Yuuki Yuuna wa Yuusha de Aru – 01

Sanshu Middle School Hero Club flew so low under my radar for the past two weeks that I almost didn’t watch it. Then, as it looked to be a low steaks civic-minded girl power middle school slice-of-life club genre piece, I almost didn’t finish it. However, one detail caught my attention:

Togo-san, one of the four central club members, is handicapped and must ride out her life in a wheelchair.

In fact, I almost dismissed YYwYdA as wheelchair-awareness-porn. Not that making people more aware of the disabled, and showcasing their challenges passively through a slice of life drama is a bad Idea. I imagine their population is as glossed over in Japan as gnomes, psychics and the transgendered are here.

Still, this season is packed tight with good shows and a middle-of-the-road slice-of-life with blushing girls trying to do good in middle school didn’t seemed like a hard sell to me. Ethically righteous or not.

Then, plot twist.

Half way through the episode, club president Inutozaki Fu let on to her sister Itsuki that she had a bit of a secret. Since they’d been talking about the school’s cultural festival and what the club was planning to do for it, I just assumed all her barely hidden shame was, well, kid stuff.

Like she had another responsibility and, despite being the anchor of the club, was going to dump it on Itsuki-chan and didn’t know how to get out of it.

I did not, however, expect that she had scouted the club to be volunteered to defend Shinju-sama (God?) from the Vertex, world destroying monsters!

One class-interrupting cell call later and Inutozaki, Itsuki, Yuna, and Togo (aka Wheelchair-sama) find themselves transported to a colorful world with a large, abstract monster bearing down on them.

Togo completely loses her shit. She’s been in a wheelchair a long time and the idea that she has to suddenly fight — physically fight — a giant monstrosity or die is understandably hard for her to accept. And this week, we don’t even see what that will ultimately look like.

It’s a cute touch that their cell phone’s all have an app that ties them together, and ties into their powers. Like everything else, I’d written it off as a funky looking chat-app that was either aping something in Japan that I’m not aware of or was slightly sci-fi for funsies.

While it’s a little silly watching the girls talk to each other over their phones during battle, it works. It certainly points out how difficult communication and coordination would be for untrained fighters who don’t have access to magic brain-to-brain com lines or military style headsets.

So, is this worth following?

Short answer: Yes! (At least for now.)

Long answer: I can’t exactly call using a handicapped character bold, but it is unusual and I didn’t expect the show’s twist at all. The magic uniforms are pretty nice too, and the world is generally beautiful, even if it has a bit of Trinity Seven’s muddy gray/black color pallet splopping on the school uniforms. At the very least, I don’t know what to expect and will give it another episode!