To Love Ru Anime Review

To Love Ru Anime Review

In the world of anime, there exists a genre that defines the shows that dedicate themselves to bombarding viewers gratuitous fan service at the expense of storyline and characters. I am of course referring to ecchi anime (ecchi being a Japanese slang word for anything dirty or sexual). To Love Ru has essentially become a hallmark of the genre in recent years. In the same way that Gundam is the embodiment of Mecha, To Love Ru is one of the most recognizable ecchi anime out there.

            Our protagonist, Yuuki Rito, is an ordinary freshman in high school, wishing for nothing more than to successfully confess his love to the cute and shy Sairenji Haruna. His peaceful world is shattered when an alien girl by the name of Lala appears to him (naked) in his bathtub (while he is bathing). Through a series of unfortunate misunderstandings, Rito becomes engaged to Lala, whose father happens to be a powerful tyrant ready to destroy Earth if Rito proves to be an unfit suitor for his daughter.

            The show itself is almost entirely episodic. Each episode basically consists of one of Lala’s many inventions going wrong and causing mayhem around her. As with every harem/ecchi anime, To Love Ru has its own cast of exploitable side characters. Rito’s younger sister Mikan is a favorite of mine, but there is also Rito’s best friend Saruyama, the sex changing alien Rin/Run and of course the bloodthirsty Yami. If I had to rate To Love Ru’s story, it would get a 5/10, simply because there isn’t a solid storyline at all. But we don’t watch ecchi/harem anime for a good story. We watch them for the fanservice, comedy, and characters. In that regard, To Love Ru is a pretty decent ecchi/harem anime. The characters are all generally likable and have their own unique quirks that keep them interesting. The show throws many jokes at the viewers, many of which involve Rito sexually harassing a girl by accident. Sometimes the jokes work, and sometimes they don’t. I personally didn’t find many of the jokes in To Love Ru funny, but there were a few that had me smiling or even laughing out loud.

            I have now reached the part of the review where I talk about the show’s fanservice. As many of you know, fanservice can either work in a show’s favor, or it can derail the story and cause the anime to become unfocused (High School of the Dead). I can safely say that fanservice works in To Love Ru’s favor. The show depends on fanservice heavily, but luckily the original mangaka and show writers were smart enough to write a story that uses fanservice to push the show along. In terms of the quality of the fanservice, all I can say is that there in fact exists an uncensored version of To Love Ru. If someone posted an uncensored episode of To Love Ru to a hentai sharing site, it would likely do quite well.

            To Love Ru shares the same weaknesses that all ecchi/harem anime face. The story, music and animation are all on the weaker side. However, the creators were aware that this genre is inherently weak in those aspects, and they wisely turned their focus towards their characters, jokes and of course, fanserive. To Love Ru is by no means an amazing show, but it knows what it is and you can clearly see that the creators had fun with it. 

Rating: 6/10

 

Kuroko no Basket Anime Review

Everyone has encountered a “ghost kid” at least once in their life. I’m talking about the kid that walks into class without anyone noticing, or the unknown kid in a group photo. These are the people that simply don’t have much of a presence when they are in a crowd. Enter Tetsuya Kuroko, a freshman at Seirin High School that is never noticed by anyone. Kuroko has the ability to be forgotten, unaccounted for and unnoticed by everyone because of what little presence he has. This proves especially useful for him on the basketball court, where everyone is focused on the ball, allowing Kuroko to move around on the court without anyone taking notice of him. He teams up with another freshman named Taiga Kagami, aiming to make Kagami the best basketball player in Japan. Where Kagami is tall, muscular, and loud, Kuroko is short, thin and incredibly quiet, making them an unlikely pair. The two of them join Seirin High’s basketball team, meeting the other players on the team. The observant, pun-master: Point guard Shun Izuki. Silent and hardworking hook-shot expert: Center Rinnosuke Mitobe. Finally, the wise and dedicated shooting guard Junpei Hyuuga. The team competes with other high school teams in Japan in an attempt to become number one in Japan. However, standing in their way are the unstoppable former members of the Teiko Middle School Basketball Club known as Generation of Miracles. The Generation of Miracles has broken up and all of the members have joined separate high school teams, ready to compete with Seirin High for the gold.

Kids on the Slope Anime Review

“Kids on the Slope” follows the story of Nishimi Kaoru, a smart, rich kid that has moved into Kyushu. His father travels around a lot due to his work, so Kaoru is forced to move into a new school every few years. No stranger to isolation, Kaoru quickly separates himself from his classmates, even when they try to approach him. That is until he is confronted by Kawabuchi Sentaro, the schools most infamous delinquent. Kaoru quickly learns that Sentaro plays jazz percussion and, being a piano player himself, eventually becomes intrigued by jazz. The two eventually start playing music together and become friends.
I wish that was where the story stopped, but unfortunately through a number of side character, meaningless romances and unresolved events, Kids on the Slope falls into the “13 Episode Trap”. The “13 Episode Trap” (not a real thing, just something I made up) is when an anime of 13 episodes or less attempts to do too much in too little time. Kids on the Slope tries to develop too many characters, such as Sentaro’s childhood friend Ritsuko, a trumpet player named Junichi and the beautiful art student Yurika. The anime introduces these characters (especially Junichi and Yurika) primarily as side characters, but then in a single episode, we are suddenly bombarded by their rapid character development. In other anime that have fallen into the trap, these bursts of development typically last about an episode, but Kids on the Slope manages to finish off Junichi’s back story in about 12 minutes. The development of these characters is just so rushed that when the anime wants me to feel something for them I unfortunately just don’t care enough. Kids on the Slope tries to develop a romance between Kaoru and Ritsuko. It spends the first 8 episodes or so frantically trying to build the romance between these two characters. The development is so rapid that it becomes unnatural and awkward. In my own opinion, a decent romance anime needs at least 20 episodes to build a natural, believable romance.
After all of that you probably think that I hated the show, and that simply isn’t true. While it did fall into the “13 Episode Trap”, to my knowledge, Kids on the Slope was able to perfect something that no other anime has before. This show managed to create the best musical sequences in any anime ever. Other shows like Nodame Cantabile and K-On! also have musical sequences. They are good, but something feels off about them, and you can instantly tell that they are just on looped animation sequence when they play instruments. In Kids on the Slope, every musical sequence feels fresh and new, but unfortunately it only gives us a handful of these moments. The animation on Sentaro’s drum playing is some of the best animation I have seen in any anime. The actual musical compositions are also fantastic. Sentaro and Kaoru’s performance at the festival is my favorite scene from the show and my favorite music sequence from an anime. Kids on the Slope had problems with its character development and story, but the music, animation and artwork made it all worth it in the end.

My MAL Rating:

Story: 4
Art: 10
Sound: 10
Character: 6
Enjoyment: 7
Overall:7