Wow, I haven't posted since Sunday that's weird. I haven't really done much of anything since Sunday, to be honest. But with this whole 'review backlog' thing I have going, figured I should
start writing them.
I went into Sister Princess after watching the first ten episodes of Gundam
00. Gundam 00 made me want to kill myself, and while I will finish it (including season 2 + movie) I needed a break in an extreme way.
My expectations of Sister Princess were low, so I figured, no chance of it disappointing me.
Sister Princess Anime Review
Wataru Minakami is the top student in his high school and is accurately
portrayed as an incredible nerd. I mean, look at that: Well, thanks to a computer glitch, he utterly failed his high school
entrance exam.
It looks like he's about to spend a year doing nothing (read: the joys of
cram school) when he's borderline kidnapped and sent to Promised Island,
where he is to attend Stargazer Hill Academy.
But not only that: it also turns out he has thirteen younger sisters that he
never knew about, and not all of them were aware of each other. Still, they
all really love their big brother.
Based on knowing this beforehand, all I could figure was that the anime
would be the sort of thing Kirino would love.
You know, little sisters loving their big brother and all. Turns out, that wasn't accurate at all...which is good, because some of the
sisters were like below the age of ten and that would have been
creepy/disturbing/get-this-away-from-me on so many levels.
Instead, Sister Princess was a light-hearted story about pretty typical
brother-sister things, minus all the hair-pulling and theft. I'd say it's
the best family since the Brady Bunch.
The Characters: Sister Princess
Okay, so we have Wataru, and we have thirteen sisters. We also have
like...two other random people. That's our cast. With thirteen sisters to
keep track of, I figured I would never be able to do it. I figured: I will
identify them by hair color, there will be no name memory except for maybe
four of them.
To my surprise, each and every sister was characterized incredibly well, and
before I knew it, I was entirely familiar with every last sister, knowing
which interest was theirs and all.
Now that is what I call masterful charactization when you can give me 13
younger sisters and make them all fully-fleshed out so I know them
well...why can't a lot of shows today do that so well?
Seriously, there are so many forgettable characters now, ones I forget about
an hour after finishing a series, and even having watched Sister Princess a
few weeks ago now, I still know which is which.
Wataru was also well-done. He kind of reminded me a Studio Key guy, Tomoya
or Yuuichi maybe. But not as awesome.
The Random Yaoi: Sister Princess
Sister Princess, 26 episodes. Sometimes a few of the sisters would mention
wanting to marry their brother in a surprisingly non-incestuous way.
So that's straight. And Wataru likes girls. Definitely. No secret. He gets
all blushy when his sisters are hugging him too much and in the beginning,
before he knows some of them are his sisters he sees them as attractive. Well then, near the end, Wataru's friend Akio shows up on the island.
Akio is first seen in episode one and then not ever seen again until the
end, though Wataru does spend the entire series writing emails to him. And
he wants Wataru to come back to Tokyo with him. And we get this:
To be perfectly honest, this may be the first time my inner yaoi fangirl has
ever told the obvious seme to go fuck himself. You want Wataru to leave his
sisters? Not cool man. Not cool at all.
Conclusion?
The whole thing where I had no expectations, so I couldn't be disappointed?
In comparison to those non-existent expectations, Sister Princess actually
managed to impress the hell out of me. It was really, really good.
There wasn't what I'd call an overwhelming plot, but this anime didn't need
one. It did well with its little one-episode arcs, its focus on the familial
relationship.
Not the sort of thing I'd expect to enjoy in any way, but hey I'm not going
to complain when an anime series exceeds my expectations.
If you're looking for something nice and light-hearted, I would seriously
recommend giving Sister Princess a watch.
There's also the second season, Sister Princess RePure, which takes place a
few years later when all of them are living separately.
I'm not going to go to the trouble of reviewing it, because really it's more
of the same. If you enjoy the first season, you'll enjoy the second.
My rating: 7/10
Just because I enjoyed it didn't mean it was without its flaws. It was
nothing special. (Who knows, maybe if I watched more anime from that time
range I'd disagree).
Fan Art: Sister Princess
Sister Princess | |
| Episodes | 26 |
|---|---|
| Genre | Comedy, Drama, Romance, Slice of Life, Harem |
| Aired | April 4, 2001 to September 26, 2001 |
| Directed by | MAL refuses to tell me |
| Producers | Starchild Records |
| Opening Theme | Love Destiny by Yui Horie |
| Closing Theme | Tsubasa by Yui Horie |
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