Hidan no Aria

High school comedy has a new name, and it's Aria the Scarlet Ammo! No series this season is zanier or more action-packed than this spiritual successor to Toradora!, where high-schooler Kinji Toyama finds himself subject to the temperamental whims of sub-5-foot-tall Aria H. Kanzaki (played by—who else?—Rie Kugimiya). But hot girls aren't Kinji's only problem. He's also attending Tokyo Butei High School, a Tea Party wet dream where everyone is safer because (by the doctrine of mutually assured destruction) every student has a gun and a knife. Of course, they're also packing heat because the school is a training ground for future law enforcement agents, but hey, who needs poorly-reasoned plot devices when EVERYONE HAS GUNS?

Kinji's wacky adventures begin when his commute to school is rudely interrupted by remote-controlled Segways equipped with Uzis—plus a mysterious phone call telling him there's a bomb strapped to his bike. In his madcap quest to avoid being blown up, Kinji is rescued by dual-wielding gunslinger Aria, who pulls him to safety just in time. However, another wave of armed Segways attacks them, and this time Kinji's rising blood pressure transforms him into Bruce Willis and he eliminates the threat with a single flashy move. Bravo, young man! As a reward for your actions, you get to sit next to Aria in class since she's transferring into the school!

In all seriousness, Aria the Scarlet Ammo obviously isn't meant to be pure comedy. But this surgical grafting of boy-meets-girl onto girls-with-guns (boy-meets-girls-with-guns?) is unintentionally hilarious—and stupid. Apparently, at no time did anyone stop to think about the illogic of a fully armed student body, or Segways with submachine guns strapped to them. Meanwhile, on the visual side, even shiny animation technique can't redeem the predictable character designs, generic suburban scenery, and dumb sight gags about Aria's chest size. If it were simply about high-intensity gunplay, with daring camerawork and a pulsating action-thriller soundtrack, it wouldn't be such a bad thing. But the high-school sitcom flavor makes it taste as bizarre as ketchup on chocolate.

Originally Posted by Carlos Santos at animenewsnetwork.com