Anime: Ore no Kanojo to Osananajimi ga Shuraba Sugiru

A few seasons back, everyone in the industry thought starting a ridiculously long title with "Ano" would guarantee a success. Now it seems that "Ore" is the new "Ano". However, this "Ore" is more of a lump of coal (cross-language pun intended).

Ore no Kanojo is your typical harem with an obligatory nice dude and a bunch of girls. The series attempts to differentiate itself by trying to make the protagonist abhor relationships (his parents both eloped with others and left him behind- what a great excuse for not having to draw parents). However, as no one would watch such a boring protagonist, they added in a bunch of typically cute girls who woo him away from his ridiculous preconceptions. As the title explains, it's about childhood friends fighting with girlfriends (or previous girlfriends) in an all out battle.

The series is pretty typical for a harem and borrows heavily from themes seen in Chuunibyou and Haganai, though nowhere near as effectively as the former works. If you ask me, this is more of a shounen harem than a seinin work as none of the characters, other than the aunt, show any behavioral maturity whatsoever. Throw in a lot of plot holes, random character inserts, and unanswered questions and you've got yourself a bona fide failure. Unless your maturity level is that of a twelve-year-old, I'd suggest skipping on this one. While some arcs are better than others, there's just so many better choices out there.

Animation:
The most notable characteristic of this series is neither the ecchi nor the action but rather the lack of color. For some reason, the show is cast in an almost-comically desaturated palette. I know Japan wasn't doing too well financially a while ago but jeez... While the color scheme gives the show a simplistic feeling, it doesn't mesh well with some of the drama-heavy scenes. Character styling is average overall with distinguishable yet plainly-drawn leads.

There are a few ecchi scenes and a few action scenes but nothing significant enough to label this with either tag.

Sound:
The show opens with a fairly catchy (flirty?) yet immature sounding OP featuring the main female cast. The ED is not as memorable but still fair. The BGM is minimalist with one or two melodies that stand out.

Many scenes take place without any BGM support so the burden is heavily on the VAs. The cast does a pretty good job considering how boilerplate some of the characters are. Ai Kayano gets the props here for sounding like she put the most effort into the role (both tsun and dere roles).

Story:
So our protagonist finds himself seated next to the beauty of the class. After ignoring her for a few days, she takes an interest in his unintended negging and blackmails him into being her fake boyfriend. This sudden girlfriend appearance doesn't go well with Eita's childhood friend and thus begins the series-long battle.

The story progresses through arcs, with a new girl being introduced in each arc. This continues until near the end when our wonderful aunt finally enlightens Eita about his situation. The story then builds to a pretty disapointing climax and a likewise disgusting conclusion (or lack of one).

There are plenty of things to poke at in this show. First of all, why go through the trouble of creating a unique premise and then throwing it out the window by episode three? By the middle of the show, it is pretty apparent that it's just yet another harem. I was also particularly annoyed that the series introduced additional subplots and then left them to rot. For example, throughout the story there are also hints that Masuzu has some serious family issues (including a bratty younger sister). However, as with the unique premise, these and other details seem to have just been forgotten.

Even though there are some comedic moments and a few worthy development scenes, the overall story is generic and disappointing. Even if they are planning for a second season, I think they could have addressed some of the remaining questions better.

Character:
Forget about all the harem candidates. The most awesome character in this show is the aunt. As a game designer of harem games, she is like the ultimate weapon. Imagine this, invite all the girls you know over and *POOF* she'll instantly disclose which ones actually like you. Unfortunately, even this weapon is not strong enough to save this series due to Eita's indecisiveness.

I'm not a fan of most of the girls either. Masuzu isn't particularly believable and her sadistic nature only puts me off further. Chiwawa is a noisy, energetic, and dim childhood friend who can't seem to stake her claim until it's too late. Himeka feels like a watered-down, weak-emotioned version of Rika from Chuunibyou. And finally, even Ai, probably the best of the group, is only attached to the main character through a piece of paper they drew when they were like five. In short, if you're looking for realistic development try something like Sukitte Ii na yo, you're not finding it here.

Value:
While not an absolute flop due to some decent scenes, this isn't going to win any praise. The show is just an empty premise that lacks the emotional depth of better harems. Even if you end up rooting for one of the barely believable girls, the ending will strip you of any hope of fulfilment. I was going to review this awhile back, but ended up re-watching the entire show again because I had forgotten what happened. Do yourself a favor and search elsewhere.

Hello my name is simo and I am here today to tell you about Ore no Kanojo to Osananajimi ga Shuraba Sugiru aka Something Something Love Something Battlefield Something Me. I will call it OreShura from now on.
Many of you are I'm sure familiar with the term 'harem'. It is among the most common setups in anime, and has been for well over a decade. Because of this people are unsurprisingly pretty damn sick of it. ME TOO. Though apparently Japan's wonderful otaku will never cease to be bored with it. Bless them.
Anyway that is irrelevant. OreShura is a masterpiece. It takes all the elements of a typical harem, puts them in a blender, sprinkles some weird leafy green shit on top, then successfully reconstructs these elements into a complete, same-same whole! So, the result is completely the same! To summarize, forget that thing about the blender and leafy green shit and what you have is all the elements of a typical harem. And this is why it is a beautiful masterpiece of beauty and pretty things.
Further details on why it is the best:
1. The show is about a guy called wooden face nose who has zero interest in anything because instead of a character he is simply a drawing of an anime male who has a voice actor saying things into a microphone and these things are synced to the times that his mouth opens and closes. The other stuff he does is occasionally have awesome seizures and then the rest of the time he stands there and the girl characters do stuff to him and he does nothing cardboard wooden tree branch face.
2. The world's most beautiful girl (name = Masuzuuzu) who is a bitch and hates everything enters into a fake-u girlfriend boyfriend contract with cardboard man because it's the only way to stop every single male in the universe from ruining her life by telling her they love her. Because of this she is a really deep character and she is a "horrible person" (direct quote from Mazuusz herself! Holy SH********) and this is unheard of in harem anime. She is so unique and has silver hair. Wood Boy is a lucky tree bark.
3. The other three characters are colour coded by their hair and weirdo-isms. Chiwawa is an osananannajimmy and therefore has first dibs on box cutting lad's arse. But pink hair hall monitor epic win! girl is actually MORE of a ohmanjimmy because she knew stick boy from before he was born. Back in the womb. And so she has the true first dibs on his various cheeks. BUT WAIT. Pink girl got nuthin on character number three aka one-tone-voice-past-life wonder girl, because she is the ULTIMATE ossanchimney because she knew floorboard man in a past life. My god, and there I was thinking the writers had run out of that special juice called shit juice that they were all hyped up on.
4. I was going to write something else awesome here but I basically covered the entire 13 episodes with the above words. I don't remember what actually happens for the show's duration other than the last episode because I just watched it. But damn, those memorable characters and generally awesome typical harem elements make up for it and then some.

OH! I haven't written about the Art & Animation section.
Art & Animation Section:
It is really good. It uses washed out colours for great looking art. Animation is beautiful art. So big quality.

THE SOUND:
very nice.

To sum up in an overall summation, OreShura is a class of work, and an essential viewing for any aspiring otaku. Watching it will give you some serious cred and might just change your life for the better. Aspire to be like cardboard box tree wood chippings sandpaper man.

The End, by simo