"At Miyagami Private Academy, there is a group of girls, who have more power and authority than any of the faculty members. Miyagami Academy Maximum Authority-Wielding Best Student Council. Otherwise known as: Best Student Council!"
Best Student Council — Gokujou Seitokai in Japanese — is the story of a down-on-her-luck parentally-abandoned girl named Rino Randou trying to make her way through life, or at least school. She enrolls at Miyagami Private Academy, an all-girls school, at the written recommendation of the shadowy "Mr. Poppit", assured that everything including room and board will be taken care of — only to see that the apartment which had been provided for her had been burned down by a rampant arsonist. So, with only her clothes, luggage, a few yen, and her puppet - named Pucchan - to her name, Rino has only one option: Become a member of the student government in order to gain the free room and board at the school dorms afforded only to members of the Best Student Council.
For the most part, Best Student Council is quite episodic, and tends to focus on a single character per episode. Barring the beginning, which causes many people vague recollections of My-HiME., Best Student Council is a schoolyard comedy with drama at a few key moments. Don't expect too much seriousness out of a series that has a talking hand puppet as a major character, though.
The Japanese title is a contraction of the ending phrase of the narration: "Gokudai Kengen Hoyuu — Saijoukyuu Seitokai".
Dubbed by ADV Films, and released in early 2007.
Tropes:
- Absurdly Powerful Student Council: This is a council with its own assault, covert and vehicles divisions!.
- Action Girl: All members of both the Assault and Covert squads, and Cyndi when necessary.
- The Alcoholic: Nurse Wakana.
- Beauty, Brains, and Brawn: President Kanade is the "Beauty", 1st Vice President Nanaho is the "Brawn" and 2nd Vice President Kuon is the "Brains".
- Black Helicopter: Used by the Covert Squad in the Cooking Duel.
- Blind Without 'Em: Sayuri. Her eyes are replaced with 3s when she loses her glasses.
- Broke Episode: When the budget is completely diverted to repairing the self-destructed dormitory.
- Butt-Monkey: Almost all of the main characters rotate between this role on a daily basis. The characters who normally don't fall into this are Kanade, Pucchan, Kuon, Seina, Kotoha, Minamo, and Cyndi.
- Circling Birdies: Happens twice in episode 1, with the first occurrence combined with the Non Sequitur, *Thud* trope.
- Color Failure: Happens to Kaori in the first episode, when she loses the election to Rino. Later happens to Rino when Pucchan is taken away from her, Ayumu even comments on this..
- Continuity Cavalcade: Almost every character who appeared in a single episode shows up again in episode 25.
- Curtains Match the Window: Most of the main characters. Cyndi is one notable exception, to help emphasise her half-foreign ancestory.
- Doorstop Baby: Which prompts the girls to go out searching for the baby's mother AND Rein's father..
- Evolving Credits:
- The faces of the two members of the Covert Squad are revealed in the episodes after they are introduced.
- In addition, the pre-credit intro evolves as well, adding members to the Student Council line-up after they join the council. Rino is added for episode 2, Minamo is added for episode 14, and the remaining Covert members are added once they are revealed later on.
- The Faceless: Seina and Kuon are the only members of the Covert Squad whose faces are shown for the first half of the series.
- Gratuitous English: Cyndi Manabe. Even more gratuitous (even in the dub) is her mother who appears later in the series.
- Hachimaki: Episode 8, when Rino, Rein, and Cyndi start cramming.
- Hand Puppet: Rino has Pucchan, who is more than meets the eye.
- Hard-Drinking Party Girl: The school nurse apparently likes to go drunk on her days off.
- Heroic BSoD: This happens to the entire Best Student Council after Kanade announces her withdraw from Miyagami Academy. Rino, Nanaho, and Kaori are hit the hardest by it.
- Heterosexual Life-Partners: Both Kanade and Nanaho plus Sayuri and Rein qualify..
- Introductory Opening Credits: In the opening, the more prominent cast members are shown in the panels of what looks like a tarot card, with their name displayed at the bottom of the card; the secondary cast members are shown just doing things regularly, with a small caption in the corner with their name on it.
- Joshikousei
- Maintain the Lie: Named after the episode.
- MegaCorp: The Jinguji and Iwazakura Conglomerates.
- Ninja: The members of Covert.
- Noblewoman's Laugh: The Kenran Gakuen Student Council President.
- Non Sequitur, *Thud*: Rino, in episode 1, when Pucchan was trying to wake up Rino.
- Parental Abandonment: The death of Rino's mother puts the story into motion, and as the series progresses, other characters are shown to fit this trope as well.
- Running Gag:
- From the ending of episode 12 until episode 14.Rino: You'd think it would be a long story, but actually it's not!
Other person: Then start explaining.
Pucchan: That little brat (Minamo) over there caused this whole mess. - Also in episode 18, characters repeating the episode's title ("Hitoshi Sato, the 28-Year-Old Lawyer From a Rich Family, Who Couldn't Possibly Be A Better Catch") when talking about said lawyer.
- From the ending of episode 12 until episode 14.
- Self-Destruct Mechanism: In a school dormitory, no less.
- Sinister Silhouettes: The two other members of Covert.
- Shout-Out: Pucchan's friend in episode 19 is named Lance Bean.
- Those Two Guys:
- Or That One Girl — Oume Ayumu, who doesn't even get named in the credits. Ironically, having Rino join the Student Council was her idea. She loses this status when she gets scouted to become an idol in episode 20. Should it also be pointed out she was always in the credits to begin with?.
- More traditional members of this trope are two classmates of Rino and Ayumu, fittingly named Eiko and Biiko, who have speaking parts for the first two episodes, and are never heard from again.
- Let's not forget about Rein and Saiyuri!
- Training from Hell: For 12 hours, for a futsal battle, and only implied.
- Two-Teacher School: Subverted, while much of the staff can be seen in the final episode, only two teachers are prominently featured in the series, and one of said two is actually the school nurse.
- The Unintelligible: The 'Indian Helper' from the Cooking Duel episode who only ever says "Namaste".
- Verbal Tic: Maachi tends to say 'ehe' a lot, sometimes to the point of being The Unintelligible. Lampshaded by Seina in Episode 13.
- Rein will often describe things using three similar adjectives in quick succession.
- Wave-Motion Gun: The "Youth Cannon".
- Whole Episode Flashback: Episodes 12 - A dramatic Character Focus. and 13 - a hilarious How We Got Here..
- You Are Not Alone: How the council gets Rino out of her depression enough to succeed in her exams.
