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School Rumble ends in a way that only School Rumble could, with three fake endings and a preview for an episode that doesn’t exist yet.  If that doesn’t tightly enclose this wonderful show in a nutshell, I don’t know what will.  The episodes leading up to the finale are in rare form as well, with the culmination of the sports festival: the relay race.  Then Harima decided to join a fishing crew in order to come to turns with the fact that Tenma was never madly in love with him like he thought, which lead to him rekindling his love of drawing manga.  Of course we have the last episode, which would only be spoiled if I tried to explain it.

It is customary to say a few words about the show on a whole after viewing the last episode.  However, I am having a rather hard time trying to figure out what to say.  In the end, the show is pretty much the same as when it started.  All the characters still have feelings they are hiding from each other, the only difference being that in some cases there are feelings were there were none before.  There is no closure, you could slap a big “to be continued…” card at the end of the last episode.  And yet, I’m very satisfied with the show on the whole.  The characters have grown internally, even if their situations have gone unchanged on the outside. 

I started to wax philosophical about the lack of closer in the series, comparing it to real high school: how it’s over before you know it, or how everyone takes things far too seriously, or how they’re the best days of your life but you don’t realize it until their gone.  Then I realized two things, I’m not yet old enough to yearn for a return to the halcyon days of my youth, and that School Rumble has a second season that is no doubt being regionalized as we speak: thus voiding the whole reminiscing endeavor all together. 

When looking back on these past twenty-six episodes, I’m hard pressed to find anything of merit to gripe about.  You could complain about the lack of a serious overarching story, but that’s not really what the show is about: it’s two parts random shenanigans and one part meaningful story.  School Rumble is, at its heart, a romantic comedy.  Even if on occasionally the show forgets that, morphing to become a fighting anime, or the story of a man and his animals. 

School Rumble achieves everything the show sets out to do; it’s funning while at the same time being meaningful.  I for one can’t wait for the rest of the show to grace our shores.  If for some reason you haven’t had the good sense to check this show out yet, you should.  Seriously, like go now.  Right now. 

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