Anime Review: We Never Learn Episode 1

We Never Learn

Studio: Silver

Genres: Comedy, Romance

Streaming: Crunchyroll

We Never Learn (Bokutachi wa Benkyou ga Dekinai) is a comedy romance series featuring a couple of geniuses and a normal protagonist. The geniuses, Fumino and Rizu, are talented in literature and math respectively and are guaranteed to get into the schools of their choice. Except that they want to study the areas that they aren’t talented in, and they are especially bad at fields that aren’t their own. It’s up to the protagonist to tutor them in order to prepare them for college and receive a “Special VIP Recommendation” for his hard work.

The premise is silly, and the first episode starts as a fairly generic school comedy. The introduction to the characters is typical, showing both geniuses excelling in class, astounding both their classmates and instructors. The main character is pretty unremarkable, needing to work hard to succeed in school. This episode didn’t astound me, but quite a few of the jokes are executed well and the characters are pretty likable. It succeeds as a cute situational comedy, and could potentially go all in on a love triangle. Based off of just the OP and ED, there will be three other girls joining in, making this a full harem anime. It’s possible that the first episode isn’t indicative of what the rest of the series is going to be.

The OP is full of fanservice and strategic looks at the various parts of the characters’ bodies, which really isn’t present in this first episode. Aside from a couple of short jokes, this episode is mostly devoid of fanservice. I was pleasantly surprised at the effort put into the animation, story, and development of the characters rather than the reliance on cheap tactics. While a lot of this episode is familiar, there was clearly a lot of love and care put into the adaptation

The sound and animation all look great, which is something I didn’t expect. The original trailer for the series looked a bit underdeveloped, but none of that really shows in the final product. The voice actors deliver a fun performance, and I didn’t notice any detrimental issues in the animation. The music is fun and catchy, and I can definitely see myself humming along with the opening song as this series carries on.

We Never Learn is off to a fun start, there just isn’t anything too remarkable in this first episode. Typical anime tropes are scattered throughout the anime, but they don’t come off as cheap or uninspired. It’s hard to tell if this show is going to all in on the fanservice (I hope it doesn’t), but for now, this is definitely one to check out for fans of the genre.