Anime: Itazura na Kiss

Ita Na Kiss is definitely one of the better shows of its season. It is a slice-of-life based romance that spans a decade (I'm not joking) in time. It is about a girl named Kotoko and her unyielding devotion to a guy she likes (one sided) despite his cold exterior and popularity with other girls. It is truly a unique story that is well developed and full of interesting surprises. Definitely worth checking out.

Animation:
The animation is fairly well done though a bit washed out by my standards. Facial expressions are a bit odd looking (a bit cartoony?) in the ED and at certain moments in the series but otherwise it looks good. There is no fan service in this one as it is a somewhat serious romance.

Sound:
The OP/EDs were average as was the BGM. VA's were good as usual. Kotoko's personality requires a lot of vibrance and range of emotions and the VA did a really good job for that. Overall sound was good.

Story:
I have seen many shows in which they fast forwards by many years for the final episode but this series is unique in that there are multiple arcs (high school arc, college arc, after college arc) and a significant portion is dedicated to each arc, including those after fast-forwarding.

The story is about the relationship that Kotoko and Naoki build after Kotoko is forced to move into Naoki's house after her father's house collapses after a magnitude 2 earthquake.

I liked how new characters were introduced half way through the series and how, despite this, it still flowed very smoothly. I've seen many shows where this ruins the progression.

There were a lot of interesting and unexpected plot twists in the series that kept the interest level high. Various challenges await Kotoko (and later Naoki) as the series progresses but the conclusion is very satisfying and leaves the viewer smiling.

Character:
Kotoko is just about as clumsy, dim-witted, and useless as a girl can get. However, she has a lot of energy and heart to make up for it. She meets a boy named Naoki in high school who turns out to be a genius/prodigy. It turns out that Naoki's father is a friend of Kotoko's father and after a family emergency, the two find themselves living with each other.

There is plenty of development in the story and many supporting characters show up throughout the story to support and sometimes challenge the status quo between the two main characters.

Execution was beautiful as the characters' feelings for each other changes. Sometimes the changes seemed abrupt, especially with Naoki, but it just makes the human aspect even stronger.

Value:
I've watched several of these episodes multiple times (especially the ones where the plot advances greatly). Some of the episodes can be very funny thanks to Kotoko's antics while other moments can be quite saddening. Overall, it is a great work and should definitely be considered for a watch (or two).

Note: This review is based on m.3.3.w. fansubs, which, just like this show, are average at best. You can as well pick them as they take little space.



Originally created as manga by Tada Kaoru (Aishite Knight, Kimagure Angel) and directed by Yamazaki Osamu (Terra e..., Wrath of the Ninja) Itazurana Kiss[/b] is a very simple shoujo anime centered the life of a (surprise) clumsy girl, Aihara Kotoko, who has fallen in love with an emotionless genius, Irie Naoki.

The two best things about Itazurana Kiss is that: one - it has no fillers (except for the last episode, uuh, it hurt), two - Kotoko's and Irie's personalities, like water and fire, make a really beautiful contrast. And that's pretty much everything for the good things. Otherwise, this anime presents nothing new to the old shoujo love-romance formula (no surprise as the manga was written in 1991). Girl falls for a cold guy, after some sort of coincidence they hook up, and then it's all love and bunnies. Though I still must commend the author for never ruining Irie's obnoxious personality despite making him fall in love.

Animation: 5/10

Animation done by TMS Entertainment (Buzzer Beater, D.Gray-man) is, well, surprising. I mean, it's the year 2008 and they still go as low tech as this? Character designs are inconsistent: in one scene you can see Irie like this, in another like that and in the third you will go wait a sec, who is this guy?... Kotoko is no exception either, as though her original design is pretty good and she definitely looks really cute at times, there are many scenes where she undergoes such horrid deformations, that, well, you will be turned off for sure (and it's not slapstick humor scenes these deformations happen in if you are wondering). Also a lot of years pass in the span of the show, however, the outward appearance of characters doesn't change at all. Be it 17 years or 28 years old Kotoko always looks the same. It kind of kills the realistic feel this show tries to present... Anyway, it would still be plausible if the movement fluidity of those inconsistent character designs would be good, but it isn't. At times it seems as if the characters are literally sliding around the screen, and when they are not, their movements are blatantly choppy. Only backgrounds don't suffer from technical problems, as most of them, though barren and simplistic, are believable and create cute light-hearted atmosphere for the show.

Direction is barely worth mentioning as the camera always follows the characters and centers completely on them alone even when they are sitting down, talking or just idling. Bland, bland, bland. It's as if the staff had forgotten what camera angles are, or didn't have a guy responsible for them.

Sound: 4/10

The opening song Kimi, Meguru, Boku by Hata Motohiro is a pretty, if slightly shallow, song. It works pretty well at creating the not so serious, light-hearted shoujo like mood for the show. The two ending songs, Kataomoi Figher by GO!GO!7188 and Jikan yo Tomare by Azu, though not as good, are pretty similar to the opening one. Unfortunately, this is where the good comments on music end. Though composer Takanashi Yasuharu (Gantz, Ikkitousen, Mononoke) never was overly distinctive with his music, in Itazurana Kiss he reaches the epicenter of blandness itself. Not a single memorable track, not a tiniest memorable tune in the whole 25 episodes long show. The music is so bland, so boring, that it barely beats the silence. In anime I usually remember memorable scenes via their music and, well, frankly, there are no such scenes in the whole Itazurana Kiss.

Finally, voice-acting is average at best. Though the heroine voiced by Mizuki Nana (Naruto as Hinata Hyuuga) sounds pretty good, especially in those panic-hyperactive situations, side characters don't. Daisuke Hirakawa (Gankutsuou as Franz d'Epinay) comes off as mediocre with his performance of Irie Naoki, ultimately sounding boring, but fitting the character's conceited personality somewhat. Other characters, be it the Kansai accent speaking Kinnouske or a pig-like voice having girl from the main character's friends group end up as being either too bland or even annoying. There is also a foreigner Christine Robbins voiced by Goto Yuuko (Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuutsu as Mikuru Asahina) so expect to hear lots of shabby engrish lines here. Also, since that character eventually learns japanese the voice-actress is forced to talk her native language with fake accent which ends up being unsettling to say the least. Goto Yuuko is a decent seiyuu, but, damn, in this show, she was forced to act awfully. I was constantly fighting the urge to plug my ears whenever Christine Robbins and her fake Japanese accent would go into action.

Story: 5/10

Though the story is extremely rushed (more than 10 years pass in the span of 25 episodes) and sometimes it's hard to take things seriously, it's not boring to watch. It's funny and sometimes cute as Kotoko's reactions to Irie's cold treatment hardly get old. Were there any fillers abound, however, I might have not managed to finish this show at all. Nonetheless now it is just an average, by the book, shoujo show, without anything new or exciting to offer. The only really commendable thing in Itazurana Kiss is that it does indeed manage to follow the whole love life of its two leads from its silly beginning to its solid end.

Characters: 6/10

Save for Kotoko and Irie, all other characters are little more than extras. Few for comedic relief, few to advance the story, however, none of them develop enough to resemble real human beings. Anyway, as for Kotoko, she is funny, really, the way she messes things up, the way she tries her best, heh, even I started to enjoy keeping my eyes on her. On the other hand, Irie, perfect at everything and cold to everyone, is a great contrasting pair to the emotional and clumsy Kotoko.

Myers-Briggs personality type indicator[/u]:

Irie Naoki - ISTP (D)
Aihara Kotoko - ESFP (D)

Show Spoiler

Value: 4/10

Most certainly not a show to watch twice. Though it has no fillers, its story is way too simplistic to be experienced more than once. I really can hardly imagine anyone watching this show more than once... Unless you genuinely fall in love with Kotoko or Irie. Of course, I believe very few could fall, for those, while quite interesting, but still half-baked characters.

1. Conclusion[/u]:[/b] Best suited for ages 13+ Itazurana Kiss is an anime clearly aimed at women who will certainly find this show better than males, including me, do. Anyway if you don't have anything to watch at the moment and you really want to live through some light shoujo romances, well, Itazurana Kiss might be your pick, as well, as two hundred other shows. It's funny as long as you watch it, but you will start forgetting all about it the same day you have finished it. Anyway, it would be wiser to spend your time on exceptional shoujo like Full Moon wo Sagashite, Kodomo no Omocha or on one of many shoujo mangas as they are the dominating genre there, for example Mars would be a pretty good choice.

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Haven't done a massive anime sit through in a long time and I think this title was quite a safe choice. Although this anime comes off as quite typical for its genre the way they dealt with it was quite interesting. What struck me the most after finishing this series was the length of time it covers. Most stories only cover up to when characters get together whereas this makes it well beyond this point. [br][br]The premise is quite simple you have an average girl that falls in love with the school genius and ideal bachelor and confesses but is flat out rejected. Afterwards out of some random set of events she ends up living with him and so there crazy school lives together begin.[br][br]Animation[br]Its not great by any means but its not dreadful either. I think after watching enough series in this genre you really don't expect anything too ground breaking unless your watching a movie, ova or something released by Kyoto Animation :P. Regardless this anime choose to stay more true to an older style of animation. The characters looked a bit awkward at times but stay consistent. The backgrounds are simple and bland. The motion uses effects that you see in all animes that don't use CG. What I'm getting at is that the animation is nothing special. I think what they needed to improve on was aging. Unfortunately even though this anime covers a long time frame many of the characters do not appear any different from the beginning. In particular the main characters, they just don't change at all.... [br][br]Sound[br]The music was there and, not appreciated very much at all. Same goes with opening and endings. I just did not have much interest in any of it. The only good part of the sound was the voice acting. The series has quite a bit of random changes in emotions so in that sense I think the voice actors did quite a good job. Although it got quite annoying after a while all the crying that happened. Other then voices nothing really reached out to me at all.[br][br]Story[br]Theres nothing groundbreaking here, just your average romance. I think the only twist is the beginning when the two main characters have to live together. Other then that most of the time the anime is very episodic, that is every episode a problem comes up, sometimes more then one and by the end of the episode or in the middle it gets solved. You don't have many issues that last more then a few episodes aside from the relationships between characters. Its just a really happy go lucky anime that really does not cause much tension. Actually I would say that most of the time your just smiling or laughing at whats happening on the screen, rather then feeling emotional. Thus the simple nature of the anime led it to be just an average story.[br][br]Character[br]I think at the beginning of the series I really hated most of the cast. Then the cast grew on me a bit as the series went on. In particular I really hated Kin-chan for the longest time. He just kept doing random stupid things to get attention and it was always soo ridiculous. What really changed this view was probably getting use to the annoying characters. Other then this the only real reason why I didn't enjoy the character side of this series was how they dealt with side characters. Everything happened to ideally and everyone was always happy in the end. I know that this anime is suppose to be like that but still, even in love stories theres no way everyone can be happy... but it works out that way here. Thus I found it quite shallow and the other thing is that they throw away characters and bring them back only when they need them. Finally the time they put to develop side characters always felt like unnecessary filler. Thus I think they should of focused more on the main characters. For the main characters the only part that felt weird to me was how they ALWAYS seemed like high school students even after they become adults. A bit too overly childish maybe?[br][br]Value and Enjoyment[br]After watching this anime the only thing that can come to my mind for value is the one message they drill into your head. That is If your annoying enough you will learn to accept whatever it is that is annoying you. Or at least thats what the anime is trying to portray, which I certainly kind of agree since as I mentioned many of the annoying characters weren't so bad after a while. I think the real message is suppose to be if you persist and keep striving for something you'll get it, but I won't take it that way because it wasn't presented that way :p. I won't deny it though I did kind of like this anime. It was funny and entertaining to watch and well, wasted many hours that I could of done something productive. I think when you watch as much anime as I do you need your fair share of serious, action packed shows mixed in with light comedy and romances. Well of course I would prefer shows that also have more serious sides to them nonetheless this anime turned out ok. I would recommend this for those who enjoy a light romance/drama thats easy to sit through. Have fun![br]

Kotoko Aihara is in love with the school's genius, Naoki Irie, but he wants nothing to do with her and rudely rejects her love letter during their senior year in high school. Through a twist in fate,Kotoko ends up living at Naoki's house. It's here that the story starts on how Kotoko wins Naoki over through her own personal, insane ways.

Story (9/10): I personally found the story to be very interesting and done. The anime very closely follows the manga, with a few events being cut out or replaced in the time line. However, the gist of the manga remains and I liked the pacing, although it could get a little fast at times. Besides the occasional fast-paced episode, the only other downside was how hard it was to keep track of the years that go by. Before you know it, the characters have aged 5 years and you sit there blinking. Otherwise, I found that everything was well thought out and nicely executed.

Character (8/10): The characters were well done and kept true to the manga. Kotoko was your average ditz that had the courage and stubborness to keep fighting while Naoki was the typical hot guy who hated the dumb girl and did everything possible to discourage her. All of the side characters were well done. They added to the story and helped develop Kotoko and Naoki without distracting too much from the storyline. I just wished they didn't randomly disappear and reappear though (such as Kotoko's highschool friends).
As for Kotoko and Naoki, there were moments were I felt like banging my head simply because of how stupid Kotoko was acting or how cold Naoki was. Mama on the other hand (Naoki's mom) will never get old and she will forever remain as one of my favourite characters to ever exist in an anime.

Animation (8/10): The animation started off pretty decent and then greatly improved later on (which I assume has to do with increased ratings and a resulting higher budget). The anime stays truthful to the manga, and considering when the manga was published, the animation may seem a bit old-schooled. I found that refreshing however simply because each character was unique and different from the new look-alike characters that are coming out courtesy of CG and heavy computer animation. The classic anime moments were done very nicely and I was laughing my head off at some of the animation used. Overall, while there was some room for improvement, most of it was done quite nicely and it was like a breath of fresh air.

Sound (7/10): I'm a big fan of the second ending some (Jikan yo Tomare by AZU ft. Seamo), but the opening song and the other ending songs never really clicked with me. However, they weren't terrible to the ears, just not ones I would listen to every episode. Hence the 7/10.

Enjoyment (9/10): This anime was one of the most enjoying to watch. I looked forward to every episode and I know many others did (comments on sites can tell you a lot). There was always something happening, something funny or just something that made you grin like an idiot. In fact, my brother was sure I was insane everytime I watched an episode because of the silly grin I would get on my face every time I watched it. However, there were a few dull moments that had me wanting to skip a few seconds (I never could make myself do so) and as such, the 10 became a 9. Overall, there was barely a dull moment and I find myself wishing I had the time to rewatch it (I'll probably make some in the end).

This anime was something that kept me living through the horrors of school and made my day through laughter. There were the downsides (when aren't there) but overall, I really enjoyed it and if you like romance (not just highschool but also after married life) with comedy galore, then this is the anime for you.