Scrapped Princess

Imagine yourself being on the run since the day you were born becaue everyone around you wants to kill you, that's how life has been for the young girl Pacifica Cassul.

When Pacifica was born a prophesy was made that she would be the poison that would destroy the world and that a catastrophe would occur on the day she turns sixteen. Because of this Pacifica leaves her home in the village of Manhurin and together with her adoptive siblings, her brother Shannon the talented swordsman and siser Racquel who is proficient in magic, she is now on the run from the followers of the god Mauser who are doing everything in their power to see to it that she will not live to see her sixteenth birthday.

It was not a spectactular show and it will not make it into my favourites, but I liked it. The storyline is decent and easy to follow, the characters are likable (although some of them I just wanted to slap from time to time, like our spoilt little princess for example) and the artwork is decent enough, even though more attention seem to have been spent on the characthers rather than on, let's say, their horses... All in all it was enjoyable to watch and it had just the right amount of excitement to still be counted as an easy-to-watch show.

Scrapped Princess gets three out of five otakus.

ANN, MAL

Junjou Romantica 1 & 2

Juunjou Romantica is a romatic comedy / drama centering around the relationships of three different couples and the struggles they face.

Misaki is studying for his college entrance exam and turns to his brothers best friend, Akihiko Usami, for some extra tutering. When his brother then gets married and transfers to another city for work Misaki somehow ends up living with Usami and that's when the interesting part of the story begins...

First of all, let me make this one thing clear, this is shounen-ai (bordering yaoi) so if that's not your cup of tea you'd be better off not watching this show.

The first series I found to be a bit disorganized, skipping fast between one story and the next, which made it hard to follow at first. Once you got used to the rather fast pace the series was OK, the characters are quite amusing and it does have it's bright moments but overall I felt like it was just moving too fast. And the start of some of the relationships... Well, let's just say I would have liked them to be a bit more... consensual.

Moving on to the second series then; this series (which follows directly after the first and continues to deal with the relationships between the characters and how the develop) is a tad better than the first one. The charachters are the same so not much to say about them and the same goes for the plot in general, but I like the way this one progresses more. It feels like the relationships have matured and the pace in which this one switches between the different stories is somewhat more managable (or maybe I've just gotten used to it by now?).

Overall this wasn't one of my favourites, I had fun watching it but neither the storyline nor the animation really caught my interest, if it wasn't for the second series I would have been left disappointed but since they did improve the two series together gets 3 out of  5 otakus.

Kamisama Hajimemashita

Kamisama Hajimemashita, or Kamisama Kiss as it is called in English, is a romatnic comedy about a girl who, after being abandoned by her indebted father and evicted from her apartment, finds herself as the heir to a rundown shrine.

After being both abandoned and evicted Nanami finds herself alone in a park late at night. There she meets Mikage, a strange man who is terrified of dogs, and ends up telling him about her misfortunes. Mikage then surprises her by saying she can have his house as a thank you for rescuing him from a dog and since she has nowhere else to go, Nanami accepts, she is given a map and after following it she finds herself standing in front of a rundown shrine. Thinking it must be a joke but that she doesn't have any other options Nanami enters the shrine where she meets Kotetsu, Onikiri and Tomoe, the shrine guardians, and finds out that not only was she given a shrine, she awas also appointed the new earth deity of said shrine. The story then follows the life of Nanami and the shrine guardians and how their relationships develop through ups and downs.

With a good ratio between love, humour and character development this is a really good show if you are into the typical anime-love-series. Despite the plot being a tad on the weak side (which was expected) this is one of those series that really tug at your heartstrings, not because it is sad but because it's just that little bit too perfect. It gives you the perfect amount of butterflies and with only thirteen episodes it leaves you wanting more. It also has the perfect tsundere bishounen (who also happens to be supernatural beings) for the fangirls to dream about.

This show pretty much killed my heart with longing for that perfect butterfly scenario but other than that (or maybe because of that?) I really enjoyed it so I give it 4 out of 5 otakus.