[Anime Review] Winter 2014 Anime Preview
Review: by Kendrick
With the new anime season of winter 2014 upon us, I eagerly sat all of the first episodes of the new shows. I was excited to watch some of the new shows because I've read the mangas from which the animes have been adapted, and others were just interesting at first glance.
Engaged to the Unidentified / Mikakunin de Shinkōkei
Genres: comedy, romance, slice of life
Themes: family
Vintage: 2014-01-08
Plot Summary: Yonomi Kobeni, an ordinary girl, finds out on her 16th birthday that she is betrothed to Mitsumine Hakuya, a boy the same age as her. Hakuya moves in from the countryside and starts living with her, bringing his younger sister who is still a primary school student with him. Also added is his older sister who is already living with Kobeni and is two years older.
Review:
I really enjoyed this show. Romantic comedies usually follow a set path with a twist. This time the twist is that the main character Hakuya is very straight forward and socially invisible. This show plays off of juxtaposition very heavily for the comedy. Hakuya is quiet and stoic but immediately sees to the heart of people. His sister is young and cute but tries to act like a “mean mother-in-law.” Even Benio, Kobeni’s older sister, acts completely different at school than at home. If you like Benio a lot, try the anime His and Her Circumstances; it’s all about Benio, minus the lolicon tendencies. One thing I didn’t like was Hakuya’s voice, but it can be ignored because his sister’s voice is spot on.
Seitokai Yakuindomo
Genres: comedy
Vintage: 2014-01-04
Plot Summary: Takatoshi is the student council president in an all girls school recently turned co-ed. This second season follows him and the rest of the student council as they do there jobs whilst having the most absurd sexual conversations.
Review:
This is one of my favorite anime comedies. This second season of Seitokai Yakuindomo comes at the perfect time because I just finished watching the first season around Christmas. This show is laugh out loud funny but only if you have a very specific sense of humor. The show thrives on sexually dirty jokes; the first episode of the first season had up to ten menstruation jokes. The second season, so far, is no different, and this first episode is one hilarious dirty joke after another. One of the best jokes during the episode had to be the short segment entitled “Squid and Takatoshi.” It involved the main male character walking into the student council room drinking yogurt and seeing that someone has hung rotting squid on the door. He takes it off the door and enters the room to find a sex toy for males. This causes him to spit up his white yogurt on the toy in surprise, leaving an ejaculate-looking liquid on a sex toy and the smell of squid in the room. I found myself yelling out loud “Its a set up!”
Witch Craft Works / Witchikurafuto Wākusu
Genres: action, comedy, drama, fantasy, romance
Themes: school, superpowers, witches
Vintage: 2014-01-05
Plot Summary: Honoka knows his classmate Ayaka is talented in both the pen and the sword, attractive in face and figure, and that everyone at school calls her the Princess. When he gets himself involved in the “Witch of the Tower” incident one day after school, however, he learns she is also a witch sent to protect him. From then on, his ordinary school life is completely turned upside down, as he discovers that most of his classmates are not what they seem.
Review:
I admit I was a bit biased going into the first episode of Witch Craft Works because I read about twenty chapters of the manga months ago and already had strong feelings about it. Overall, the first episode of the anime adaptation was really good. The introduction of the main male character was a bit cliche, but he really is nobody. I laughed when they had the male bully, Obama-kun, speaking in English because that is the way it was in the manga. My only issue was not so much of a problem with the show but the process of going from a manga to animation. The manga had a certain uniqueness to its style that made the manga awesome. For example, in the manga, Honoka’s fire is as beautiful as it is deadly. If this continues, I believe some of the other characters will lose a certain something that made them awesome.
Recently, My Sister Is Unusual / ImoCho
Genres: comedy, romance, slice of life, supernatural
Themes: ecchi, family, fanservice, harem, incest
Vintage: 2014-01-04
Plot Summary: A girl named Mitsuki Kanzaki lives with her step-brother Yuya after her mother remarries. One day, Mitsuki is possessed by the self-proclaimed spirit of a young girl, Hiyori Kotobuki. Hiyori (in Mitsuki’s body) must fall in love with Yuya to move toward the “Gates of Heaven.”
Review:
The show centers around a step brother/ sister duo that are going to be living together alone. While this is nothing new for awkward brother/sister love shows, there is a twist that makes the show unique; the sister is periodically possessed by a raunchy female ghost. The ghost introduces the other major plot twist in the form of a chastity belt that is forced upon the possessed sister. This was another anime of which I had read the manga a few months prior, and this series is right up my alley. I have a weakness for the fantasy fulfillment harem type shows. There are bound to be more girls to complicate the already crazy and outlandish situation. My only issue with the anime thus far is the censorship, but in a way that’s to be expected. We’ll have to wail until the blu-ray comes out for the uncensored version.
