Chios School Road is a schoolgirl comedy manga with a novel premise it bills itself as a dramatic extreme going to school comedy and indeed the vast majority of the mangas action takes place specifically on our protagonists daily journey to her house of higher learning. But a novel premise cant carry a title on its own so how does Chios stack up to similar manga? Like a lot of entries into this very frantic physical take on comedy manga a lot of Chios School Roads strengths lie in welldrawn closeup panels showcasing shocked expressions ridiculous and convoluted situations played with utmost seriousness with the occasional softer less hectic intermission to allow the story what of it there is to catch up. Chios also builds up a fairly thorough network of callbacks and recurring supporting characters who play off our protagonists in interesting ways that reward ongoing reading and make it marginally more involved than a simple 4koma might be. Our protagonists are Chio herself a western video game otaku she expresses outright disdain for JRPGs and the possessor of a very overactive imagination and her marginally more normal friend Manana who herself seems to have something of an unhealthy fixation on appearing normal adult and so on. The two have something of a vitriolic dynamic and though were told that theyre longtime friends whether or not it actually seems that way tends to vary chapter by chapter. The tone of the manga makes their interactions something of a knifeedge walk and while it could fairly be said to succeed more often than it fails it does occasionally lapse into +tic NeeSan levels of the characters seeming to just genuinely dislike each other which is unpleasant to say the least. The manga tends to really shine when it focuses on Chio and her harebrained misadventures. Because of the narrow scope of the premise many of these involve her becoming stuck in some kind of situation that requires her to essentially platform in real life. The very first chapter has her Assassins Creeding her way through her neighborhood and through a combination of the panelsexcellentlydrawn and with the architecture throughout reminiscent of how actual sandbox video game levels are sometimes designedand Chios goofy narration the entire scenario is tied together really nicely. Its hilarious and later chapters that tackle similar concepts or related gamer nerd concerns. One chapter in a diversion from the usual premise focuses on her staying up too late and debating the classic is it too late for me to go to bed and get a good nights sleep question with herself in another she has an extensive argument with her Inner Hardcore Gamer who takes the form of herself dressed in a bunch of military gear and sunglasses about whether a clear standin for Pokemon GO is a shit game or not. Manana is noteworthy too as the deuteragonist and Chios more levelheaded counterpart. Her fixation on appearing socially normal and adult tends to get her into just as many awkward situations as Chios otakudom does her but the methods by which she navigates them are different. So the rare chapter that focuses on Manana providing it doesnt make her look like an asshole which does happen once or twice is a different kind of highlight and prevents things from becoming repetitive. These segments that focus on Chio and Manana are the almost indisputable highlights of the manga and show an uncommon command of character comedy. Its a shame then that the manga begins to fall apart a bit when it brings in characters who arent Chio and Manana. Some of the supporting characters are finea reformed delinquent provides one of the few other effective foils for Chiobut many are rather boring and lean too heavily on stereotypes and cliches to ever rise above mild chuckle levels of humor at the absolute best of times. Theres a school track star who has an exhibitionist streak a kabadi club captain who is portrayed as a predatory lesbian despite the fact that being a kabadi club captain is infinitely more interesting a character trait on its own than a stereotype that started being unacceptable decades ago an overweight salaryman who makes so little an impression that one tends to forget he exists and finally there is a homeless man who lives in a park near the school who seems to exist solely to crow about how sexy and awesome he thinks high school girls are. Oh and were told this fellow came to his current state after groping a high schooler on a train. I have a vague idea that this is supposed to be funny said character is probably an author standin which speaks volumes in of itself but its mostly just kind of stupid especially since characters like these are a dime a dozen anymore. Occasionally a backup character will get some development to make them more interestingsuch as when the school goody twoshoes shes a member of the ethics committee goodness indulges her love of candy with the help of our lead girls and is later able to impress her favorite teacher and a character who we find out is an indie idol is probably the most interesting support character in the entire manga so its certainly not all bad. If some of this sounds rather ecchi for what seemed like a fairly innocuous premise thats a bit of an issue too. Since even if you have no particular moral objection to fanservice on the conceptual level and indeed this reviewer does not its kind of out of place here especially when a number of gags rely on how allegedly homely our characters are. So at the end of the day Chios School Road undeniably does some things wrong. But the highlights come often enough that if you have an existing interest in this sort of story its recommendable. Really it comes down to how well you can overlook its flaws. Buried beneath the lazy supporting characters is an expressive art style that manages to rise above many of its expression panelfocused peers and most of all a strong core cast who play well off each other.