Short Showdown! AHO-Girl vs Tsuredure Children!

A week ago on my birthday, Blackatron wrote a great article assessing if a short could be anime of the season. He did address both AHO-Girl and Tsuredure but while he just kind of touched upon them and the others spoke their peace on the shows, I figured I’d chime in on my opinions given the fact I’ve seen both shows to completion this season.

Art/Animation

So lets go into the artwork first. Both shows had a very interesting and distinct anime style opposed to the other. Tsuredure had a very calm and casual animation style that used very vibrant colors and a shading style that used that very cool technique I’ve loved since Samurai Jack where the outlines for the hair are not black per traditional animation style but actually a shade off from the hair color, helping them all look considerably more distinct (more on the importance of this later). AHO-Girl has a very traditional by comparison style of animation, with a fairly stable and consistent style of animation, barring certain scenes (looking at you Initial Dog).

Art/Animation Winner: Tsuredure Children

Musical OP/ED

Let the battle continue! Musically both have a great OP and ED with very similar themes. It should be noted however that both have different themes leading to an apples vs oranges comparison. Specifically, its a comedy short vs romantic comedy short comparison. Tsuredure has a very sweet romantic sounding OP in “Aimai Moko” by Inori Minase, with the singer being Rem from Re:Zero’s VA. Pound for pound, that alone would sell this OP to me over AHO IF it wasn’t for the fact that AHO-Girl’s OP “Zenryoku☆Summer!” by angela captured the feel of the show and comedy shorts perfectly, also the different intro videos absolutely sold me making me ensure I NEVER touched the bar to skip this hilarious intro. From the ED standpoint, “Dear” by Yui Ogura is a sweet ending, usually great for the endings of each episode which tended to be a sweet and heartfelt moment. Examples of this include a scene between a couple who just advanced to the point of finally kissing, or another with someone who is unable to speak their mind and confess to their crush hopping onto the wrong bus just to have those precious few extra moments before having to wait to see them again. Odore! by Kyuukyoku Tetsugaku however caps off every episode of AHO with the kind of humorous tone found through the entire episode and times great to moments such as Yoshiko being full on uppercut by Gintoki A-Kun or Yoshiko’s mom fighting Oppai-President in a battle that leads to the aforementioned president of the PUBLIC MORALS COMMITTEE to ninja-steal a little girl’s panties to save face in front of said girl.

Musical OP/ED Winner: AHO-Girl

VAs:

Another thing I’d like to point out is the choice of VAs for this show. AHO-Girl had a great way to encapsulate the show by having individuals who were amazing comedy cast members, including Tomokazu Sugita who did Gintoki from Gintama (a classic and beautiful comedy), Aoi Yuuki who did Froppy from My Hero Academia (and also Tanya from Youjo Senki), and Yoko Hikasa who was Steph from No Game No Life, Ko from New Game, and Sakie-sensei from Demi-Chan (and basically comedy MILF characters in general). Tsuredure had Inori Minase who was Rem from Re:Zero who just encapsulates adorable girls via unrequited (but not really) love, Kana Hanazawa, who is usually very teasing/perverted characters such as Marimo from Teekyuu and Raphi from Gabriel Dropout, Kaito Ishikawa who voiced Genos from One Punch Man, Iida from My Hero, and Nine from Zankyou no Terror. Both shows had great individuals from shows I really liked and it helped to know that these guys can really sell these characters even before I fully realized who they were. In the end though, I loved the Voice work from AHO because of their great pacing and synergy.

VA Winner: AHO-Girl

Overall Theme:

This one is a bit hard because its unfair to compare AHO-Girl to Tsuredure without admitting they are a Comedy and Romantic Comedy respectively. Let’s gun through to the shows with this slight thematic difference in mind. AHO is just a hilarious gut buster but I just can’t even begin to assess how many funny little jokes there are in this show and how great they are, because they range from very obvious to more subtle references. Tsuredure had a very sweet theme and was heartwarming and adorable but occasionally had awkward moments, leaving me feeling like this show was just a great example of how cringey and sweet high school romance could be. The final consideration I have is that this 12 minute short fit as a medium. I do think that Tsuredure absolutely kills it as the 3-4 short stories of different characters for the 12 minute block. AHO’s characters have me dying and I feel they are more memorable (for one thing I actually remember their names) and would do better as a 3 minute short across 48 episodes or even as 24 minute episodes across 6 episodes but don’t do as well in this 12 minute block format as Tsuredure does.

Overall Theme Winner: Both Shows

Now you may think this is a cop out answer but really both are great fruits. AHO-Girl is the funny and delicious Apple that will keep the doctor away because laughter is great. Tsuredure is great to keep you alive on the open seas to stave off scurvy because Oranges are great underneath the peel. My personal favorite is AHO-Girl but most people sympathize with and therefore vote Tsuredure as number #1 on most forums, with AHO a close second. This aside, we have a great couple of shows and I would love to hear your thoughts on the matter or your ranking of the two. Leave a like and/or comment and feel free to subscribe and let me know that way you can avoid the awkward!