Common Name: Saiki Kusuo no Psi-nan
Alternative Names: Saiki Kusuo no Ψ-nan, The Disastrous Life of Saiki Kusuo
Score: 6/10, 4/5
Length: 120 Short form parts Combined Into 24 episodes
Genre: Super Powers, Comedy, Slice of Life, School Life
Summary: Since birth, Saiki Kusou has been cursed with psychic abilities that were as dangerous as they were useful. Now as high school student he's learned to control his powers and manages to live a fairly peaceful life. It's a far cry from normal, but he can at least decide when and when not to be bothered with the aggravations that come with dealing with other people. It's believed, however, that if he ever loses control of his powers he might just be able to bring about the end of the world.
Review: So...in case this wasn't obvious to everyone, just because a show is made by an author from the same region as a different and highly successful author doesn't mean the first author's show will be as good as the second author's. I mean, I'd assume that'd be pretty obvious, but I'm pretty sure that's the main reason this show got to see the light of day.
Saiki Kusuo no Psi-nan is a gag anime centered around the titular character, Saiki Kusuo, who has been cursed with an large number of insanely strong psychic abilities. The show even goes so far as to provide a list of all the bullshit he can do, and I don't even think it's a complete list.
Telekinesis Levitation Telepathy Teleportation Apport Precognition Psychometry Clairvoyance Pyrokinesis Fulgurkinesis X-Ray Vision
Yup, that's a list of abilities alright; it's totally not a list of things that the writer can use to make a chapter-long gag and then move on to the next. In all seriousness though, the vast majority of this show's episodes follow a very straightforward formula: Saiki has a friend who wants him to do a thing, he uses his powers to try and get out of it, he fails somehow, he ends up helping said friend, he hates helping said friend, and he admits said friend isn't so bad in the end.
Every episode, we get a shot that looks like this with some minor variations.
So, clearly this is only a gag that can go on for so long, right? Apparently not. While it is humorous at times, it legitimately feels like the author used 3 dart boards covered with the names of characters, scenarios, and the abilities Saiki could use to solve it. So, more often then not, Saiki ends up looking like some kind of all-powerful god king who is willing to stoop down to the level of his so-called friends every now and then.
At least he doesn't have to stoop far since they're all pretty awful people.
Despite how it looks though, this show isn't actually all that cracked out and insane. Because of the dartboards and the fact that Saiki is canonically a broken piece of shit, the show's events actually feel kinda reasonable. One of my personal favorites is when Saiki explains to the audience that he is solely responsible for all the idiotic nonsense we've come to expect from anime (weird hair colors, clothes blasting off in a way that reveals little, the one-hit punitive knockouts, etc.). That example alone pretty much sets the tone of the anime. It's dumb, breaks the 4th wall on a regular basis, and is only occasionally humorous after the gags have gotten stale. If that sounds up your alley, give it a look. If you like it, there's good news! There's a second season coming later this year. God save us, and not referring to the pink-haired asshat.