English Dub Review: How Heavy Are the Dumbbells You Lift? “How Heavy Are the Barbells You Lift?”

Overview:

The gym takes a vacation on an island.

Our Take:

For the last episode, we go to an island vacation that’s conveniently located off Tokyo and is yet surprisingly tropical. Let’s roll with it anyway.

Akemi shows her competitive side, where it’s not just the sight of buff men that energizes her, but her own ability to perform. And perform she can– she can do push-ups while also doing a handstand. I can barely do a handstand, much less also a push up without falling over. That’s crazy impressive for Akemi to do. On the other side, Hibiki shows her potential at boxing, which has been hinted at over the series but now we see it in full swing. She can hit so hard that the sandbag flies off the chain, and that sure is some muscle strength. In the middle of it all, Akemi notes that while she’s glad that Sakura is her friend and exercise partner, she is happier that Sakura is managing to show her inner strength. When they make it to the final competition, Akemi wants to prove her all, not just to win the prize, but to compete against Sakura. Unfortunately, Sakura’s hunger-striking means that Akemi doesn’t get her moment…

It does show how the two girls’ relationship has changed drastically over the course of the series. At first, Hibiki was a little intimidated by Akemi, who seemed cool and collected from a distance. However, once she started to see the real Akemi, the Akemi who works out all the time and loves muscles, she started to see Akemi as a more full-fledged person. The same goes for Akemi in turn- we don’t see much of her personal life, but she seems to be quite busy, as both the daughter of a rich family and as a student with a lot of responsibility, such as running the student council. It’s not exactly that she’s lonely, but we also don’t see a lot of her time spent with other people. This could just be the focus of the show, but it seems like Akemi doesn’t have the freedom to express her quirks much to other people either. However, she has a familiarity with Hibiki now, that they can be themselves around each other. That is really touching, and rather cute.

Also, the show naturally ends with an exercise video type information session on push ups. I am so bad at push ups. This show is the gift that keeps on giving.