Retsgip’s Anime Blog

As per request, the Ouran review

Rating: 9.3/10

For some reason, as I write this entry, I get this really strange mental image of me at a group counseling session. It’s my turn to speak, and I stand up, raise my hand, and say: “Hi, I’m Retsgip. I’m male and I like Ouran High School Host Club.” My speech triggers a short round of applause, some oohs and awws, and a nice hearty group hug from my peers as they pat my back and telling me “it’s okay” and how proud they are of me. What the hell?

So, leaving my abnormal mental image on the back-burner (preferably in the trash, thanks), what else can I say about Ouran?

Well, it’s the first shoujo anime that I truly enjoyed watching, despite my interests being mostly on shounen anime. Sure it’s debatable whether or not the anime version of Ouran can really be classified as shoujo since it really appealed to both males and females, but Ouran still illustrates a lot of shoujo qualities for the majority of most episodes.

I asked myself why it was such a successful shoujo anime for both genders, and I came up with a few things. For one, the writers have embedded a huge amount of comedy throughout Ouran, introducing a mixture of metaphoric, blatant slapstick, embarrassing, and parody ridden humor. Also, the characters seemed to have lots of depth, and were also easily likable (despite them being male). Thirdly(wtf is that even a word?), most important aspect that I saw was that it was fun.

Plot:

The weakest part of Ouran is it’s plot. It doesn’t matter how much I love the anime, I can tell the plot is lacking. What the plot does have though, is an overall goodness. What I mean is, the plot for each episode is usually pretty weak, but if you gather everything together it turns out to be rather impressive. We get background stories for every Host and also get to see interactions and friendships evolve slowly throughout the series.

The problems they face as a whole, are not very important, but what is important is that they face them together (for the most part). In the end, this is a comedy anime about friendship, but by no means does that harm the quality of Ouran one bit.

Relationships:

Lets face it, for a shoujo anime, the love story is pretty weak. Although, I did hear that in the manga, they put a lot more focus towards it. Tamaki x Haruhi just doesn’t happen in the anime, even if it’s somewhat implied in the last episode. But whatever, that just makes it less “girly,” and allows for a greater range of viewers. The more love story, the less male viewers I’d expect to watch the show (profiling in action right here).

The kind of relationships you get from this anime are super strong bonds of friendship between a group of friends. They all know every little secret about each other (with the exception of Kyouya because he’s mysterious), and nobody really cares. Strong bonds of friendship mixed with minimal amount of drama, makes for a rather enjoyable viewing experience in my opinion.

Artwork:

The artwork wasn’t out of this world, or even particularly fantastic, but that wasn’t the what Ouran was aiming for. It did however, do a perfect job at animating expressions and feelings. Characters such as Honey or Tamaki show a crapload of ups and downs with their feelings, and I think they did a good job portraying that through their artwork. To me, the most important aspect of the art was it’s consistency. My only complaint is that Haruhi wasn’t that good looking. I found myself admiring the men more than trying to figure out what made Haruhi so appealing to the Host Club(visually, that is).

Sound:

I thought the ED for this show was fantastic. I don’t have any way to host the song for you, but if you have an account at Gendou, you can grab it here. It’s use in the last episode right as Haruhi cracks the whip to spur on the horses got me all choked up and tingly. Overall, the OST wasn’t horrible, but I can’t say I’d listen to it idle as I walked down the street or anything. It fits perfectly into the ritzy nature of Ouran and their club, and actually creates a realistic atmosphere.

As for the seiyuus, I think they all did a great job. I don’t really pay enough attention to the names of any seiyuu so I can’t tell you if one lived up to their expectations or not, but I can tell you I think they all did a great job. I never once thought that the seiyuu did a poor job of acting out a scene or anything (minus the scene where Haruhi is acting).

Characters Ranking(here’s the fun part):

6. The Twins

The twins are easily my least favorite character in the show. I couple them as one character because, well they pretty much are. Sure they start branching off towards the end of the series, and it’s kind of a big deal that you tell them apart, but I hate them both so does it really matter? One thing I don’t understand, is how the girls even enjoy watching to brothers. I can understand every other Host, but the twins I just don’t get. It’s a little creepy even I think. If I could have them remake this series, I’d ask them to give the twins less episodes.

5. Mori

From here on it got really hard for me rank anyone(besides #1) because I like most of the cast equally. Mori offers a calm and somewhat secure presence. He’s like superman except without the cape…or the tights…or, well yeah you get the point. He’s not a huge source of comedy but I can remember times that I laughed due to something he did or said. Most of the time his humor was less slapstick and a little more subtle. He’s kinda hot too.

4. Haruhi

Although I don’t think Haruhi deserves a high spot in my ranking, I do acknowledge that her attitude and personality is what makes Ouran tick. She has the most realistic viewpoint on life or situations, and more often than not is the voice of reason. This is especially important, seeing as everyone in the Host Club is the opposite of reasonable. If I tried to count the amount of times I saw her with a (-_-)” face, I’d probably lose count around episode four. I think what scared me the most about her was that she thinks exactly like me, and it was kind of hard putting myself in her place since uh…I’m a guy. Her ability to see through every character’s facade and actually see them for who they really were, is probably her best talent. She’s a reverse trap, which means she’s trouble. Any female who dress in men’s clothing (excluding sport’s jerseys) are bound to be trouble.

3. Kyouya

Kyouya is kind of hard to fall in love with. At first, I put him in the background and he was my least favorite character, but as the show evolved, so did he. He actually turns into a key element in the show and is a source of quite a bit of comedy. I’m thinking the episode where he hangs out with Haruhi at the mall is one of the better episodes of the series, and it’s mostly because he’s the focus. His scheming and plotting is what makes him so sexy. He’s the evil mafia boss, except he’s a good guy.

2. Honey

I have no shame in loving Honey. I don’t really think his character is all that impressive in terms of sexiness, but I do think he’s super cute (there I said it bitches). I love the scenes where he breaks down into tears and runs and hugs Haruhi or Mori because he either can’t eat cake, or…can’t…eat cake? I usually enjoy any jokes where Honey is the focus, because he’s the second most outragous character, and boy do I love outragous humor sometimes. Oh yeah, he’s cute too…*sweat*

Honestly though, I think Honey is one of the more complex characters in the show. His past isn’t blatantly obvious like most of the other hosts, and he also has two personalities, both of which I find awesome. He’s actually really smart, and pretty observant aparently since he was the second host to realize Haruhi’s true gender. Notice he doesn’t care that Haruhi’s a guy or a girl and treats her like a father/mother figure regardless the rest of the series. “Haruhi kawaii!” is one of his more used phrases I’d say, second only to “Cake!”

1. Tamaki

I don’t even know what to say about Tamaki because I’m pretty sure nothing I could ever say would do him justice. Tamaki is one of the most memoriable male characters I’ve come across in my anime watching days. Never have I seen a male have such an affect on women, and for once it’s not some creapy side character. His stunts are the most outragous and are usually packed with poses, monologues, tears, facial expressions, and pretty much anything else you can think of. If I had to request a host, it’d be Tamaki because he would probably give me the most laughs in the shortest amount of time. His ability to make friends as well as see people for who they are is his greatest skill. Nobody even expects him to be so good at seeing through people’s facades, but he does, and it usually makes them really uncomfortable. Cuz you know, he grabs their chin and dips them n shit. Yeah, I really have got to go practice that…

Final Words:

I recommend this to everyone, even if you’re a tough shounen boy or whatever. If you like comedy and don’t mind watching a bunch of guys mack on rich girls for money, then I’m pretty sure you’ll enjoy this series. Take it with a grain of salt, though. Don’t expect a lot to happen, and don’t expect much action. The majority of the episodes are them hanging out, getting into weird situations, or using their Host skills. What you should expect, is some good clean comedy, most of the time with meaning or thought behind it. Anyways, I really enjoyed it. 9.3/10 is a pretty high score for me.

-Retsgip