Shameful Otaku Secret!

Something for the ladies?

Along with Fox Girl Panty Shot High and Tenchi Muyo Rides Again (a.k.a. Kanokon and To Love-Ru, but I like my names better), something redeeming appears this season. Well, possibly. It just covers the opposing end of the spectrum, aka anime for shoujo. Of course that means romance, because girls are biologically precluded from liking robots.

Story and Characters

If Visual Novel adaptations for boys feature early light-hearted scenes devolving into tragic horror (see Kanon), then do manga adaptations for girls start with tragic horror and slowly get better? I don’t know, but Itazura Na Kiss‘s Aihara Kotoko sure gets things piled on in the first episode. After two years of pining after boy genius Irie Naoki, she writes a confessional love letter only to have him reject her. His reason?

Fucking ouch.

On the upside, her friends are all greasers or ’80s-John-Cusack lookalikes.

Her father has built a lovely new house, but when the central pillar is eaten by termites immediately, a measly level 2.0 earthquake tears the whole thing down. Now she’s forced to lodge at her father’s friend’s gigundic mansion. Her father’s friend is named… Irie. And now you see the premise.

Seems from the preview that Kotoko’s goal for the season is to do better in school, to the point of topping Naoki, just to show his cocky ass what’s what. I assume that somewhere along the way, he’ll learn the error of his ways and learn to love her. Or something. Who knows, the manga never ended because the author accidentally killed herself while cleaning the house she’d just moved into. Bizarre.

Animation, Music, Acting

Neither acting nor music are particularly impressive, but I suppose that’s not what we’re here for. The only really appealing characters visually are Kotoko and Naoki, which seems appropriate considering they’re the main character and the “love” interest. Voices are not horrible for the most part, but that main pair are great: Daisuke Hirakawa (the immortal Makoto of School Days) as Naoiki, so you know he’s okay to hate the character, and Nana Mizuki, recovering her dignity after a season of Rosario To Vampire.

Thoughts

Nothing really struck me so far, and there are a lot of shows waiting. But I sort of feel like if I really am going to blog either Kanokon or To Love-Ru (still undecided which, they both suck pretty bad), I must atone in some way. Will that atonement take the form of Itazura Na Kiss? Not sure.