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スクールランブル (Sukūru Ranburu)
Genre	Romantic comedy, Slice of life story, Drama
Manga
Written by	Jin Kobayashi
Published by	Kodansha
English publisher	Del Rey Manga Tanoshimi
Demographic	Shōnen
Magazine	Weekly Shōnen Magazine Shōnen Magazine Special Shōnen Magazine Wonder
Original run	October 22, 2002 – July 23, 2008
Volumes	22 (List of volumes)
Manga
School Rumble Z
Written by	Jin Kobayashi
Published by	Kodansha
Demographic	Shōnen
Magazine	Shōnen Magazine Special
Original run	August 20, 2008 – May 20, 2009
Volumes	1 (List of volumes)
Light novel
Written by	Hiroko Tokita
Illustrated by	Jin Kobayashi
Published by	Kodansha
Original run	April 2004 – December 2007
Volumes	2
TV anime
Directed by	Shinji Takamatsu
Studio	Studio Comet
Licensed by	Madman Entertainment Funimation Entertainment Revelation Films
Network	TV Tokyo
English network	Funimation Channel
Original run	October 10, 2004 – April 5, 2005
Episodes	26 (List of episodes)
Original video animation
School Rumble: Extra Class
Directed by	Shinji Takamatsu
Studio	Studio Comet
Licensed by	Madman Entertainment Funimation Entertainment
Released	December 22, 2005
Runtime	25 minutes each
Episodes	2 (List of episodes)
TV anime
School Rumble: 2nd Semester
Directed by	Takaomi Kanasaki
Studio	Studio Comet
Licensed by	Madman Entertainment Funimation Entertainment
Network	TV Tokyo
English network	Funimation Channel
Original run	April 2, 2006 – September 24, 2006
Episodes	26 (List of episodes)
Original video animation
School Rumble: Third Semester
Directed by	Shinji Takamatsu
Studio	Studio Comet
Released	July 17, 2008 – September 17, 2008
Runtime	25 minutes each
Episodes	2 (List of episodes)

School Rumble
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.:
School Rumble (スクールランブル Sukūru Ranburu) is a Japanese Shōnen manga series written and illustrated by Jin Kobayashi. First serialized in Weekly Shōnen Magazine from October 22, 2002 to July 23, 2008, all 345 chapters were later collected in 22 tankōbon volumes by Kodansha. Shōnen Magazine Special published a sequel, School Rumble Z, monthly from August 20, 2008 to May 20, 2009. A romance comedy centering on relationships between Japanese high school students, School Rumble focuses on a love triangle involving the series’ two protagonists, Kenji Harima and Tenma Tsukamoto, and one of their classmates, Oji Karasuma. The series often discards realism in favor of comedic effect.





School Rumble’s popularity has resulted in its adaption into multiple forms of media. TV Tokyo broadcast a 26-episode anime program between October 2004 and April 2005. In December 2005, a two-part original video animation (OVA) entitled School Rumble: Extra Class was released. A second season, School Rumble: 2nd Semester, aired between April and September 2006. Finally, two more episodes, collectively entitled School Rumble: Third Semester, were bundled with the Japanese manga volumes 21 and 22. Three video games have been produced—two for the PlayStation 2 in July 2005 and July 2006, and one for the PlayStation Portable in 2005. Two light novels written by Hiroko Tokita and illustrated by Jin Kobayashi were published in April 2004 and December 2007; four official guidebooks written and illustrated by Jin Kobayashi have also been released.
Del Rey Manga publishes the English translation of School Rumble. In the translation, Del Rey Manga maintained the traditional Japanese name order[n 1] to preserve puns based on the characters’ names. Funimation Entertainment published the first and second anime seasons and the Extra Class OVAs in English. School Rumble has been translated into additional languages, although the final two episodes, the video games, and guidebooks have yet to be released outside Japan.
The manga was well received by Japanese-language readers; several volumes have appeared in the top manga sales charts. The North American English translations were less popular, but still ranked several times in the top 100 as well as ranking 145th for overall manga series sales in 2008. Critics of the English-language translation have been positive overall, praising Kobayashi for his art style and overall use of humor. However, the manga has received some criticism, mostly centered around some of the jokes and repetitive plot. The anime adaptation also sold well in Japan and was praised by Kobayashi and—for the English-language translation—critics. The decision by Media Factory to aggressively pursue its intellectual property rights for School Rumble is believed by proponents of fansubs to have had a negative impact on the franchise’s release and sales in the North American market.
Plot.:
School Rumble is a romantic comedy revolving around the daily lives of the students of Class 2-C at the fictional Yagami High School, as well as their friends and families. The main female protagonist is Tenma Tsukamoto, an unremarkable second-year high school student who secretly admires her eccentric, enigmatic, nice-guy classmate, Oji Karasuma. Tenma struggles to confess her feelings to Oji. He remains oblivious to her interest, instead seeking fulfillment by indulging in curry. The main male protagonist, delinquent Kenji Harima, similarly yearns for Tenma, attending school solely to be near her. Like Tenma, Harima has difficulty declaring his love, and whenever he summons the courage to do so, circumstances conspire against him.
Harima complicates the love triangle through constant bumbling, and misunderstandings among the students aggravate the situation. Harima becomes involved with Tenma’s close friend, Eri Sawachika, after the pair are thrown together in mutually embarrassing situations. Later in the series, he develops a friendship with Tenma’s younger sister, Yakumo Tsukamoto, who becomes Harima’s assistant on a manga he writes. The plots of Harima’s stories portray a Harima-like hero fighting to save a Tenma-like damsel in various historical or fantastical situations, usually in battle against an obvious facsimile of Karasuma. After the hero saves the heroine, she always falls in love with him. Yakumo’s relationship with Harima causes problems with Class 2-C’s student representative, Haruki Hanai, who has a crush on Yakumo, with the sisters’ shared surname causing Harima and Hanai to misinterpret the object of each others’ respective infatuations.[n 2] Although Harima manages to engineer romantic encounters with Tenma, her relationship with Karasuma nevertheless progresses, and Harima’s bonds with Eri and Yakumo grow stronger. Eventually Tenma musters the courage to confess her love, but shortly after Karasuma loses his memory. His amnesia gives a purpose to Tenma’s life; she concentrates on her studies to become a doctor and help Karasuma.
Although School Rumble focuses on Harima and Tenma, the series explores a number of supporting characters. These include Tenma’s friends Mikoto Suo, who runs a kenpō dojo where her childhood friend, Hanai, trains, and Akira Takano, a mysterious and uncannily perceptive girl. As the story progresses, more major characters are introduced into the relationship web.
The series ends with Class 2-C’s graduation ceremony. At this point most of the plot-lines are settled, but there is no clear resolution for the main protagonists. Karasuma still suffers from memory loss, and although Harima attends the ceremony with Eri, the status of his relationship with Yakumo is uncertain.
Anime series.:
Like the manga, the anime has been well received but does not avoid criticism; in particular the quality of the animation for both seasons, including the OVAs, has attracted mixed reviews. Some of the humor and romantic elements have been derided while the English dubbing and soundtrack have been universally praised. Most reviewers took the position that, even if they dislike certain elements, the series as a whole contains something that makes them want to see more; a view summed up by Chris Beveridge of Mania.com, who writes:
The stories are really quite simple as well as being things we’ve seen done dozens of times before. Yet it manages to infuse it with a great deal of fun and humor even if it is familiar. There’s a certain energy here that works in the shows [sic] favor as well as bringing in some different elements in terms of the characters. It also doesn’t hurt that several of the characters really are quite dim which is a nice contrast from the usual kind of leads.
Beveridge cautioned that because the anime was designed around the non-linear format of the manga, its transitions might at first be troublesome for the viewer, but by the final volume finds the anime in all its aspects far superior.
While School Rumble is generally recognised as a shōnen title targeting the young male market, Katherine Luther, staff reviewer for About.com, refers to it as a shōjo title aimed at girls and young women. Lisa Marie, reviewer for RightStuf’s Anime Today podcast, agrees that others, notably males, might see the series as shōjo. Luther calls the first DVD “the perfect back-to-school accessory”, while Marie characterizes School Rumble as “insane”, asserting it appears on the surface more laid back than other titles like Excel Saga and Haré + Guu. However, it uses its “cast to break[...]every rule of reality, but it plays everything so straight [that] it takes you a moment to realize what just happened doesn’t make any sense.” A fan of the sub-genre, she praises the anime it for its surreal humour, and for being “anime newbie friendly” in that its jokes work on multiple levels. Not all are of Japanese origin—such as a reference to the long triangular resolution of Star Wars: Return of the Jedi—giving the series broad appeal.
Anime News Network’s reviewers found much to enjoy about the first series, although Theron Martin warns that the first DVD should be “watched in small doses, as trying to tackle too much of it in one sitting will elevate the suicide rate of your brain cells”. Carl Kimlinger comments that “from the moment the words ‘School Rumble’ come spinning onto the screen, you know you’re in for … undiluted good times”, and that the title is “two of the greatest animation non-sequiturs you’re likely to see anytime soon”. Carlo Santos praises volume six’s bizarre comedy, but laments its romantic elements as being too generic. Overall, his rating is mediocre, saying that “although this disc technically marks the end of [the first season of] School Rumble, it’s really more of a pause, seeing as how the last few episodes simply ride along with the plot rather than try to reach a dramatic finish”. Reviewers from Mania.com followed this pattern; Dani Moure was skeptical of the series’ long-term entertainment value, but like fellow reviewer Danielle Van Gorder, foundhis early indifference fading as the story develops. IGN’s Jeff Harris, N.S. Davidson, and David F. Smith gave mostly positive reviews, although Davidson believes the audio and extras had begun to wane by volume five. Jakub Lhota of the Czechoslovak Anime E-Zine rated the first season a 8/10, stating that he enjoyed it more than some other anime series he had previously watched, and the style—if not always the color[70]—of Funimation’s metallic locker artbox for School Rumble’s English translation of the first season was welcomed.
According to Theron Martin, the OVA series School Rumble: Extra Class was made mostly for devoted fans; claiming that familiarity with the series is almost a necessity before watching it, although he later came to the view that it may also be useful as a sampler of the series. Chris Beveridge gives the OVA series an overall negative review. He did not highlight a single specific reason, instead observing that although all elements that “make the TV series enjoyable are certainly present here, they just feel weaker”. However, it did make him want to watch more of the television series, thus serving its intended purpose in keeping interest in the series alive. Katherine Luther endorsed the view that viewers need to be familiar with the story, but reviewed the OVA positively. While she noted lulls in the action, she believes fans will be able to overlook this. Unlike Martin, Luther did not believe the OVA is a good introduction to School Rumble, due to its short sequences and seemingly random nature.
Zac Bertschy of Anime News Network declined to post commentary on the preview announcement for the second season, claiming “we assume if you loved School Rumble, you’re gonna check out the sequel regardless of what anyone says, so why bother reviewing it?” David F. Smith from IGN gave the first part of season two a rating of 6/10, with lower scores for the Funimation extras and higher ones for the plot and story. Specifically, Smith praised the anime for never taking itself seriously, and the studio for not cutting its budget for sight gags—something he notes that other companies do. Tim Jones from THEM Anime Reviews found the second season funny and nonrepetitive, and Bamboo Dong of Anime News Network praised the second season for not conforming to the conventions of reality. He complimented it for focusing more on the other students and their relationships than on the main love triangle. Chris Beveridge claimed that, although it comes across well, the season should not be watched in a marathon sitting. He was more critical of Funimation’s packaging, preferring the first season’s metal locker boxart to the packing for the half-season sets.
Fansub controversy.:
In 2004, School Rumble’s Japanese license holder, Media Factory, declared its titles off-limits to fan-made subtitled translations—a practice known as fansubbing. The directory website AnimeSuki later removed all links to fansubs of Media Factory’s work in response to a cease-and-desist notice issued by the license holder. Media Factory-owned anime has been the subject of debate over the validity of fansubbing practice. Proponents believe School Rumble would have more quickly received an English license had fansubs been allowed to circulate and generate viewer interest.