AYA sounds quite interesting. do you nkow where i can download the anime?
Ai Yori Aoshi tv Review
The anime adaptation of Fumizuki Kou's manga features Kaoru Hanabishi, a normal every day college student. For years, he lived independently and alone. One day, his entire life gets turned upside down. He meets a young woman about his age one day at the train station. She appears lost and is searching for someone. In kindness, Kaoru lends a hand, without knowing that he was who she was searching for.
Aoi Sakuraba is the only daughter of a wealthy family. As such, her hand is well sought after. Unfortunately for her family, she already has her heart set on Kaoru, her betrothed. As a gesture of good faith, her parents allow them to live on the same property, with her acting as the landlady and her caretaker as the owner. Poor Kaoru has been reduced to playing the part of a tenant.
Of course, they don't know about all the other women who will be moving in with them...
How will Aoi and Kaoru explore their love with so many distractions? Will Aoi be able to cope with the number of love rivals?
Story & Characters
AYA's plot is... simple, but functional. I mean, it's just a simple romance, but with its own mark. I've heard comments that say "AYA is like Love Hina but with more fanservice", but definitely it's not. It's more mature and deeper (if we talk about Aoi and Kaoru, only... out of that, you see fanservice every 5 minutes :P).
Due to it's nature of a "show with lots of girls and one guy", I must admit that there's some "tenchi complex" in this anime, but at least you don't see all the girls chasing Kaoru ;P (not often, lol).
Seeing the relation between Aoi and Kaoru makes you feel in a very weird way. You suffer, laugh, etc... with them. Somehow, they can reflect the perfect couple anyone would like to have. I loved how this aspect was developed during all the episodes.
Too bad the other characters don't develop properly, like Miyabi-san (one chapter was dedicated to her, but I think it wasn't enough). And there are lots of questions without answers. Probably you can know more if you read the manga, but the anime seemed to be "short" in this aspect.
Rating:
Art
Excellent. AYA's artwork is simply one of the most beautiful pieces of character designs I've seen in any anime. From Aoi's cute appeal to Taeko's really "WTF" body, it was a top-notch work. Backgrounds are also beautiful and well detailed. I remember a page with lots of locations from Japan, that were reproduced in AYA, and it was a nice detail, IMO :)
Fanservice for the public, that's for sure. Even the loli fans have some things to watch here (Mayu seems to be very... well-formed, for being so young).
I find funny how the anime and the manga designs are so different. Anime style tends to take the path of "making characters kinda more real", while the manga style looks more cartoon-ish (not trying to say it's inferior).
Rating:
Sound
Music is the most dissapointing part of AYA. Though the ED and OP themes are excellent, the BGMs aren't really the greatest thing in the world. It sounds like your typical generic shojo music. Sometimes, music can ruin a moment in a episode... but fortunately some BGM's fit perfectly in certain situations (again, Kaoru's flashbacks...).
I strongly recommend to get Namoshirenu Hana, Towa no Hana and the vocal songs. They're cute :)
In the other side, speech is wonderful. Kawasumi Ayako's work here was simply pretty, Aoi's voice can really touch your heart easily. Kaoru's voice is good, it really reflect the voice of a college student with lots of problems, and etc... the only voice that annoyed me was Tina's (too loud).
Rating:
Presentation
HM... I'd lie if I say this show shines because of its originality. Let's just say AYA is like taking lots of elements from other romance animes, mixing them with an excellent chara design, voice acting and a regular OST.
Having that in mind, I watched it and it hooked me to the end. Some episodes tend to be not interesting (when the "mascot" appear, for example), other ones simply make you feel really sad (like Kaoru's flashbacks), but overall I think I had a good time with it. A lot of eye-candy abuse, though...
Humor is decent... seeing Tina teasing Taeko and trying to touch everyone's breasts is so funny (specially when she tried to touch Miyabi-san's).
As a conclusion, Ai Yori Aoshi can generate a lot of opinions, due to each person's criteria. Some people may love it, other will probably think it sucks and etc... In my opinion, it's worth watching it. I recommend to see the first 4 episodes, so you can have an idea of what you'll see in future episodes.
In few words: you can love it, or you can simply hate it.
Rating:
Final Verdict
7.8333 (good)
Reviewed by kyosuke, Dec 31, 2004
Comments
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phresh27 Feb 03, 2005
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kyosuke Feb 05, 2005
Sorry, I have no idea. Try looking around @ P2P programs. Maybe you'll have some luck if you do that.
OR... you can also buy the DVDs ;P
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UberDog Mar 23, 2015
Good review, nice job.
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