Ping Pong Club

[cassiesheepgirl]

Ping Pong Club

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I've been meaning to write this for a while, so in the spirit of actually doing things I've been planning on (hurrah for new years resolutions), I actually sat down today and got on with it. I've taken into account previous feedback that I've been given, so I'm hoping that it's better.

Meh. I can do better than this now.

[therik]

2.5 is "merely passable at best"?

Are you generous with your passes or harsh with your numbers?

Seriously though, decent review here. Nice use of a comedic tone to get your point across. Sounds almost like you're holding back in places, though. If it's really this bad, you should go to town on it and have a bit more fun.

I get the strange feeling that Vee Kew is looming over my shoulder as I write this, so I won't pick apart any grammar. I'd just point out a couple of thingies:

This leaves an empty sort of feeling that can only be filled with well-placed tumbleweed blowing in the wind

What else does a tumbleweed do?

no holes barred humour

You might mean "No holds barred". "No holes barred" sounds like - and indeed is - a porn film.

[VivisQueen]

Hello. Your review read very well. I highly enjoyed it, in fact. I think your strength lies in bringing things across in an interesting and witty manner. For example, I particularly like the way in which you introduce the review, lines like 'The other is the double-act that is Maeno and Izawa, whose outrageous antics provide most of the ‘entertainment’ – and believe me; I use that word very loosely' and so on.

However, there are two things which stand out for me which you should work on. Firstly, you use 'the series' a lot. The repetition gives a distanced, stilted feel to the review. Mix things up a bit by using the anime title. I (and, I notice, a lot of the reviewers also) personify the anime. So: Ping Pong Club did this, and Ping Pong Club did that, and Ping Pong club gave the impression that etc. Not: the series is like this and the series is like that and the series gives the impression that etc. Think of 'the series' and 'the plot' and 'the story' more as occasionally variants to use when you're sick of personifying all the time.

Secondly, there's the weird sentence structure in your opening paragraph mixed with the passive voice. Grammatically it makes sense, but meaningfully it's just awkward and unnecessarily so. Look at the original and then my suggested rewrite to see what I mean:

Some anime you don’t expect to get much from, and are then pleasantly surprised; some you have high hopes for and end up disappointed; and in some rare cases you have high expectations and the series delivers. However, Ping Pong Club fits into none of these categories. Instead it falls into that dismal little box of a series that you weren’t anticipating much from and then got even less in return.

TO

Some anime will pleasantly surprise you even though you don't expect much from them; some anime will disappoint you in spite of your high hopes; and, in some rare cases, you'll find a series which meets your high expectations! However, Ping Pong Club fits into none of these categories. Instead it falls into that dismal little niche of anime which promise very little and deliver even less.

Like I said, that's only a suggestion. But you get the idea. More 'I drove the car' and less 'The car was driven by me'.

Other than that, seems like you took a lot of the previous critiques on board. Awesome.

[cassiesheepgirl]

Originally Posted by therik

2.5 is "merely passable at best"?

Are you generous with your passes or harsh with your numbers?

Seriously though, decent review here. Nice use of a comedic tone to get your point across. Sounds almost like you're holding back in places, though. If it's really this bad, you should go to town on it and have a bit more fun.

I get the strange feeling that Vee Kew is looming over my shoulder as I write this, so I won't pick apart any grammar. I'd just point out a couple of thingies:

What else does a tumbleweed do?

You might mean "No holds barred". "No holes barred" sounds like - and indeed is - a porn film.

Thanks. I've changed those two bits on my word document. I've left it as is on here for now since I may as well leave it as it was when I posted, makes it easier for me when I'm writing to see what I'd originally done AND the feedback :)

I must admit it was quite fun writing this one, good way to vent your frustration. I probably was holding back a bit, since I tend to find that if I go off on a rant I find it hard to shut up (plus it often isn't particularly coherant) XD

[cassiesheepgirl]

Originally Posted by VivisQueen

Hello. Your review read very well. I highly enjoyed it, in fact. I think your strength lies in bringing things across in an interesting and witty manner. For example, I particularly like the way in which you introduce the review, lines like 'The other is the double-act that is Maeno and Izawa, whose outrageous antics provide most of the ‘entertainment’ – and believe me; I use that word very loosely' and so on.

However, there are two things which stand out for me which you should work on. Firstly, you use 'the series' a lot. The repetition gives a distanced, stilted feel to the review. Mix things up a bit by using the anime title. I (and, I notice, a lot of the reviewers also) personify the anime. So: Ping Pong Club did this, and Ping Pong Club did that, and Ping Pong club gave the impression that etc. Not: the series is like this and the series is like that and the series gives the impression that etc. Think of 'the series' and 'the plot' and 'the story' more as occasionally variants to use when you're sick of personifying all the time.

Secondly, there's the weird sentence structure in your opening paragraph mixed with the passive voice. Grammatically it makes sense, but meaningfully it's just awkward and unnecessarily so. Look at the original and then my suggested rewrite to see what I mean:

Some anime you don’t expect to get much from, and are then pleasantly surprised; some you have high hopes for and end up disappointed; and in some rare cases you have high expectations and the series delivers. However, Ping Pong Club fits into none of these categories. Instead it falls into that dismal little box of a series that you weren’t anticipating much from and then got even less in return.

TO

Some anime will pleasantly surprise you even though you don't expect much from them; some anime will disappoint you in spite of your high hopes; and, in some rare cases, you'll find a series which meets your high expectations! However, Ping Pong Club fits into none of these categories. Instead it falls into that dismal little niche of anime which promise very little and deliver even less.

Like I said, that's only a suggestion. But you get the idea. More 'I drove the car' and less 'The car was driven by me'.

Other than that, seems like you took a lot of the previous critiques on board. Awesome.

Thanks for the reply. Yeah I see what you mean with the use of "the series", I'll have to keep an eye on that. I think at one point I was worried about repeatedly using 'Ping Pong Club' and sort of went the other way.

And with that opening sentence - thank you! There was something about it which I couldn't quite figure out and the more I stared at it the more I couldn't quite figure out the way to fix it. It makes more sense now. :D

[VivisQueen]

Okay, on second thought I got it wrong. It isn't passive voice. I was hesitating about blaming it on passive voice but couldn't figure out otherwise what it was. It reads in a similar awkward way as if it were passive voice. But I've just been informed it's actually poor syntax. Awesome.

Thanks and sorry.

[cassiesheepgirl]

So, after reading part of the manga, my hatred for this series was renewed, and after reading my first stab at this, I decided to scap it and start again, though a couple of odd lines managed to stay in there.

Edited Version:

Story: 1/10

When I started watching Ping Pong Club, I didn’t expect very much from it. If I’m honest, all I wanted was a sneaky giggle and some crude fun. What I got was all of the crude, none of the entertainment, and about as many laughs as you’d find at a clown’s funeral. Actually, I take that back; the latter would provide many more opportunities for amusement than this monstrosity of a series.

The show focuses on the antics of the Ina Middle School’s male ping-pong club. When they face closure, they must win the district tournament in order for their club to remain open. Unfortunately the majority of the members consist of perverted slackers, who have little to no interest in actually playing the sport. In a desperate bid to get them to practice, a new female manager, Kiyoko, arrives and offers a month-long pervert pass to whoever performs best at the competition. Unfortunately, after less than a third of the way into the series, the district tournament has finished, and with it goes the show’s only real attempt at including any form of plot.

Ping Pong Club simply offers an outlet to showcase the deranged activities of the club’s members, occasionally throwing in the threat of the girl’s team taking over their clubroom to give the pretence of an actual storyline. I can excuse the absence of plot to some extent, but the lack of humour is the series’ most detrimental downfall. Though I am the first to admit that comedy is purely subjective, I had at least hoped that in twenty-six episodes, I had hoped that my lips would at least curve into a half-hearted smile. Sadly, even the barely smirk-worthy jokes, such as Maeno’s ‘Protruding Pecker Serve’, soon become relegated to the realms of the bloody annoying with the show’s excessive repetition. Now I like a good knob joke, but after seeing Maeno’s wiener peering out from his shorts the first couple of times, the subsequent hundred occasions on which the series seems to re-use this gag merely provides employment for out of work tumbleweed.


Animation: 1.5/10

In a desperate bid to find something nice to say about this god-awful series, I will concede that the visual style perfectly suits the content – both are cheap, crude and nasty. The more normal cast members look like stock characters hastily grabbed from a bin of mediocre design that no one really cares about nor notices. On the other side of the paddle there are the ‘zany’ cast members, whose grotesque appearance had me reaching for the sick bag on more than one occasion. The worst offender is Maeno – the most hideously unattractive character that I’ve ever witnessed. However, kudos goes to the naked old age pensioner who gets her wrinkly boobs stuck in a shower drain for forcibly burning such an horrific image into my retinas for life. Building upon this visual rape, Ping Pong Club fails to display any smooth movement, and instead relies upon an abundance of panning shots, presumably in the hope that the poor animation quality will go unnoticed.


Sound: 2/10

I find that in any comedy series, the soundtrack is the key to making a humorous situation completely riotous. Regrettably the cheesy score only makes a weak attempt at enhancing the comedy and thus not only fails its purpose, but also becomes incredibly annoying at the same time. Ultimately both the music and voice acting offer nothing particularly worthy of mention – let alone praise – and may as well be forgotten.


Characters: 0.5/10

Ping Pong Club boasts the most incredibly terrible cast that has ever managed to ooze its way onto my screen. The majority of the characters fall into the category of ‘one-trick ponies’, where each person receives one measly personality trait, which results in tiring and endless running gags. For example, Tanabe’s presence would be insignificant if not for his horrendous body odour. While fun to point and snigger the first time his odious stench causes someone to pass out, the joke soon wears thin, and the realisation that his personality has no substance whatsoever quickly becomes apparent.

The characters fortunate enough to avoid the ‘one-trick pony’ trap, inevitably suffer from their own pitfalls. Takeda, as the most insipidly normal member of the series, manages to excite less than those static ping-pong balls that lurk in the dusty corner of the clubroom. Maeno and Izawa's outrageous double-act antics provide the majority of the show's 'entertainment' – and believe me, I use that word very loosely – but their wacky personalities are unable to compensate for the weaknesses of the others. Against all my hopes to the contrary, Ping Pong Club exhibits a complete lack of character development and subsequently mocks me for being so foolish as to expect any kind of redemption from it. While the show feebly attempts once or twice to develop its cast of immature and crude idiots, it instead manages to once again fail. By the end the same pack of annoying, pathetic buffoons awaits.



Overall: 1.5/10

The biggest joke of the entire series was that I actually continued to watch it until its inescapably pointless conclusion. I had hoped that it might get better – it didn’t. I thought maybe there might have been some twist at the end to make trudging through the twenty-six mind-numbing episodes worth it – there wasn’t. Ping Pong Club certainly proves that simply pushing the boundaries of tastelessness with its crude humour does not immediately equal good comedy – or, in this particular case, any at all.

[ThePatches]

Alright, I have to go to lunch, but I'll try to clean off my Vivisection tools and give some input sometime today. At first brush, it was amusing, but didn't seem hateful enough.

[KiraRin]

Oh, you've done it now. If I ever felt like writing a counter review (to tell the anime populace the truth :P ), then this would be the reason! I loved Ping Pong muchly, and you trashed it

But onwards with the vivisection.

Originally Posted by cassiesheepgirl

Story: 1/10

When I started watching Ping Pong Club, I didn’t expect very much from it. If I’m honest, all I wanted was a sneaky giggle and some crude fun. What I got was all of the crude, none of the fun and about as many giggles as you’d find at a clown’s funeral. Actually, I take that back; the latter would provide many more opportunities for laughter than this monstrosity of a series did. <-- I think you can get the point across without the repetition

The show focuses on the antics of the Ina Middle School boy’s ping-pong club <-- I think the plural is in the wrong place here. "Ina Middle School's male ping-pong club" sounds better to me for some reason. When they face closure, they must win the district ping-pong tournament in order to remain open. Unfortunately the majority of the members consist of perverted slackers [COMMA] who have little to no interest in actually playing ping-pong. In a desperate bid to get them to practice [COMMA] a new female manager, Kiyoko, arrives and offers a month-long pervert pass to whoever performs best at the tournament. Unfortunately after less than a third of the way into the series the district tournament has finished, and with it goes the series’ <--- repetition only real attempt at including any form of plotline. <-- I know the show is about ping-pong, but I feel it would flow a little better if you cut the repetition. Maybe use "in the sport"

Ping Pong Club simply offers an outlet to showcase the deranged activities of the club’s members [COMMA] while occasionally throwing in the threat of the girl’s team taking over their clubroom to make it seem like there is actually give the pretence of <-- just sounds a little tidier a storyline. I can excuse the absence of plot to some extent, however the lack of comedy is the series’ most detrimental failing. Though I am the first to admit that comedy <-- repetition is purely subjective, I had at least hoped that in twenty-six episodes, I would have raised more than a half-hearted smile. Sadly, even the jokes that are barely smirk-worthy, such as Maeno’s ‘Protruding Pecker Serve’, soon become relegated to the realms of the bloody annoying after the excessive repetition that Ping Pong Club displays throughout. Now I like a good knob joke, but after seeing Maeno’s wiener peering out from his shorts the first one or two couple of times, the subsequent billion <--- just feels a little too OTT occasions on which the series seems to re-use this gag merely provides employment for out of work tumbleweed.


Animation: 1.5/10

In a desperate bid to find something nice to say about this god-awful series, I will concede that the visual style perfectly suits the content – both are cheap, crude and nasty. The more normal cast members look like stock characters hastily grabbed from a bin of mediocre design that no one really cares about nor notices. On the other side of the paddle there are the ‘zany’ characters, whose grotesque appearance had me reaching for the sick bag on more than one occasion <-- what was so grotesque about it? Maybe a little more detail. Building upon this visual rape, Ping Pong Club fails to display any smooth movement, and instead decides to rely relies upon an abundance of panning shots, presumably in the hope that the poor animation quality will go unnoticed.


Sound: 2/10

I find that in any comedy series, the soundtrack is the key to making a humorous situation completely riotous. Regrettably the cheesy score only makes a weak attempt at enhancing the comedy and thus not only fails to succeed, but also becomes incredibly annoying at the same time. Ultimately both the soundtrack <-- repetition and voice acting offer nothing particularly worthy of mention – let alone praise – and may as well be forgotten.


Characters: 0.5/10

Ping Pong Club boasts the most incredibly terrible cast that has ever managed to ooze its way onto my screen. The majority of the characters fall into the category of ‘one-trick ponies’ [COMMA] such as Tanabe whose entire presence would be insignificant if not for his horrendous body odour. While fun to point and snigger the first time his odious stench causes someone to pass out, the joke soon wears thin and the realisation that Tanabe’s his personality has no substance whatsoever quickly becomes apparent.

Of course I am possibly being slightly unfair to the series here, as with every rule, there are one or two exceptions. Takeda [COMMA]for example[COMMA] far from fits into this generalisation of one-dimensional characters <-- this sentence feels clumsy, like the words are in the wrong order. "far from fits" doesn't seem right. Instead, as the most insipidly normal character portrayed in the series, he manages to be less exciting to watch than one of the static ping-pong balls that lurk in the dusty corner of the clubroom. The other exception to Ping Pong Club’s reliance on utilising just one characteristic per person is the double act of Maeno and Izawa whose outrageous antics provide the majority of the show’s ‘entertainment’ – and believe me I use that word very loosely. I had initially hoped that the pair might compensate for the deficits that the rest of the cast suffer from, with their wacky personalities <-- are you talking about Maeno and Izawa with the "wacky personality" comment? Or the rest of the cast?. Alas, the complete lack of character development soon mocked me for being so foolish as to expect any kind of redemption from this series. While the show feebly attempts once or twice to develop its cast of immature and crude idiots, it manages to once again fail and by the end the same pack of annoying, pathetic buffoons awaits. <-- a lot of repetition of character in this paragraph


Overall: 1.5/10

The biggest joke of the entire series was that I continued to watch it until its inevitably pointless conclusion. I had hoped that it might get better – it didn’t. I thought maybe there might have been some twist at the end to make trudging through the twenty-six mind-numbing episodes worth it – there wasn’t. Ping Pong Club certainly proves that simply pushing the boundaries of tastelessness with its crude humour does not immediately equal good comedy – or, in this particular case, any at all.

Hope this helps ^^

H.

[cassiesheepgirl]

Originally Posted by KiraRin

Oh, you've done it now. If I ever felt like writing a counter review (to tell the anime populace the truth :P ), then this would be the reason! I loved Ping Pong muchly, and you trashed it

But onwards with the vivisection.



Hope this helps ^^

H.

Thanks Kira. I know Ping Pong Club has a bit of a cult following but I just... no... really hated it. Couldn't find one good thing about it lol. Normally I'm one of the first ones to like crude crap (c'mon I loved Ebichu) but this one just really didn't do it for me.

I really hate doing the character section as I find it really difficult to not repeat the word 'character' too much. >.<

Originally Posted by ThePatches

Alright, I have to go to lunch, but I'll try to clean off my Vivisection tools and give some input sometime today. At first brush, it was amusing, but didn't seem hateful enough.

I had to restrain myself a couple of times. I figured that "The characters are as flat and lifeless as their flaccid little pricks" might have been a bit too ranty. >_<


Edit: Had an edit and got rid of the repetition, plus a few extras I noticed as I was going through, plus added a little into the animation section.