is based on. The ending is also rather bizarre. While Ichizon by its own admission doesn’t take itself very seriously, the rather somber and serious nature of some of the last few episodes felt very much out of place. For something was all about randomness and silliness this was a strange course to take. It's a bit ironic that these episodes were actually the best ones in the series, which makes you wonder how much better it could have been as a whole if it had worked on developing the plot to lead up to them. Among Ichizon's characters, only Sugisaki Ken stands out in any way. With most harem type shows the male lead is usually the dullest and most uninteresting character in the show. Not so in Ken's case as he manages to carry the series by himself. Pretty much the only times I really laughed was because of something he said or did. The various girls of the council all have their own quirks but they all miss the same thing, actual personality. Sure they were all adorable and cute to look at but each of them had two or three personality traits that were just used over and over making each of them less substantive than cotton candy. Artistically I found the characters to be very pretty and the styles and costumes were appealing. However because the series is set in a rather dull and plain club room that means there is little in the way of backgrounds and that makes the show as a whole to seem more drab and uninteresting than it really should have been. So while I found the art and animation to be very good, its setting brings it down much as it did with the story. What I did find refreshing was an almost totally fresh faced seiyuu cast. In a time when the same dozen or so actors are reused ad nauseum it is really nice to hear some new blood. That being said the performances really aren’t that strong and in the end sound just like what we are used to hearing already. The music is fluffy and cute and not all that interesting. Though some of the ending remixes were funny, particularly the one from episode 11. Ichizon in the end is disposable anime. Its worth a few laughs and then meant to be throw away. I doubt that anyone in a couple of years will even remember this show even existed. Its a real shame since as I said before, I really wanted to like it. While I don’t think it’s really terrible and maybe overall not quite as bad as I rated it, it was so boring and unenjoyable that it was painful to complete. If you are fairly new to anime or haven’t seen more than a couple hundred shows you might find this to be pretty good. For the more experienced viewer though, Seitokai no Ichizon is likely to be a disappointment.

Archaeon

December 26, 2009

Mixed Feelings

You know, Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuutsu has a lot to answer for. For a while there it felt like anime, as a medium, had decided to be a bit more inventive, a bit more creative. Hope is a great thing, no? To be fair, what happened next wasn't really the fault of SHnY, but the damage was already done. Beginning with Lucky Star, which was a pretty good comedy for the most part, the slippery slope of formulaic school based parody shows with a supposedly eclectic set of characters who literally do nothing rapidly became a tiresome methodology, with numerous shows following this trend until theadvent of Seitokai no Ichizon (The Student Council's Discretion). The story is based on a series of light novels, published from January 2008, by Aoi Sekina (with illustrations by Inugami Kira). Now one would think that an adaptation of a novel would have a bit more depth to it, but Seitokai no Ichizon seems to follow only one path - try to please as many people as possible. It's no surprise then that the show really struggles with plot coherency and development, especially as, barring a particularly dull sub plot, there isn't really any point to the story. The whole series is set, for the most part, within the confines of the Student Council Office, and while this may at first appear to be an orginal approach, one should remember that SHnY, amongst others, had very similar settings. The big problem with confining the story to a specific area is that there is a only so much the writers can do to develop the plot. Thankfully (maybe), Seitokai no Ichizon doesn't really try to develop what little plot it has, and is content to follow the path set by Lucky Star - lots of parodies, sketches and jokes while the characters do nothing. Now, one could consider the comedy in this show to be funny, and some of it actually is, but the fact remains that much of the humour has actually been done better in other shows (or do I need to mention Gintama). In addition to this, the series makes a great show of trying to get the audience involved, a bit like a really bad Christmas pantomime, but this effort begins to cool after the first few episodes. Instead of going down the route of actually showing how a typical student council works, and adding humour to that premise, Seitokai no Ichizon travels at breakneck speed towards one of the most pointless and inconclusive outcomes I've ever seen. In all honesty, the one saving grace the series has in terms of it's story and plot is that I found some of the jokes to be funny, but even that wore off pretty quickly. Now don't get me wrong here. There isn't anything specifically wrong with Seitokai no Ichizon per se, especially as there have been other shows that have little to no back story, and arecompletely relian on parody, humour and audience partcipation. However, this shouldn't come at the cost of the characters, ir even of the humour itself, and it's unfortuante that the series has fallen into that trap. While the show resoundingly denies that it's a harem anime, the tried and tested stereotypes are available throughout the story, and the series has the feeling of being written by someone who really does believe they know what the audience wants, even when it comes to looks. That's right. Seitokai no Ichizon is very clearly on the moe bandwagon, especially when it comes to character designs. From the fiery tempered tsundere to the outspoken loli. From the silent but deadly hot chick, to the shy and withdrawn bundle of cuteness. This series makes no bones about who it's target audience is, and it targets that market with a certain degree of ruthlessness. That said, there hasn't really been a lot of thought as to how the characters should look. The presentation is that same, tiresome, fanservice tinged moe that that makes up up over half of the school based comedies around to date. While the presentation is pretty decent, one can't help but wonder why the cast doesn't feature anyone with any kind of physical blemish. The backgrounds and backdrops also follow a similarly over-simplistic style, espcially as most of the show is set in the student council office. As for animation, well, it's actually pretty good, especially during the parodies. The choregrpahy and animation design isn't the greatest, however it does serve it's purpose in that the whole show is simply a joke delivery system, and as such, there isn't really any need for top quality animation and CG. The characters move reasonably well for the most part, however the series looks and feels very similar to a host of others, and that is one of it's biggest problems. In terms of sound, Seitokai no Ichizon isn't too bad really. The OP, a boppy little J-Pop track called "Treasure", is sung by most of the cast and, aside from being fairly well chorepgraphed, is nothing to write home about. The ED, on the other hand, is where things get a little more interesting as the series features a variety of ending themes that are sung by at least two members of the cast. That said, they're still forgettable J-Pop songs. Acting-wise, the show is reaonably well represented, especially as the four main female leads are relative newcomers to anime. Given that fact, it wouldn't actually be unreasonable to assume that the entire show is nothing more than a platform to launch their respective careers (it's been done before after all). That said, there is some merit to their, and the rest of the cast's, performances as the characters, barring one or two annoying voices, are pretty well portrayed for this type of show. As for the characters themselves, well, where do I begin? The fact that this is an epsiodic parody harem comedy should give you a hint as to what you should expect. While the series is extremely moe-centric, the characters are all nothing more than stereotypes of the first order and, while they are reasonably good in that respect, at the end of the day that's all they are. The show tries to add some deeper meaning to the characters, especially to Sugisaki Ken, but these efforts don't fit in to the plot in any substantial manner, and serve as nothing more than distractions from the comedy. The characters don't develop in any manner that is both plausible, and in keeping with the story, and this is the main reason why the series is so reliant on the comedy content. There will be those who laud Seitokai no Ichizon for a number of perfectly valid reasons, and in certain respects it's a good series to watch. It's quirky, humourous, and somewhat engaging, and I will freely admit that it managed to make me chuckle, especially with Mafuyu's burning passion for BL. That said, the series could easily have taken things one step futher by throwing out all the stereotypes and going for something truly original as the parody would have had far more impact in that way. It's a shame then, that the show tries to take the more satirical path and tie it to parody as the two don't easily mesh, so what's left is a mish-mash of jokes and sketches that jump from one to another like a frog on a hot rock, and coherency is the first to fall victim to the lacklustre plot. All in all, this isn't a bad show, but it's not really a shining example either. Fans of shows like Lucky Star, Hyakko, PaniPoni Dash, and even SHnY, may find the series enjoyable, but may also find that much of the humour is a bit flat, or has been done better elsewhere. It's sad to say, but those who haven't had the opportunity to watch this type of series before may find this far enjoyable. It all depends on one's perspective. On the whole, this isn't the best example of a parody anime. Gintama, Lucky Star, even Jungle wa Itsumo Hale Nochi Guu, give parody it's due, and use the gags in unusual and original ways. Seitokai no Ichizon, on the other hand, tends to stick to formula, and it's efforts to try and please everyone is the main reason why the show is as mediocre as it isl.

TragicRomance

December 29, 2011

Recommended

"What happens when you have 4 beautiful girls,a good-looking guy,a student council,parodies & comedy?Yes,you are right,the answer is HAREM,oh,no I mean Seitokai no Ichizon.This anime is a parody so you better be prepared before you watch this anime.Watch other anime it parodies or else you won't understand the jokes in a better way" (Story:-8/10) There isn't a linear plot in this anime i.e. each episode begins & ends randomly.The student council consists of 5 members.The first 4 student council members are chosen by votes.The top four who get most votes gets to be in the student council while 5th spot is for the student who gets mostgrades.We have our 4 beautiful girls Aka-chan,Mafuyu,Chizuru & Minatsu who got their positions due to being well-liked by everyone while Ken who got in council simply by his hard work & good marks but his reason of joining it or more like the motivation of all of the study he did is........only to form a harem.Sounds pretty generic,doesn't it?but it isn't.In fact it is better than most of harem anime I have seen. Almost the whole show occurs in a simple room which is obviously student council where all the members have fun almost all the time & do work only if they really have to do it.Afterall,They are not a ordinary student council.The majority of the show is spent in doing parodies of other anime like Lucky star,Suzumiya haruhi,Death Note,etc with reference of some others like baka test. There are also Mafuyu's crazy yaoi fantasies like she wants Ken to end up with her imaginative Nakameguro-kun or with his nii-san,who of course do not exist.These parts are really funny & you will be laughing really hard even if you are against yaoi. Often Ken mentions this student council to be a place of his dreams,a harem only to be beaten up or to be shut up by the girls.There is also a journalism club that likes to degrade council by spreading false news lead by Lilicia but that is only for comedic reasons. 8/10 since the plot is very random. Art:-(9/10) The art of this anime is very clean & beautiful.It is not rushed & each area is explained carefully.The characters designs are also drawn beautifully & they look awesome. The backgrounds are also very impressive.Since most of this anime occurs in a single room so I am amazed how they end up not making this room look boring.Most of time is spend in student council so it is described very well.There are also some scenes outside of the school & they still manage to do it impressively. There isn't a moment in this anime where I found the characters' proportions weird plus I don't think so that I have seen this much of a single room before,lol. So,9/10 for its awesomeness:) Sound:-(9/10) Opening & ending songs do not feel anything memorable when you hear them for the very very first time but they will gradually grew in you,especially the ending song.The opening song may sound boring at first but by the end of it you will be already trying to download it.The ending song is actually one of my favorite.It is very funny especially "I am Kaichou" one is awesome & you will be laughing very hard. I didn't noticed the BGMS very much since I was too busy laughing but the ones I noticed were nice.They are suitable to the mood the scene is trying to give. Voice acting is done very well.All of the female voice actors have done a good job.I especially liked Ken's voice actor.He has put great effort on his flirty side.Even when he cries,it almost feels like he is really crying.You can see the effort being put into it. Character:-(10/10) Now this is the department where this anime truly shines.At first you think that "Oh no,this anime consists of usual archetypes." but as you see more of it you realize that are different & are explained rather well,a thing some other anime lacks.It feels like all of them can understand each other.Even the side - characters in this series are not boring. Chizuru is a sadist who is very mature but there is an evil side to her.She loves teasing others as much as she loves our main heroine aka chan. Aka chan...is well....aka chan,the usual bubbly,loli & childish kid,errr,I mean girl(sorry aka chan)who wants to make the student council the best one in the world. Have you ever seen a tomboy who is good in maths or any other subjects?If not then you will see here.Minatsu is a tomboy who is good at maths.She likes action manga & is the strongest one in the group.Also she has a bit of yuri taste(I didn't really wanted to say it,err....anyways). Mafuyu may seem like the usual underclassman who is kind to other but can't make friends but here comes the difference.Even if she can't make friends she doesn't care about it,She is not like the usual,"Oh,I can't make friends" type of girls she is different because she doesn't care about it & is happy with her seitokai friends.Her BL love is absolutely entertaining. The main character,Ken himself isn't boring either.In fact he is the most interesting main character in an harem or in this case HAREM-LIKE anime I have seen.Ken is a KINDHEARTED pervert who likes to play H-games & wants to make student council his harem simply because he loves happy endings due to an incident involving his girlfriend(I won't spoil it for you further) I like how the creator has took risks on her/his characters but they have come out really well.10/10 for this outstanding choice. Overall/Enjoyment:-(10/10) You will really enjoy it since enjoyment is one of the prime factors of this series.You will love the comedy & the jokes in this series.This is one of the best comedy series out there after all.If you can handle the little yaoi moments here & there then you will absolutely love it.Also remember to watch other anime before which it parodies to get a better idea of what is happening. Have fun & enjoy!!!^_^

Seitokai no Ichizon

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