Review Episode 1 - 7
Airing date: July - ?
Studio: Studio Gokumi
Episode: 12
Genre: Comedy, school life, slice of life.
This type of genre is my favorite, if it had romance then it would of been the best, but you cant really expect to see much romance in this series where the main characters are all junior high school student. If there was any romance aspect, it'll just end up being used for a pun at the end of the episode.
Kiniro Mosaic anime is based off its 4 panel comic (yon(4) koma manga) which all tends to be gag/comedy style so as you watch the episodes they go through a lot of short jokes, no serious plots or much character development, just a show to sit back and enjoy.
Screen captures may include major spoilers, proceed with caution.
Episode 1: "...in Wonderland"「ふしぎの国の」
The story begins with Oomiya Shinobu a carefree Japanese girl who did a home-stay at a family friends place in Great Britain when she was 10 years old. There she meets Alice Cartalet a very shy timid golden haired girl. Shinobu becomes obsessed with Alice chasing her around the house scaring her giving the impression that Japanese are scary. As they spend more time together Alice gets attached to Shinobu. The night before Shinobu departs back to Japan Alice wishes to visit Japan someday. And 5 years later...
Shinobu gets an airmail from Alice, but with no progress in the English language, she cant read the letter from Alice, having her friend Komichi Aya "read" it for her. They go to their classroom and there is a new transfer student, to Shinobu's surprise the new student is none other than Alice Cartalet.
Here begins the first episode of a great series of comedy/slice of life.
Kiniro Mosaic is very cute, perhaps a little too cutesy for many. This kind of series isn't really meant for the story, but more about the interactions between the characters introduced in the series. I would have to say the voice acting parts in this episode, where they speak in English was decent compared to some of the other series that try to speak in English. I guess this comedy school life genre is quite cliche, the only difference that Kiniro Mosaic does is that it include the blond haired transfer girl from Great Britain as part of the main theme of the series. (where as in other series, the blond haired transfer students tend to end up being side characters)
Episode 2: "Even if I'm small" 「ちっちゃくたって」
Good morning, this episode starts off with Shinobu and Alice waking up, just kidding lets go back to bed again. we have new characters introduced, in this episode. As Shinobu and Alice eat breakfast (Shinobu eating jam and toast and Alice drinking miso soup) Shinobu's older sister Isami Oomiya, who is a fashion model. When the two go to school they meet up with Shinobu's two close friends; the one with the twin tail is Komichi Aya and the tall red hair girl is Inugami Yoko. Next up is their English teacher Sakurai Karasuma, who wears a jersey as her "formal" uniform. Alice see's her as a rival because the teacher gets Shinobu's attention because she is the english teacher.
This episode start off pretty funny with Alice comparing Isami as a geisha(?) and Shinobu as a kokeshi doll, which was surprisingly fitting. The introduction of Aya and Yoko were great too, Aya really reminds me of Azusa from K-on, both being the nervous character. Shinobu really loves the western culture so she really loves her English teacher, seeing that Alice gets jealous and wants to compete with the teacher to get Shinobu's attention. The gags work quite well so far, with the new introduction of the characters, so far they do a good job working off from each other.
Episode 3: "What kind of friends will I make?" 「どんなトモダチできるかな」
New episode with new character, the new transfer student who also came from Great Britain, and not only that, but is Alice's friend! Her name is Karen Kujo, who is half-British and half-Japanese. When Karen told her father (who is Japanese) that Alice moved to Japan to study, her father said how wonderful Japan is and they just decide to move there as well. Karen is admitted to a different class from Alice and Shinobu, with her broken Japanese she is still afraid of how to interact with the other students. Getting confidence from Shinobu and her friends, Karen opens up and makes a lot of friend.
Karen is a great addition to this series, probably my favorite character from this series. She's another really cute character, the way she speaks Japanese is just funny and cute. Its funny in this episode how Alice gets jealous of Karen when Shinobu gets really excited over Karen's transfer, more golden hair girls to be with. Did I mention Karen is my favorite?
Episode 4: "Aya Nervous in the Rain" 「あめどきどきあや」
This episode has a good focus on Aya the twin tailed tsun tsun character. From what it looks like Aya really likes Yoko, and that Yoko got what it looks to be a love letter in her shoe box. All through out the day Aya is really considered and is curious of what the letter contain. At the end of the school day Aya asks Yoko what the letter was about, but it seems like Yoko has forgotten about the letter, so she decided to open it and read it, the letter was from ... Shinobu asking how to say something in English. Yoko was a bit upset, but Aya felt relieved.
Great to see the interaction between Yoko and Aya, the dense minded Yoko saying things to Aya who gets the wrong idea, gets red and starts acting in tsundere mode. Karen also calls Aya "Ayaya" which I find really funny. This was another enjoyable episode with simple cute jokes here and there.
Episode 5: "Together with Onee-chan" 「おねえちゃんといっしょ」
Like the title says, together with Onee-chan (older sister). The episode with its many small jokes, has a focus on Shinobu's older sister Isami. Isami is a fashion model, kind of a cool type character, even though she's a fashion model, it looks like Shinobu still needs to work on her fashion sense according to he sister, all Shinobu wears as a fashion or even casually is western dresses. Karen becomes a fan of Isami and asks her if there is any tips on how to do fashion poses. Isami then takes the girls out to take pictures with them.
Another cute episode, but it definitely had the potential to be a better episode. The jokes this time was a little dragged out instead of having a bunch of small bit of gag here and there, it must be because they tried to focus a lot on the story with Isami, not saying that Isami is a boring character, but the way they bounced the jokes around in that part was a bit slow. Once again, this was another cute episode but it had lots of potential to be better.
Episode 6: "Golden Alice, Golden Karen" 「金のアリス、金のカレン」
This episode is divided into two parts, first part focuses on the group figuring out where to go for a break. Yoko wants to go to the Beach, Karen wants to go to the Mountain, Aya wants to stay home, eventually Karen wins over them with puppy eye face and they decide to go to the Mountains.
The next part is them going to the summer night festival, what more can you ask for than cute girls in Kimonos.
Great episode this time, When they all decide to go to the mountain, Yoko and Aya are waiting in the humid hot sun for the rest of the gang to come to the meeting spot and are blow away by Shinobu's fashion, she was wearing a very heavy layered looking dress, that was priceless. Many little jokes through out the mountain part and moving onto the night festival, don't play fire..works, at the end of the episode with Karen holding the big fireworks, was dangerously cute. Hope that they keep up the good work with the steady gags.
Episode 7: "Hungry Karen" 「はらぺこカレン」
Karen is the spot light character of this episode. In the beginning it starts off with Shinobu praising how Alice and Karen are really great at singing, so Alice and Karen do a duet, but is interjected with Shinobu adding a random noise in-between which throws off the tune. Karen goes to visit the gang with arm full of snacks that were given to her during lunch time, Karen then goes on talking about how everyone tends to give her a lot of food, then Alice says that She will get fat if she keeps this up and Karen vows to stop getting food from everyone. This episode has lots of dieting and exercising related gags.
Interesting episode, but wasn't the best episode, there were some reused jokes from other 4koma comedy school manga's, but that's not surprising because it'll be impossible to not use reused jokes because every series has used them. I still have to say they did a good job with making some new jokes with the cliche dieting stories. Still can't wait for the next episode.
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