OP: “plan” by Saori Hayami

I’ll say up front, I found that quite a bit more interesting than I expected to.  I figured I’d sorta like Tonikaku Kawaii Joshi Kou-hen, because I like Tonikawa.  But overall the premise of this arc sounded kind of meh, if I’m honest.  In the end though it worked for me, not least because as someone who has some experience teaching in Japanese public schools, a lot of the humor is very on-point.  There are a lot of other reasons why it exceeded expectations, but being in your zone never hurts a series’ chances.

Nasa being the focus of the story in this particular way is a nice change of pace, for starters.  He’s always the “star”, but Tsukasa is like a full moon – when she’s around it’s harder to really see anything else.  Nasa is such a fascinating guy, kind of a superhero of the mundane.  He knows so much stuff (if Japan had Jeopardy he could be Ken Jennings).  He’s got life hacks for just about everything, and he array of practical skills is ridiculous.  He also has a huge network – he seems to know every random person who shows up in the cast.

How did Nasa get that way?  It’s an interesting question.  He’s basically fearless, which means he never shies away from a learning opportunity or a new interaction.  His curiosity continually opens doors for him (as it will).  I also think the fact that he’s incredibly smart and skipped high school meant he was free to dedicate his intellect when it was at its most absorbent entirely to stuff that, A. he found interesting or, B. had practical value (or both).  He effectively designed his own curriculum in life, and became an honor student working on it.

Which leads us to here, with Yanagi-sensei asking him to teach a programming class at her new job, an all-girls high school.  In the first place as soon as the word “volunteer” came up, I gagged.  That’s what’s wrong with this fucking country – why the hell should Nasa give his time and expertise away for free?  If he teaches he should get paid, period.  But yes, he is too nice for his own good.  What happens in the class was very realistic – if you dropped a cute 18 year-old boy in front of a class of high-school girls and told them he was a teacher, it would be a hell of a scene.  And it was.

Add “he’s married” to that?  Katie, bar the door.  Those kids would flip out exactly as they did.  Another thing that struck home for me is how inept the students were at the material.  Programming?  I’m frequently stunned at how clueless most Japanese kids are at even the most basic PC-related tasks  (and as here, the teachers almost as bad).  Naturally enough the ultra-earnest Nasa is taking this seriously, and is very good at it.  And because he’s so close to their age and approachable, they bond with him quickly.  The class rep even asks him for advice on dealing with her boyfriend, a real “player” – of dating sims, that is.  And the advice Nasa-sensei gives is pretty on-point, too.

When Nasa goes so far as to design a software app for tracking the girls’ programming class – which the principal immediately realizes could be applied to any subject – we reach the realm of exploitation.  Whatever this “specially appointed sensei” thing is, there damn well better be a paycheck attached to it – not to mention if he’s designing educational software, that’s a potential gold mine.  Nasa is not rich, obviously – with his skills he probably should be, but maybe this whole development is a good illustration of why he isn’t…

I was worried the whole high school girls thing and Tsukasa’a potential jealousy would be a lot more tropey, but Hata Kenjirou is fairly restrained about that sort of thing as a rule.  Add all that together and Joshi Kou-hen is very much classic Tonikawa, at least so far.  The twist with one of the students being a genius named Kaguya who everyone calls “Princess” (who plots courses to the moon) has the potential to impact how well this all works – I sense danger there, but it’ll be interesting to see how it ties into the recurring plot, if at all.

ED: “Guru Guru Live (ぐるぐるライブ)” by Tsukasa Yuzaki (CV: Akari Kitou)