Review of AHO-GIRL

Hidden beneath the antics, the one-liners, and the pop culture references, Aho Girl’s goal is obvious even to the untrained eye; it desires your attention. “Look at me! Look at me!” Aho Girl screams, waving its arms and jumping about in a frenzied, excessive, and desperate manner. In doing so, this show has managed to not only work but endear itself to the audience as well. Quite a few seasonal viewers have been smitten over this show and, at first glance, it’s easy to see why. Aho Girl is energetic. It’s straightforward. And it’s occasionally charming. However, Aho Girl is also painful to watch. First andforemost, this show is simply not funny. For Aho Girl, which largely subdues its aesthetics in an effort to emphasize its writing, this is a severely damaging flaw. Aho Girl fancies itself an extravagant comic extraordinaire yet it never fully ventures into the absurd; it’s as if Aho Girl is frightened of abandoning its slice-of-life roots and as a result is rather hesitant of displaying signs of vivaciousness. The instances where its comic genius sparks to life are memorable in their own right (the homage to the Power Rangers, in particular) but they are few and far between. It hardly helps that Aho Girl, like most mediocre comedies, is obsessed with explaining the jokes to you; with every act of mischief, there’s not only a character (read: the “self-insert”) elaborating on the details of said act but there are also occasional cues from Aho Girl itself that tell you how the act was intended to be funny. As this show can attest to, even comedies can be guilty of infodumping.

From the first episode, Aho Girl is engaged in a war against common sense. This is a show that prides itself in its intentional stupidity; for Aho Girl, lapses in judgment and instances of in-the-moment logic are par for the course. A carefree attitude and general acts of silliness are a major source of this show’s appeal. That said, Aho Girl underwhelms when it attempts a serious approach; it’s as if the show doesn’t understand its audience. Most viewers appreciate Aho Girl because of its slapstick humor, because of the amusing eyecatches, because of its short runtime and, yes, because of the fanservice. I doubt that these viewers picked up Aho Girl for the half-baked, insipid, and monotonous moments of insight that ultimately result in little but wasted time. These moments of insight are not only executed poorly but their suitability is subpar; Aho Girl tends to observe the most trivial matters, like a low score on a quiz, and overexert itself when it should be focusing on the more important problems, like the abusive relationship at the center of it all.

Every problem that arises from Aho Girl stems from the disastrous dynamic between its protagonists; it’s the repugnant elephant in the room that Aho Girl’s fanbase has condoned, glossed over, neglected, and outright ignored at times. The cast members are defined by a single trait but no cast member has as damaging a trait as Akuru Akutsu (the “self-insert”) and Yoshiko Hanabatake (the show’s poster girl). Yoshiko’s defining trait is idiocy while Akuru’s is anger; while Yoshiko compensates for her lack of intellect with a can-do attitude, Akuru offers little outside of his constant rage. There have been plenty of characters similar to Akuru, like Last Exile’s Alex Row, that have provided substance, versatility and growth to their cast beyond their brooding tendencies and hair-trigger temper. Akuru, however, is feeble in comparison; he makes little effort to express himself beyond screaming matches and physical abuse. When he encounters a problem, Akuru explodes. When his friend attempt helping him, Akuru becomes spiteful; he insults, he torments, he belittles, he punches, he kicks, and he hurls expletives at his friends simply because he perceives them as annoying. Sure, Akuru apologizes once in a while but he never bothers to change. Honestly, why should he? The other cast members, specifically Yoshiko, and Aho Girl itself by proxy have long since accepted this as rational behavior. That the show has treated Akuru’s abusive tendencies as a gimmick, that the show’s fanbase has little reaction to it, is sickening to me.

There is a place in this world for Aho Girl, where it can exist without scrutiny of any sort. Aho Girl has established itself and thrived in GIFs, in Vines, in reaction videos, in memes and in the Weird Side of YouTube. It is there that Aho Girl’s positive traits can flourish. However, under any sort of analysis, Aho Girl not only leaves you unsatisfied but more than a little repulsed as well. This show, allergic to depth and disgusted by morality, is at best mildly amusing and at worst one of the biggest disgraces of a thoroughly mediocre season. Aho Girl makes a spectacle of itself - presenting faux-meaningful observations; idolizing its vapid female lead; overindulging in panty shots; deploying one tired, overused cliché after another (the sister complex, among others); and fishing for attention - while accomplishing absolutely nothing in the end. While its peers in the comedy genre have pushed boundaries, expanded horizons, enlightened its fans, and revolutionized the medium, Aho Girl has contributed little beyond munching on bananas.