"Onii-chan Dakedo Ai Sae Areba Kankeinai yo ne" (Light Novel) vs Anime Discussion

After recently picking up the light novel version of Onii-chan Dakedo Ai Sae Areba Kankeinai yo ne and reading up to volume three, I am blown away at how much the anime could have been…if it just followed the light novel’s direct pacing. It is amazing how different the anime feels in tone and execution compared to the light novel which in my honest opinion is the choice form of enjoying this brother/sister love fest. So let’s get down to the facts that separate the mediocre anime from the amazing light novel.

So first thing I noticed when reading the light novel was that the conversations really bring out the best in the characters. The first volume sets up how Akito comes to living with his sister AND how he becomes so close to the whole student counsel AND how everyone ends up living under one roof. The anime kind of just throws you into the story where they are already living together and Akito is already a part of the student counsel. I always thought that the first episode of Onii-chan Dakedo Ai Sae Areba Kankeinai yo ne felt strange as if they were not explaining how some things came to be. Also the conversations in the light novel are extremely witty and well written. Each conversation is important to the plot and helps shed some light on why someone acts the way they do in public. There are scenes where a back and forth conversations between two characters can last for an entire chapter. You might find this tedious to read but I found that the light novel blew the anime out of the water in terms of how interested I was with the characters. The anime also takes all the seriousness out of the light novel. I was quite surprised to find out that the light novel was not a romantic comedy but more of a serious slice of life that explores two siblings pasts. 

So continuing on what I touched on at the end of the pervious paragraph, the tone of the anime is the second problem when being compared to the light novel. This might not be a problem if you just want another generic high school comedy harem but after reading the light novel’s first three volumes, there is no turning back to the anime. The light novel goes much deeper into how the student counsel goes about helping Akito cure Akiko’s “problem”. The way the anime introduces the main focus of curing Akiko is “Hey it’s wrong to want your brother’s d!#@ so stop that!! Oh we also all love you Akito!!!” So like I said if you want mindless harem, go with the anime. If you want a more serious drama, go light novel.

The anime tries very hard to be funny but the only show that can rip off other anime and be funny about it is Gintama

Now the biggest beef I have with the anime is the omission of some very important information. The light novel goes MUCH more in-depth to the back stories of the characters as well as what happened to Akito and Akiko’s parents. The novel even brings up why Akito acts the way he does around his sister. The flashback conversation he has with his parents when he was little is EXTREAMLY IMPORTANT TO THE WHOLE PLOT. It completely shows why he acts so caring around Akiko AND brings up some VERY IMPORTANT information that is never brought up in the anime. This information (that Akiko and Akito are actually not blood relatives and that it is Akito who is not really a part of the bloodline) is uhhh PRETTY F#@$ING IMPORTANT. How it didn’t make its way into the anime is beyond my comprehension. 

Ugh I am complaining a lot and I apologize. While I find the light novel the superior version of the story, the anime is not…all that bad. It is definitely more laid back and focuses more on the comedy aspects of the story but it still provides some of the key moments in the light novel. As a standalone anime it is decent but when compared to the light novel it will never quite match up. I have not been so engrossed in a story since my first read of the Sword Art Online light novel. I have a deeper appreciation of all the characters especially Akito after reading some of the Onii-chan Dakedo Ai Sae Areba Kankeinai yo ne light novel. There is much more going on than the anime is telling you.

Dat face when you stay up late reading something awesome

"To Love-Ru: Darkness" Episodes 3-9 Thoughts

So while I do not hide the fact that I watch anime (actively) to my friends, To Love-Ru: Darkness is an anime that I will never tell a soul (that I personally know) I watch. I sometimes wonder why I do watch the show since the main focus is well…not really the plot.

So yeah To Love-Ru: Darkness in case you somehow didn’t know is an ecchi comedy from the animation studio XEBEC. This season marks the third season of To Love-Ru and it has a running manga which the show is based off of. I shamefully raise my hand again by confessing that I have been keeping up with the manga and actually have been enjoying it. I tend to usually not want to watch or read ecchi related content but the wacky events that happen in the To Love-Ru universe are actually quite fun to watch/read.  To Love-Ru: Darkness has so far proven to be just as wacky as its two predecessors and of course has kept up with the fan’s demands for the…animation!-___-

"What?! There is inappropriate content in this show!!?

Episodes three through nine have kept the same pacing and structure as the first two. My post on the first two episodes can be found here but if you do not want to read up on what happened in the early parts of the show all you have to know is that the show revolves around a male high school student named Rito. Rito becomes involved with a space princess named Lala very early on in the To Love-Ru time line but plays more of a sideline role in Darkness. The main female protagonist for this season is Momo (Lala’s sister) who wants to create the perfect harem for Rito. Other than that, you shouldn’t fret about the plot because every episode wants to exploit two things; comedy and ecchi content. So the comedy: if you do not like slapstick type comedy then please steer far away from this anime. Everything that is considered a joke in this anime comes in very short bursts and is usually recycled themes and gags. Ecchi content: there is a lot of it and I am willing to bet that at least eighty percent of each episode shows the trademark awkward camera angles and rays of light blocking certain body parts. I will put my two cents out here and say if you are only wanting to watch this for the ecchi related content, I would wait until the Blu-ray and DVD (…people still watch DVD’s?) versions of the anime come out because there is so much censoring in this show. Every little thing has annoying rays of bright white lights coming in from no where. It has gotten to the point where it actually distracts me from the overall visual elements of the anime. It’s a shame too because the anime is quite beautiful. The backgrounds are very well defined and the characters models are amazing. All the females are visually attractive and even though the facial expressions are represented in a comedic way (sort of simplistic if that makes sense), they still express emotions fairly well. 

The characters in this anime are strangely easy to like. The show boasts a pretty large cast (not Negima!?big but pretty close) and I can honestly say that I can remember at least seventy percent of them. Each character has a pretty unique personality even if some of them sport the typical tsundere or super shy stereotypical personalities. What really shines is Momo the main female lead of the show. She sits behind a façade not wanting people to really know what her goals are really aiming for. She’s also becomes fairly vulnerable with her feelings towards Rito by episode nineish. Overall the cast is pretty well done and each of the female leads should offer you something that makes you want to see them succeed with catching Rito’s affection.

So bullet points: Slapstick comedy, overwhelming ecchi content, beautiful animation with fairly annoying censorship in the forms of blinding light, and a quality cast. Should you watch it? I say yes but wait for the Blu-Ray copies to be released. Also support the anime industry by BUYING THE DAMN ANIME AND NOT PIRATING IT. Like the gaming industry the anime industry is really struggling at the moment and every time you download something without paying for it you put the people of the industry’s jobs at stake. Please if you do not have the means of purchasing anime, please watch whatever you can find on legal streaming websites such as Crunchyroll.

"Onii-chan Dakedo Ai Sae Areba Kankeinai yo ne" (Anime) Episodes 3-10 Thoughts

After ten episodes I finally know what Onii-chan Dakedo Ai Sae Areba Kankeinai yo ne really is. It's not a good anime BUT an extremely cute one (so a s#!tty one right...?).

Onii-chan Dakedo Ai Sae Areba Kankeinai yo ne I think would be considered the generic harem anime of the season due to the fact that nothing really happens...ever. The only thing that I can tell you what this show is trying to accomplish is that there are four girls (two extremely cute ones and three others that I could care less about) trying to get with our main character Akito. They go through the typical “Going shopping” and “Shower” scenes that are in EVERY other harem anime. There just really isn’t any plot twists or hang on…any plot whatsoever.

But hey characters can save a show…right? I actually like Akito because unlike a lot of male protagonists in harems, he has likeable qualities. He is neither a perve, sex crazy adolescent teenager nor the polar opposite super shy but strangely likeable to every girl everywhere. He is simply a guy who lives with his sister and childhood friends while attending high school. He has sexual desires but he doesn’t want to lose “it” to just any girl. He isn’t the best male lead I have ever seen but a solid one that I can bear with. The female cast is however a mixed bag. We have five main female leads introduced by episode seven that compete for Akito's affection, Akiko the annoying (but too cute) sister, Anastasia the mischievous (and WAY too cute) instigator, Arashi the assertive s!ut, Haruome the…I don’t know what…(boyish looking girl?), and Arisa who is quite annoying and little. The only characters that I have even a lick of liking towards are Anastasia and Akiko. Anastasia is extremely cute and is always trying to get Akito to say inappropriate things. She is by far the one with the hardest time controlling the inner struggle of how to deal with her feelings towards Akito. The other female character, Akiko is Akito’s sister (I’m sure they will pull an “Oh she is actually his cousin/half-sister/adopted sister” crap to try to make it ok for incest -___-). She is madly in love with Akiko and no it is not the brother sister type love; it’s the type of love that apparently Japan loves to throw into anime…Unlike most of the world I don’t particularly mind a brother and sister getting married since in our past it happened quite often. Inbreeding to an extent can produce dangerous results but it has been scientifically proven that these odds are very slim. Even with this thinking though, the love that Akiko supposedly has for Akito seems very forced. She is also quite annoying as every scene I see her in makes me want to duct tape her mouth shut BUT she way too cute for her own good. The things she goes through trying to get Akito’s affection is remarkable and impossible not to find adorable. I wouldn’t mind having a sister like Akiko to be honest…Anyways the point is that minus these two characters, the rest in my opinion are s#!t. The other characters just do not appeal to me physically or ideologically; they are just boring and/or generic. 

How could you not find this cute!?

or this?!

So there’s no plot and pretty crappy characters…well the animation and sound are bound to be amazing by today’s standards right…? WRONG well kind of…There are many scenes where the animation is quite good such as the one-on-one scenes between Akito and the various female cast. The character models are where some of the…let’s call it quality control seems to slip a little bit. I don’t know if it is just lazy animation or a lack of a needed budget but some of the scenes sport some bad character models. Whether it is the hair, facial expressions, or just how the shot is well…shot, something always seems to be off. It’s like the characters could look better but they just don’t…IT may be just that I have become excessively picky with animation since technology has helped animation tremendously but I feel as if this anime is not getting the amount of work it deserves. The females are still very stunning in most scenes it just seems as if the quality doesn’t hold through all the episodes. Sound wise the voice actors have done a decent job expressing their characters. Even though Akiko and Arashi are very annoying (multiplied by their voice actors), the voice actors pull their personalities off quite well. The sound track however is extremely generic…Both the openings/closings and the music during the show are just not noteworthy. It is barely passable. 

Most of the scenes are like this; they are shooting for a comedic effect with the style of animation but it just isn't done very well.

So let me get this straight…there is no plot to be found, crappy characters, inconsistent animation, and passable audio qualities? Why the hell would I watch this then!? Well that’s a tough question to answer. It seems that many animation studios think that today’s audience just wants cute, high school shows rather than the thought provoking, action orientated, or deep romance anime we have seen in the past (Steins;Gate, Death Note, Fate/Zero (actually pretty recent), Rec, ext.). Maybe they think we are easy to please, I don’t know but I have to say one thing about this show; it’s decent. It’s extremely cute, funny in a lot of parts, and at certain moments rewarding. The character interactions are enjoyable to watch and each episode does not feel like it is dragging. Overall it’s an average show with some cute characters; is that not good enough for you?

WHAT DO YOU MEAN CUTE CANNOT CARRY A SHOW!!?

Currently Watching Anime (December 2012)

This past month has been absolutely hectic with finals finishing up. Not only did they mess up my anime posts but also my life in general. I have had barely any time to work on music, play TOR, or even hang out friends -___-. But hey with 5 weeks off from classes coming up I cannot complain. Here is what I am watching at the moment:

Initial D Fifth Stage 2 out of ?
Little Busters! 10 out of ?
To Love-Ru: Darkness 9 out of ?
Tonari no Kaibutsu-kun 11 out of ?
Sakurasou no Pet na Kanojo 12 out of ?
Sword Art Online 24 out of ? Finished!!!
Onii-chan Dakedo Ai Sae Areba Kankeinai yo ne 12 out of ? Finished!!!
Kamisama Hajimemashita 6 out of ? Stalled
K 1 out of ? Stalled
Haiyore! Nyaruko-san 1 out of ? Stalled

Sword Art Online is starting to get a little...ehhh along with Little Busters. I have still yet to know what the main focus of Onii-chan Dakedo Ai Sae Areba Kankeinai yo ne is and where the hell did Initial D Fifth Stage go!!?? Oh by the way Tonari no Kaibutsu-kun and Sakurasou no Pet na Kanojo are amazing so go watch them now.

"Kamisama Hajimemashita" (Anime) Dropped -__-

What started as an enjoyable experience has unfortunately sizzled out into something that is hard for me to explain. My initial experiences with Kamisama Hajimemashita were all very positive. I really liked the main character Nanami because she was placed into hardships that she had to overcome. Even though things seemed bleak, she trucked through every situation that arose. The animation was unique and colorful with some impressive lighting throughout every episode. What I think really let me down and eventually started to hinder my experience was what I feared in the beginning; it’s a shoujo. These types of shows are aimed for young women and after a couple episodes of men (weird looking pretty boys with no real noteworthy personality and/or goals) fighting over her, I soon became incredibly bored. Every episode seemed to tack on another person trying to either steal Nanami away because of her powers or to tick Tomoe off. There really wasn’t any thought provoking plot that was driving the show; just some amazing looking visuals. I honestly wanted to bite the bullet and just finish the show for the sake of not quitting but it just got to a point where I just couldn’t do it anymore. I feel as if you really must like the male leads and the whole triangle of love crap going on to even remotely like this show. I will probably finish the show sometime in the future just so I can give it a full review but for now this show equals what Tari Tari was last season; a complete bore.

"Tonari no Kaibutsu-kun" (Anime) Episodes 2-9 Thoughts

At the beginning of this current anime season, one of the two shows that I ended up choosing to follow was Tonari no Kaibutsu-kun. I had read the first couple chapters of the manga and formulated the opinion that it was not going to be a generic high school romance. In fact, little did I realize that the female lead in this show would soon become one of my all-time favorites.

So I’m not going to spend a lot of time going over what happens in the first couple episodes. A quick rundown is that the story revolves around Shizuku who unknowingly becomes attached to Haru who is a delinquent on the outside but actually a very intelligent and caring person on the inside. Shizuku has spent almost her entire life only worrying about results and grades. She spends almost all of her free time either studying or helping out in her father’s shop. What surprised me initially was how strong of a female lead Shizuku is. Most people are going to come to the conclusion that she is a heartless b!#ch that plays with Haru’s heart but in reality there is much more going on in her inner struggle. When you are placed into a situation with no bearings or knowledge of how to proceed, you make mistakes and in this show you will see both Haru and Shizuki make many mistakes. What the premise of the show has provided is Shizuku’s inner struggle to deal with her feelings towards Haru. In the beginning she thinks of Haru as being a bother and a nuisance but as the two become closer, she starts to realize her true feelings for him and ends up struggling to deal with them especially since they start to get in the way of her studies. You might think that this is a completely ludicrous and stupid thing to struggle over but to Shizuku she has never dealt with such a situation. She is used to having control and strategic planning in her life. As soon as Haru came into the picture, everything changed. She made new friends such as the internet dweller Asako, the calm and collective Souhei, and the smart yet mischievous Kenji. These characters offer up some pretty enjoyable character interactions that help show how both Shizuku and Haru mature.

Shizuku is not the only character in this anime that is having trouble with his/her inner self. Haru has a troubled past and he has almost no hold on his aggressiveness. He is constantly getting into confrontations over meaningless issues. Between Haru’s temper and Shizuku’s inability to think properly, these two are perfect for each other. The chemistry between the two is a little too hard to overlook even if you don’t want to see it. Haru is madly in love with Shizuku and while she wants to believe that she has control of the situation, she is also hopelessly head over heels for Haru. To see how things progress between the two, for better or worse is very fun to watch. This is not Kimi ni Todoke; everything does not seem happy and perfect all the time for the two lovers. There are fights (both vocal and physical) and misunderstandings at very key points that make you think that the relationship won’t last. This makes the romance seem real and not part of some fantasy world where everything is always positive and works out in the end.

Over on the animation and sound side, it works. It's nothing over the top for a 2012 anime but it isn't hindering or lacking either. The character models are drawn very well and the moving shots flow nicely. Also during the comedic scenes, the animation switches to a very basic style with plain faces and models to show the silliness and humor. It is done fairly well and usually adds to the overall enjoyment of those particular scenes. Sound wise the voice actors are very good at driving the emotional scenes making them very believable. The background music is nothing fancy but it does an adequate job setting the mood for each scene. 

Overall, this anime feels like a real world situation between two very dysfunctional members of society. The characters are the furthest thing from generic especially Haru and Shizuku. There are some very tense moments along with some “Oh my god I cannot believe he did that. How is he not embarrassed?” lovey dovey moments. If you are looking for a well written show about a realistic romance, I recommend you pick this up. I completely dread having to wait each week for the new episode to come out; the wait absolutely kills me -___-.

Cutest couple ever :D