| Doki Doki School Hours #3 |
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| Tuesday, 12 December 2006 | |
 Four more episodes of fun from Okitsu High - well, three from the school and one from Kyoto, as the gang head off on their annual field-trip. Between graduation speeches, mentoring student teachers and the horror of having to lead summer clubs, poor Mika-sensei's barely getting a chance for a rest...9 - The Tearful Graduation Ceremony It's graduation time at Okitsu, and even though it's not her students that are graduating, Mika-sensei's depressed - not about any of the students who are leaving, but because she's been asked to take charge of the graduation ceremony. That means having to speak in front of a crowd - and that's something she really doesn't want to do. Fortunately, her students are on hand to help her out - but whatever they do just seems to make matter worse. A hayfever attack doesn't help matters, either...   10 - The Kyoto Field Trip Incident of Love and Hate! It's field-trip time for Mika and her class, who are off to Kyoto - it's almost as hard for Mika's dad to handle her absence as it is for Mika to handle her students, especially when Kobayashi's been left in charge of arranging the activities. Her choices of sightseeing destinations become a minor problem, though, compared to the disappearance of Seki and Iincho...   11 - Sunshine After Rain, Partially Student Teacher Mika's been assigned a student teacher to supervise for their two-week placement. Her students are determined to find out as much about the new teacher as possible, but since Mika hasn't been given much detail herself yet they've only got their imagination to work with. That's enough to send some people over the edge (Nakayama's already convinced her beloved Watabe's planning on running off with her), but the fun really begins when Hori-sensei arrives...   12 - Horror of Midsummer's Extracurricular Activity Mika has a minor miracle on her hands when none of her class fail their final exams - meaning there are no summer make-up classes for her to lead during the holidays. Yay! Nothing to do with Mika-sensei's exam being too easy, no. Her summer reprieve soon gets put on hold, though, when she's assigned to look after the soccer, cooking and manga summer clubs - there's the small matter of the Okitsu Curse, which promises that a Terrible Fate will befall the teacher who supervises one of the clubs. No-one can quite remember which club is supposed to be the cursed one, but what if it's one of Mika's..?   Fairly typical batch of episodes for this release - if you enjoyed the first two volumes, there's nothing here that will really change your opinion, although the episodes slip into fantasy-land once or twice (most noticably the detective scenes during the Kyoto episode) which is a new gimmick. The only real problem is that some of the gags are beginning to wear out a little, especially if you watch the whole disc at once - there are only so many times Seki can turn up in girls clothes, or Kudo can have a nosebleed over Suetake, before it starts to become a little stale. Watching the episodes 1-per-week, as you would if it was on TV, would probably help overcome that problem, though. Horie-sensei's arrival does mix things up a little, even if just for the one episode, as it adds a new character to the mix and gives the existing ones something different to bounce off, so that episode was probably the disc's highlight. Nakayama also hasn't been on the scene long enough to really get into a rut, either, and her appearances always bring a smile to my face, even if poor Watabe doesn't feel the same way. This isn't a disc that you can really write much about - a common problem with this sort of light comedy, as there's no real story to it. Personally, I love it, even though the jokes are beginning to get a bit tired - something to be worried about for the remaining volumes, maybe, but not really an issue here. I love the characters, I enjoy the humour, so Doki Doki gets a thumbs-up from me. Depending on your sense of humour, though, your mileage may vary...  |
