Review of AHO-GIRL

Aho-girl is a series I nearly gave up on after the first two episodes - it's a 4-koma adaptation with short episodes and very random, sometimes outright dumb humour. The titular character, "idiot girl" named Yoshiko, is often more annoying than funny and her writing only at rare occasions reaches the witty and surprising qualities I would expect from a series in this formula. However, the more action focuses on the supporting cast and the protagonist Akkun, the more compelling it becomes. After five episodes, I have to admit that I had some decent laughs and even enjoyed re-watching earlier episodes while knowing a bitmore context to the story and roles certain characters would take on later.

Some reviews here points to Akkuns "violence" against Yoshiko (and rarely other women) and interprets the show as misogynist - I think it's an obvious misreading, as all those scenes are in the formula of slapstick comedy and shouldn't be taken literally. There's also a bit of sexual humour, with Yoshiko trying to "seduce" Akkun in various, absurd ways, but I find it all less questionable than typical fanservice in many comedy anime titles (and here it's always part of the gag rather than actual fanservice). Parts of the humour might be off-putting to some, but I think it would be unfair to reject the whole series based on those fragments and I personally didn't mind them, outside of the somewhat-gross last episode.

In general, I was very much sceptical about this series when I first encountered it, but I think that later in the season it really starts working well as a quick, absurd comedy it's ought to be. It's not for everyone and I was still sometimes disappointed by the quality of the writing, but it was also able to positively surprise me with some more creative gags. It might not be a must-watch, but still worth giving it a try, at least to find whether its kind of over-the-top absurdity appeals to you.