This is a season I just gave up on ever happening. Classroom of the Elite was a show I watched as I slowly started getting back into anime after being away for a few years, and this was how just strange enough to fascinate me. The premise is everyone in this high school is separated into classes, and the classes are ranked. You operate both as an individual, as well as a group to accumulate points, and hopefully raise your class in rank.
The class we follow as our leads are class D, the lowest rank at first. The big thing to note is that everyone in this class was put there because there is something fundamentally wrong with them as a person. One has a psychotic obsession with getting everyone to love them, for example. And we realize the issue with our lead character is that Kiyotaka is a sociopath, and the show handles it wonderfully. It's one of those things that isn't immediately obvious, it's a lot like how a real sociopath would be. The longer you spend with them, the more off they are. That's what helps keep you hooked, the show makes everyone's issues feel genuine, and a lot of the time they seriously do hamper progress.
As the show progresses, you see more and more of every other character as Kiyotaka devising ways to make use of everyone in the class through some villainous machinations. While being our leader, his plans are what you would expect out of an antagonist, especially with how he will manipulate a person's emotions to get the result he wants. The show is on a bit of a tightrope in keeping you on Kiyotaka's side as the protagonist, and it does so in part because a lot of the other classes are just as, if not more, sinister than he is. The show does a good job of not pushing this so far that you simply can't take his side on all this.
If there is an issue it's that we don't know what's going on outside of the school at all. It's clear a lot of people who came here had no idea about the cutthroat nature of these classes, yet apparently, the philosophy of the school is to prepare students for what is a rough world outside. It does create a bit of a disconnect, and with the introduction of things like 'The White Room' (I won't go into details to avoid spoilers), I realize after two seasons I know nothing about the world itself outside of this school, but now events that took place outside the school are relevant to the characters. It's only a minor quibble, but it's one all the same.
Some of the tests also get a bit complicated in the rules. If you pay close attention it's easy enough to follow, but a few of them, like the VIP one, can lose you if you miss a small detail. The shoe does a pretty good job at keeping up on the explanations though, so even if that does happen you can piece together what's going on soon enough without having to play back the rules.
There are a lot of things I could say about the show, but all of it would be pretty big on the spoilers. The show comes down to how much you enjoy watching Kiyotaka manipulate the events going on around him to raise the status of the class, and see if he's ever going to get over his complete lack of feelings for others. This is a show with very little action and whole lot of mind games. If that's your thing, the show is fantastic and I highly recommend it.
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I only started the series at the end of the hype train. From what I gathered from the snippets of texts from the source material vs the animated scene, source material > anime still wins in the amount of detail. If it's just based on the anime, some parts just comes off as plot armor given how conveniently left out some details. The extent of how much they could purchase with their points, you think someone like Ayano would have just purchased someone's dirty backstory instead of going to some mental hoops.
The problem is how much would that even cost him? How would he know in advance if that was even going to give him any useful dirt? There was already a huge cost to save someone's grade season 1, and on his own he didn't have enough to do that, he needed help from someone else who had saved up an incredible amount of points.
And at no point do I feel anyone in the anime has been given plot armor after the first two seasons.
I think he had 90k plus points when he tried to struck the deal. Left the clasroom conspicuous for Horikita. Knew Horikita saved up her points in advance and played her drive to do good if it aligns with her personal objectives. Ayano could have just be covert about striking that deal which struck me odd that he made his intent obvious when Sudo's expulsion. Seeing the scene first time made me think he knew Horikita was going to be there and help as planned.
How much would anything cost him? He can ask if he wanted. Just as how he could ask how much would it cost to remove the restriction on their cellphones sim. He didnt know the value but asking wasnt a problem and covertly.
I am currently looking for new anime to watch. ATM trying to finish My hero academia which I could catch up in about three days. Also this sounds like the type of anime I'd enjoy watching as there's competition and mind games too. There's also Fruit basket on my watchlist, do you recommend that too? have you ever written a review on them?
I did have a review of Fruits Basket, I put it as my #3 anime of last year as well. It was really good, and one of the few Slice of Life kind of shows I really like.
I'm not big on My Hero, but it's still a good show. Eventually I will watch the latest season.
I started this anime by chance, I would say it was a random recommendation from Facebook, this anime is SIMPLY AMAZING how the main character whose personality is being shown little by little is completely a genius, I really hope he shows some feelings soon, I don't follow the manga but I'm up to date in animation. Without a doubt I have recommended it tons of times, I would say that the first season advances a little slow, just a little, but the second one is simply turning out to be something that every time I finish a chapter I want to continue without stopping.
10/10, thanks for not spoiler to readers who are curious enough to find this gem. Greetings! 👋