Haganai Season 1 Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack Review
“Haganai” is a solid character centric anime series.
“Haganai: I Don’t Have Many Friends” is a 13 episode anime series (the last episode being an OVA) that revolves around a seemingly strange new transfer high school student named Kodaka. We soon learn that Kodaka has yet to make any friends due to the fact that he made a bad first impression on his first day of school. Luckily, things change when he meets a fellow classmate named Yozora who he sees talking to an imaginary friend. Kodoka approaches Yozora and the two lonely souls hit it off (sort off). Yozora also winds up roping in Kodoka into creating a school club called The Neighbors Club. The club’s goal is for students (including themselves) to make new friends. Naturally, over the course of the season, new members begin to appear such as Sena (the popular girl who wants real friends), Kodaka’s sister Kobato, Yukimura (a crossdresser), Rika (a sexual science loving student), and Maria (a 10 year old nun and faculty adviser).
Plots of the episodes involve Kodaka’s past, the group trying to stay in contact during the summer, Kodaka and Kobato coming over to Sena’s place for dinner, a surprise revelation about Yozora (in episode 11), and club activities like playing video games, karaoke, scary stories, a matsuri festival trip, a water park trip, a pool excursion, and an outing to Sena’s beach house. The OVA involves a round-robin story with each club member writing a story.
Despite the fact that there is barely a story to be had in “Haganai,” the show manages to work because of one thing- the characters. Aside from the rather irritating Maria, the series is filled with well developed characters that are both likable and identifiable. “Haganai” could have easily been another outlandish or over-the-top high school series that we so often see, but instead, this is largely a heartfelt comedy. Yes, the show has some wacky and perverted humor here and there, but it’s still a surprisingly grounded and honest series with strong themes about friendship, identity, uniqueness, social statuses, and acceptance. It’s a show about a rag tag group of characters becoming friends. You wouldn’t expect the members of the group to be friends with one another (especially considering how much they bicker with one another) and yet they become friends regardless. It may be sappy to some, but I found it nice to watch a pleasant and positive anime series for a change.
On the subject of the characters, I have to say that there’s a particularly touching and surprising moment in episode 11 between Yozora and Kodaka. I won’t spoil what happens, but it makes you rethink their friendship. It’s a really nice moment that makes the series even better overall.
Video/Audio:
Presented in widescreen 1080p, “Haganai” is not the flashiest anime series in terms of animation quality, but the hi-def transfer is a big step up from the DVD copy. The colors are noticeably clearer in 1080p which is always a big plus.
This set contains English Dolby TrueHD 5.1 and Japanese Dolby TrueHD 2.0 audio tracks. Truth be told, I am a fan of both the English and Japanese tracks. I know a lot of anime fans are anti-dubs, but the Funimation crew has been doing some fine work lately with the English tracks.
Extras:
* Trailers for “Heaven’s Lost Property- Forte,” “Tenchi Muyo! War On Geminar,” “High School DxD,” “We Without Wings,” “The Future Diary,” “Guilty Crown,” “Fairy Tail,” “Lupin The Third: The Woman Called Fujiko Mine,” “Remnant Knights Game,” and Funimation.com
* Textless opening and closing songs.
* A U.S. trailer, 12 Blu-ray and DVD spots, 2 original commercials, 2 promo videos and TV spots for “Haganai.”
* Commentary on episode by Jad Saxton, Whitney Rodgers and Jerry Jewell. The three joke around and talk about characters, auditions, voice acting, video games, etc.
* Commentary on episode 8 by Zach Bolton, Alison Viktorin, and Kristi Kang. More of what you’ve come to expect from Funimation audio commentaries.
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