Erm, I do not think that the fan-subbers are the issue here XD lol...Hmm, and sound section should not be the quality of
the sound that you heard, it should be about the quality of the music itself, cos quality of the sound could be improved
if you have a home theater ;) (wish I had one :x)
Actually a nice review ^^ good job but you should stick more to the point next time :D
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
Effectively a "magical girlfriend" story with the magic replaced by extra fanservice, Ai Yori Aoshi is a fairly by-the-numbers romance. With the requisite amount of comic misunderstandings, hot springs episodes, melodrama, WAFF and dim-yet-busty girls the series is, for the most part, an amusing but generic story. However, there is one thing which keeps the series from mediocrity, and that is the wonderfully appealing relationship between the two leads. Although Kaoru is your classic kind-hearted sappy girl magnet (with a few wrinkles in his backstory which make him a bit more interesting) and Aoi is just a Belldandy-style gentle-and-loving-doormat, their oh-so-sweet romance gives the series a real core of strength, making viewing much more worthwhile every time it shows up (in between heavy doses of filler and fanservice).
The other characters are the usual disposable group of support characters- loser friends, busty junior classman/maid, foreign bimbo, bratty childhood acquaintance, stern minder and cute animal mascot, with personalities ranging from amusing to outright annoying. The fanservice often verges on excessive, but the series does usually manage to be quite funny when it tries. Although most of the episodes are filler, they rarely become tedious and the glimpses of Kaoru/Aoi material are well worth watching for. Technically, the animation is decent if unspectacular, boasting some attractive character designs (esecially Aoi), while the Japanese voice acting is overall quite good.
Overall, Ai Yori Aoshi is a decent series for those who like their romance sweet and their fanservice free. Not fantastic by any standard, but worthy of a casual look.
Rating:
Art
Art and music are excellent, like in the original series, but several severe animation flaws (most notably in episode 5)
made me downgrade this attribute.
But I can't praise the work of the fansubbers enough. Not only did they use all honorifics and translate the spoken
words without any errors in the English language, they translated each and every Kanji/Kana displayed in the images (in
a way that it boundlessly embeds into the image art), sometimes even labels on fast moving targets, and added footnotes
about Japanese cultural elements now and then (most notably in episode 10 about the spa resort). This is the best fansub
quality I have ever seen - both the ani-kraze and AonE version. (I prefer the AonE version, as the language is easier to
understand for a non-native speaker, it feels less domesticated and contains more translation of visible text within the
scenes; ani-kraze made me use my dictionary more often and took away a little of the "Japanese feeling" now
and then.) Geneon Entertainment (ex-Pioneer Entertainment) who now licensed this series will have a hard time to beat
this.
Rating:
Sound
For my primary viewing session, I listened to this show in its original language of Japanese. The series features a very good stereo mix that mostly takes advantage with the music and the ambient sound effects to provide a good experience. The show seems to provide a lot more depth and feeling to it than the first season did and I ended up cranking this up a fair bit more than most normal shows to enjoy it all the more. Dialogue is crisp and clear throughout both language tracks and the music comes across great here.
Rating:
Presentation
I think this is one of those anime's where you would either love or hate it. For me, I enjoyed it quite a bit.
The animation is splendid and beautiful. It's well drawn, very neat and clean. I've always loved how the scenery was drawn, the colouring... everything. It was so realistic and peaceful, makes you want to go to the place yourself.
The story was 'okay' I suppose. Sometimes it's rather predictable, but I loved it to the end.
I love the characters. How they look, sound, react. It just makes the anime fun. There's a huge range of variety for their characteristics.
Aoi's extreme sensitivity sometimes made me go "wah?" because I couldn't exactly understand what the big deal was. She does cry a lot, and some might find it annoying. I find it rather cute though, and how Kaoru always comforts her. When those parts take place, it just makes me smile at how cute they are.
This anime was enjoyable to me because in most romance animes, they don't exactly explain why the heck the character likes another (somewhat like Love Hina), maybe because they focus more on comedy. This one is more on romance and it gives details and viable reasons. Not just 'Oh he's nice, I love him', as in most cases are in other animes.
Ai Yori Aoshi is rather emotional. The fillers and particular episodes will either make you go 'awww' or bring you somewhat near to tears (depends on how emotional you really are).
In conclusion, this is one of the most enjoyable romance animes I've watched. It brang smiles to my face without me knowing. Artwork is wonderful, blahblahblah. Go watch it.
Rating:
Final Verdict
6.3333 (average)
Reviewed by ChunkySkillz, Aug 10, 2005
Comments
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tareren Aug 20, 2005
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jianichie Sep 30, 2005
I love that book
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UberDog Mar 23, 2015
Good review, nice job.
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