anime review

Just completed: Aku no Hana (Flowers of Evil)

Is Aku no Hana a story about teenage urges and desires gone awry or does it have a deeper meaning regarding teenage angst and ennui?

While we ponder on this, we have to watch the show move at a snail’s pace. Kasuga, the protagonist, fancies himself to be different from the rest. He thinks that by reading different/varied literature, he is a pioneer of sorts. Once, by mistake, he steals the gym clothes of his classmate Saeki, whom he worships as his femme fatale, his muse. Big words for someone in middle school. He is seen by the class oddball Nakamura, who then forces him into a contract.

What follows is a twisted and dark journey into teenage worries and anxiety. The under confident Kasuga, the all-embracing Saeki and the bullying yet needy Nakamura: the show revolves around these three and the only time we see the rest of the class is when they are commenting on these three.

But is it an over-reach? The manga is still on-going and the show’s first season spanned only 13 episodes. The story seemed to be going nowhere except spiralling through Kasuga’s worries and fears.
On the fence about it.