Anime caters to many different sensibilities, but The Disastrous Life of Saiki K. is a popular series from the past few years that’s gone on to find massive levels of success. Saiki K looks at Saiki Kusuo, a teenager with tremendous psychic abilities, as he tries to navigate through a regular, boring life. Saiki K works so well because of its outrageous and distinct brand of comedy.
There are plenty of gag anime that are available, but Saiki K’s chaotic energy and pacing make it stand out. Every episode of the anime is hilarious, but there are also a series of running gags that represent some of the funniest moments in Saiki K.
10 Teruhashi's Ultimate Beautiful Girl Technique
One of the best jokes in Saiki K is that Teruhashi Kokomo is so gorgeous that her beauty actually functions as a superpower that's almost comparable to Saiki's psychic skills. It's a solid gag that plays into anime stereotypes and Teruhashi literally radiates a glow that turns those around her into her adoring subjects. Her powers only get stronger as the series goes on and Teruhashi’s beauty becomes legitimately dangerous. It's always enjoyable whenever Teruhashi uses this Ultimate Beautiful Girl Technique to take control of the situation.
9 Yumehara’s Romantic Fantasies
The Disastrous Life of Saiki K has a large cast of supporting characters, but they all get fleshed out in impressive ways and become sources for their own running jokes. Yumehara Chiyo is portrayed as an innocent, yet insecure female classmate for Saiki. Her romantic tendencies have her try to manufacture "meet cute" scenarios between her and Saiki, but he always uses his psychic powers to curb her efforts. Yumehara's nature to disappear into these stylized romantic fantasies that never go according to plan is very entertaining.
8 The Work Of Dark Reunion
A great source of comedy throughout Saiki K revolves around Kaidou Shun and his irrational paranoia towards an evil organization that's known as Dark Reunion. Kaidou crafts a crazy narrative where his arm houses incredible power and how it's made him the target of Dark Reunion.
Whenever something goes wrong or Kaidou experiences some sort of bad luck he'll immediately jump to the conclusion that Dark Reunion is responsible. It grows funnier every time that it happens, especially since Shun most likely isn't any kind of target at all.
7 Saiki’s Failure To Understand Modern Art
A lot of Saiki’s efforts in The Disastrous Life of Saiki K. are devoted to the suppression of his powers or finding ways to use them to minimize the annoyances in his life. Saiki is both psychically powerful and intelligent, but there are still certain facets of the world that go beyond those areas, like the creativity involved with art. Saiki K exploits how art, especially contemporary creations, completely confound him. Art is repeatedly an area that Saiki cannot penetrate and his unsuccessful attempts to do so are always hilarious.
6 Toritsuka’s Reading Material
Part of the fun in The Disastrous Life of Saiki K. is that although it features rich and entertaining characters, they often function as lovable stereotypes in many regards and they each have their own vices. Toritsuka is introduced as a powerful spirit medium, but he's often reduced to his embarrassing penchant for dirty magazines. This becomes a frequent obstacle that pops up at inopportune moments in order to undercut Toritsuka's expertise. It's revealed that a lot of Toritsuka’s time in the temple is even devoted to "tournaments" between lewd materials.
5 Mera’s Many, Many Part-Time Jobs
Saiki K’s Mera Chisato is a character that plays into the Japanese custom where some schools won’t allow students to work part-time jobs. Saiki discovers that Mera has to work as a waitress to help make ends meet with her family.
Mera’s unfortunate situation quickly gets pushed to an extreme place and the anime makes it clear that Mera works about a dozen different jobs, all of which she must keep a secret. Mera’s disappearance is often paid off with her away at some new job. It eventually turns into the character’s defining trait.
4 Manabe Baiku's BKB System
One of the stranger tangents that The Disastrous Life of Saiki K has taken involves a more tangential character by the name of Manabe Baiku. Manabe is an aggressive bike instructor who is supposed to improve the cycling skills of Saiki and his friends. Manabe pushes a BKB system where his principles always come down to that mnemonic device. It initially stands for "Burn the Knowledge into you Boneheads," but Manabe Baiku turns up in various situations and always unexpectedly berates someone and uses a new application of BKB in his insult.
3 The Popularity Of Gori-Rabbitz & OLFANA
Saiki K is such a fast-paced show where strange details often get thrown at the audience that initially don’t seem important, only for them to turn up later. Gori-Rabbitz is a strange franchise within the series' universe and students are often shown coveting Gori-Rabbitz material and it fills up the background of scenes. Alternatively, Saiki laments how his telepathy leads to the most popular video games being spoiled for him, so he plays unpopular games to fight this. Saiki's choice is a medieval title called “OLFANA,” which periodically pops up with him.
2 Saiki’s Extreme Love For Coffee Jelly
There’s such fun character work done in The Disastrous Life of Saiki K. and Saiki himself is a highly effective character. Saiki wields crazy power, but his tendency to mask his strength and hide in the shadows gives him such depth. One item that’s consistently proven to be Saiki’s weakness is his irrational love for coffee jelly. Saiki’s excitement for this dessert is frequently used as a punchline or a satisfying way to hold power over Saiki. It’s just funny that something so simple has this strong of a hold on Saiki.
1 The Direct References To Other Anime
It's not unusual for gag anime to feature jokes that poke fun at the larger genre as a whole as well as other shows that exist alongside it. Saiki K is a very self-aware program that moves at a lightning pace and often breaks the fourth wall. However, it has also directly referenced other series like Assassination Classroom, My Hero Academia, Naruto, and the king of gag anime, Gintama. Saiki K will occasionally deflect to one of these other anime hits to help push a joke even further.