Good Luck! Ninomiya-kun - Reviews

Goshuushou-sama Ninomiya-Kun (My heartfelt sympathy Ninomiya-kun) is a 12 episode ecchi harem anime. Be warned, I do hate the ecchi/harem genres so take heed of my words. Shungo Ninomiya is an extraordinary teenager who gets into the situation of looking after an androphobic (fear of males) succubus. Instant fail. And I've seen this type of story before. Not to mention she wants to fall in love, but if she gets intimate, the guy will die. It goes without saying I was drinking for this anime. No way I'd watch this sober.

Animation

The animation quality is fairly good for a 2007 anime. The style is very generic however, with over stylised eyes for some characters. I've can't count how many times I've said this before. This is an ecchi anime and with it comes gratuitous panty shots and bouncing breasts. At least they aren't unrealistically large, but Mayu has boobs too big for the rest of her body. And of course there is more fan-service when they get into wierd situations. Such situations include Mayu getting water sprayed al over her when she is wearing naught but a white dress, exposing her breasts through the resulting transparency. This is purposefully done in an attempt for comedy, which is what ecchi really is. It's an attempt of making perverted shit funny and honestly, it doesn't work for me. I don't find pervy shit funny, though I did laugh at the likes of 'Baka and Test' and 'The Dictator'. I'd be forgiving of baring skin if it were done in a sensible, adult manner. But it isn't. Shameless. Of course there's girls fondling each other. There are cross-dressing muscle men in bunny suits too, who speak very terrible English.

Sound

The sound is the best bit of this anime, but its not amazing. It's fairly decent like the animation quality, but isn't so amazing that I wanted to download the OST. However, the first music in this anime sounded so damn awesome that it almost made me want to. Most of the music is orchestral/intsrumental and fits fairly well. It does have the cheesy romantic jazz on occasion, which kinda tries to add comedy at times. No fault with the music though the sound design could be better. It feels like the music is overused. Sometimes, no music is better than having music. The anime itself is only avaiable in Japanese audio, so subtitles required.  These voice actors are present in many well known animes but I can't be asked to detail it.

Characters

Shungo Ninomiya is the typical highschool student harem protagonist, but he actually the opposite of a loser. He's a bit of an extraodinary individual, being trained as a mercenary by his older sister and being the most popular boy in school among the girls. The first scene after the intro is him tied up and being sexually harassed by his female classmates. I though he was going to get raped or something. Of course, all of the boys in school hate him, obviously as the jealous group of schoolboys trope. There is something to suggest that Mayu is a childhood friend too, but of course harem trope: he doesn't remember her. No parents, they are off aborad, some shit escuse but at least they've been acknowledged. He lives with his sister who is always on scene with a video camera when he is about to get close to a girl, to record it and spread it on the internet I assume. He's also a bit perverted, trying to take advantage of sleeping Mayu, but not the first scene in the school medical room. A typical harem protagonist, made worse by the fact that every girl likes him. NOT something to be envied. Trust me, it's not fun being secually harassed by girls, no matter how hot they are. Even if they shove my face into their breasts (motorboating)... ... ...enough of the off-topic. He is the only one qualified to look after Mayu, since he is somewhat immune to her uncontrolled succubus powers.

Mayu Tsukimura is a succubus who fears guys. Succubi have the power to attract men, but Mayu can't control her power and all the guys turn into pervert zombies when she is present, moreso when she is scared and/or worried. When they so as touch her, they faint. Shungo is the only one who is not affected by this. However, if a guy was to get close to her, say by kissing her or by 'making babies,' then the guy would die as she would inherently steal their life-force as a succubus. She has pink hair and big boobs, another friggin trope. She is quite shy, but has a history with Shungo, the only guys she statrs to tolerate. She wants to get romanically involved with him, but being a succubus she can't do it without killing him.

Reika Houjo is the typical bitch, tsundere, wealthy, ojou-sama, student president character in this anime. She somehow ends up working as a maid at Shungo's house, this is obviously because she wants him for herself. Another trope, do I need to explain her? She has a side-kick, Mitsuru Hosaka who tries to help her seduce Shungo and suggests crazy ideas to her. Did I mention she has small (normal) breasts, which she is upset about, in the typical shitty ecchi manner. Her rival in love, Mayu has bigger breasts and she won't stand for this. She also has many maids and underlings at her disposal for her nefarious schemes.

Shungo's adult sister Ryouko Ninomiya is a tough mercenary and ends up working at the school as both the nurse and the teacher. A shallow character who doesn't do much, except disappear with Mayu's older brother Mikihiko Tsukimura, often to put Shungo and Mayu in embarrasing situations to film it. Honestly, I thought these two elder siblings had something going on. Especially as Mikihiko is the male counterpart to a succubus, an incubus, not a succubus. Succubi are only female, while incubi are only male. Ryouko also treats her younger brother like a slave, he has to do the housework and cooking in the large house she has somehow obtained.

Other characters are not that interesting. Hinoka Ayakawa is the leading culprit when trying to sexually assualt Shungo at the start and like every other girl, wants Shungo for herself. She eventually becomes friends with Mayu, after initial rivalry. There's the trope glasses girl Irori Okushiro, another girl infatuated with Shungo and happens to have big boobs, though not as big as Mayu's.

Story

Mayu is in the care of Shungo and he has to even sleep with her. This is because he is unaffected by Mayus's uncontrolled powers and everyone wants to cure her fear of men. Of course I mean literally sleep, most harem ecchi don't have the guts for characters to actually have sex, despite non-harem ecchi anime managing to do it and do it in a sensible manner. Shungo is the most popular boy in school, among the girls anyway. The girls are always trying to woo him. Mayu makes friends, various girls get introdued, theres an episode where Mayu is trying to hide BL manga (gay love, probably hentai) from everyone at the end. And she reads it next episode (while Shungo is asleep in the bed near her) and then proceeds to draw her own. They do the cliche trope ecchi thing where they make something appear to be sexual when it really isn't, playing twister in this case. Nothing really happens for overall story as is usual for harem ecchi. There is no plot. Just pervy antics. I am sick and tired of these terrible stories which are the same, where nothing actually happens! There's even an entire episode spent on Shungo's quest to make ramen noodles for his sister. All of the girls end up in the kitchen wearing naught but school swimsuits and aprons. Afer a big deak is made of it, she ends up eating a friggin cup noodle given to her by Reika and she doesn't eat the ramen made by Shungo and gang. For no apparent reason, every female character ends up wearing school swimsuits and aprons. Plot progression is the main thing harem ecchi's lack, however I recently gave 11eyes a decent score since it actually had a plot and that was a harem/ecchi.

Conclusion

I honestly got bored of it, so much so that I started to write this review in the middle of watching it. Due to the sheer boredom. I don't see the point in harem ecchi like this, where it lacks a story. It doesn't even have too much perverted ecchi, so the perverts won't even find anything here. There are worse (more perverted anime) out there, but they'd probably want to go look up porn instead. If this is supposed to be funny, I didn't laugh once. And I was drunk, which makes me more susceptible to laughing at terrible anime. Not even alchohol curbed my cynicism toward this anime and all that are like it.

Family-friendliness Rating: 5/5 Would be 4 but the scene with the see-through white dress made breasts fully visible (lower is better)

Overall Rating: 2/10 (higher is better)

Story

Harem series usually don't get much better than the characters that compose them and the situational aspects that they explore.  If it's your genre, then you're more likely to watch it not just for the characters themselves, but mainly the element that it expands upon like comedy, romance, etc. So what does Goshuusho-sama Ninomiya-kun offer to the genre? Over-the-top laughs and situational humor, at least for those who really have much to like from this genre, provided you can stomach anything from bust jokes to yaoi manga to general hints at fanservice. One shouldn't expect too much from the story, much of it is pretty situational and only a few episodes revolve around the overall series question: to whom did Ninomiya make his promise some odd number of years ago?

The story revolves around Ninomiya-a highly trained combative expert who happens to come across an alien girl, Mayu, and her brother. Mayu seems to be a sweet klutzy girl on the surface, but in reality theres one slight bit about her that deviates from the norm: she's a succubus - meaning she can suck the life energy from the men who surround her...yet she also attracts hordes of men with her succubus powers.  To complicate things further, she has an intense androphobia that makes her agitated when she's surrounded by the...crowds. Mayu ends up taking Ninomiya as her bodyguards and living with him.  Add to the insanity Reika Houjou, Ninomiya's class president who also comes to live with him to keep an eye on Mayu...as she's none too happy about Mayu hanging around him.

There were parts of the series that entertained me and I liked it overall  a little more than I thought I would coming into it-everything from the "ramen" mission to the island episode, even to the ninja chase, but the collective series itself is pretty standard harem romantic comedy with only a few twists and none that one who seasonably watches this genre couldn't predict.  Most of the episodes themselves are standalone and only loosely intertwined save for a few when talking about Ninomiya's memories and explaining the backstory of the characters, but it comes very late in the series, and it falls into what happens into series of this type-the story's left for the very last bit and clumped together.

One thing I did like with this series was the situational comedic shorts that began with each episode, some of them were actually better than the collective story itself for entertainment value, but then again, it also depends on your taste of humor.

I would actually watch Ninomiya-kun again, but I wouldn't say it's a series that's the best of its kind, very standard, but enjoyable if you like series of this type.

Animation

I didn't like the character designs in Goshuushou-sama Ninomiya-kun all that much-it's better than most, but not quite up to par with some better series (Kanon 2006, Clannad) in the genre, and perhaps because it wasn't a clear cut transition from manga to anime as well as it could have been. The action scenes, compared to other series with this focus, were not up to par, but this is very much a romantic comedy series, so I don't think it was as much of a focus. The cel backdrops and overall set designs were good overall, so that's one thing I'll give the series credit in this end.

Sound

The music for Ninomiya-kun might actually be the best overall aspect of the series for the most part.  "Yubikiri" is a very catchy J-pop electronically oriented theme that once it gets stuck in your head, you can't get it out.  I actually really liked it and the opening animation that went along with it.  "Furefure Ponpon" is equally catchy as an ending theme, but I'll admit it didn't catch on to me as much as the former.  BGM seems standard and works well with the scenes, particularly with the series' focus on comedy.

Voice acting was also of note as each VA defined their characters well-many might recognize Mai Kadowaki (whom has had many, many harem roles) as Mayu. I'll admit the voice acting wasn't so much stand-out to me as it just had a proper "fit" with the series schematic.

Characters

The characters for Ninomiya-kun are likable but really don't exceed among that, I imagine those who might enjoy series of this type might think Mayu your typical cute, busty klutz and Reika a bit of a tough-as-nails character...all while sporting a maid outfit. Yes, quite cliche in construction as well as presentation. Yet there really isn't much more to them that are memorable aside from the situational predicaments they find themselves within.  Ninomiya-kun isn't a bad male lead for a series of this type, not at all.  He does fall into typical male cliches (i.e. "accidentially" bumping into Mayu on several occasions).  Those three were pretty much the main cast alongside the secondary characters, whom made the series fun in the situational aspects, but otherwise weren't that memorable.  I did like the VA for Mayu's dad, as I recognized him from a number of other series and found his character bring enough humor to make him stand out among the secondary cast.

Overall

Overall, there were parts of Ninomiya-kun I liked, but I would say it's a pretty standard ecchi romantic comedy.

Some funny moments, some ecchi moments, but with a horrible plot and too many cliches.

Funny thing that there was that many succubus (fake succubus, you know, the succubus of this anime is the worst of all animes and stories...and most funny, even men are succubus... yep, Incubbus does not exist in this anime) and no other youkais.. JUST succubus... and of course, 2 guys (and 2 girls) with unhumanly strenght and speed...

And seriously, Tsukimura Mayu should've died at the end, then I could give at least score 6...

Isn’t it strange when a character behaves out of… character? Imagine when a whole series feels out of… series. Goshuushou-sama Ninomiya-kun (GN) is such a series and the reason it is so frakking bad in its own way.

This anime is of course a harem and one should expect nothing but substitute for porn and, if possible, some jokes. The joke part is how most of the times the male lead is a weak-useless-unreliable-undecided-scared-waste of mankind who for fan catering reasons all the girls in the show dig him for that. This show tried to have a twist in this formula by making the lead male very powerful and self-aware, which in theory means a far more likable character. Unfortunately the formula of such shows is so damn fixed in a mentality where anything that tries to change only makes everything even lamer than what it already are.

In this show, all the girls in the school constantly sexually abuse Ninomiya because his self-control and acrobatic skits when trying to escape them is considered super sexy. I guess playing it hard to get has its charm too and if you are raised to behave politely means automatically that any girl who does foreplay with you and begs for your cock to enter her is considered a reason to jump out of the window with a triple flip and landing on your feet, before needing to dodge a hundred death traps set by the jealous male population of the school.

This was actually fun the first couple of times. I mean, I haven’t seen that a lot in harems and so it felt refreshing… for a couple of times. Because after that it became repetitive and annoying, on top of being completely unrealistic and impossible to identify or sympathize with any character or situation. Because let’s face it, successful series are those you can find a part of yourself projected on one of the characters, even if it is just wishful thinking. Ninomiya is impossible to like for any given reason. A typical spineless harem lead would appeal to all the spineless wimps out there, but to what kind of people would this one appeal to? If ALL THE CHICKS IN YOUR SCHOOL have the hots for you and you are SUPER STRONG AND CAPABLE TO DEFEND YOURSELF then I see no reason why you shouldn’t just HAVE THE FUN OF YOUR LIFE! In a typical harem, you can kinda excuse the lead to be incapable to go for it because he is a waste of usable space but Ninomiya is not like that. He is clearly sexually active and from time to time even tries to do a few naughty things himself. He is otherwise not a saint, his own sister is a slut who does her best to have her brother do orgies so she can film the whole thing and the teachers in the school simply don’t give a rat’s ass about all that. Oh, and as always parents don’t exist.

This is one of the boldest premises I have ever seen for a hentai story and if it weren’t for Ninomiya’s impossible to understand personality, this show would be a porn feature with non-stop sex and violence. Of course so could any other harem but then again, the typical males there are simply lacking balls so it is less unrealistic for all them than for this one.

What is even harder to accept is how this anime could be a parody of harems. I mean, it is making fun of the archetypical lead male so in a way it counts. But then again, ain’t all harems as a genre nothing but a parody of school romances and hentais? So does that make GN the parody of a parody? Perhaps. Whatever it is, it still feels bad and even less unrealistic and after a few times you see it, becomes boring as any other run-of-the-mill harem out there.

The weirdness does not stop with Ninomiya, as the lead pink haired girl in the series is equally weird. She has androphobia and Ninomiya is chosen for his modesty to help her open up to men, while with his inhuman power he is also to protect her from other men. Because you see, she is a succubus who by nature makes men attracted to her as means to feed on their life. Again, this whole deal plays as a parody, as she is more than willing to do any perverted thing with him as means to open up (her legs lol) to other men(’s cocks). And as you can imagine she does a lot of things, all of which offer zero development to her and the plot in general.

The weirdness goes even further than that by having the lead blue haired girl in the series acting all weird as well. She acts like a snotty queen in front of everyone but doesn’t think twice before turning to a love-slave to Ninomiya and dressing/behaving in the most degrading to women ways. So yeah, she is clearly a parody of feminists acting all tough to men but go all pets to their favorite guy.

You know what? Maybe GN really is a parody of a parody after all. And maybe if it had done more than just a vague premise in its execution, it would be an interesting anime. I mean, if the plot was going somewhere or if 90% of the durations wasn’t tired-to-death ecchi jokes that don’t help the show escape its original formula. Well too bad because it didn’t; it is otherwise a same-old harem premise with lots of openings for romance and orgies where NOTHING HAPPENS and ends almost as it began. Let’s just say the idea was right but the execution lacked balls… hm, how ironic in a show where the protagonist has a pair for a change.

Beyond all that, the visuals are nothing great or spectacular; this is clearly a B to C grade production in terms of budget. The character figures look simplistic and there is a general lack in complicating animation or lightening effects. As usual, only the ecchi scenes are given more attention, which again makes the whole deal feel like a typical show even if it isn’t. Music themes and voice acting are again nothing major to remember but at least there are no overly ridiculous pinches in voice (not even pink-hair has annoyingly enough voice compared to others I have heard over the years) and the songs are relaxed pop pieces you hear twice without problem and then skip and forget entirely for the rest of your life.

Will I ever watch this again? No, but I will probably remember the parody of a parody part. It is an interesting concept to try to make a show to feel like that and then becoming all serious and dramatic, thus subverting the formula, deconstructing the genre and leading to new or evolved genres, to progress and freshness. HEAR THAN ANIME INDUSTRY? Stop frakking around with the same old shitz and try to mess with the formulas more.

And now for some excused scorings.

ART SECTION: 5/10
Analysis: General Artwork 1/2, Character Figures 1/2, Backgrounds 1/2, Animation 1/2, Visual Effects 1/2

SOUND SECTION: 4/10
Analysis: Voice Acting 1/3, Music Themes 1/4, Sound Effects 2/3

STORY SECTION: 2/10
Analysis: Premise 1/2, Pacing 0/2, Complexity 0/2, Plausibility 0/2, Conclusion 1/2

CHARACTER SECTION: 5/10
Analysis: Presence 1/2, Personality 1/2, Backdrop 1/2, Development 1/2, Catharsis 1/2

VALUE SECTION: 1/10
Analysis: Historical Value 0/3, Rewatchability 0/3, Memorability 1/4

ENJOYMENT SECTION: 1/10
Analysis: Art 0/1, Sound 0/2, Story 0/3, Characters 1/4

VERDICT: 3/10

Story: 

This series developed a very unique and deep story. You won't see anything promising at the start though. The series moves a bit slow, and shows very few moments in the beginning of the series that might catch your eye if you're looking for story, though that shouldn't be much of a problem when you've got plenty of panty shots and bouncing breasts. If you have patience for just a few episodes, this one is a must, you'll find a lot of moments that'll keep you eager to know what's next. I give the story a definite 9/10 for it's deep, but not overwhelming story that's touching but won't make you shed a tear.

Animation:

The only problem I had with the animation was the fighting scenes, though some were actually very well done, the others turned out a bit poor (though still enjoyable), showing characters moving only individual body parts, and adding motion blur instead of more frames. Besides the fighting scenes, the animation was very well done. Lip syncing is almost perfect, and there seems to be a good amount of detail in the art itself. I give the animation a 7/10, for its favor in art detail but an average animation's frame rate, setting itself at least on the better side.

Sound:

The voice acting as for the japanese dub (the only official dub released to date) was amazing, every word felt like it was so natural, even Reika's squeals seemed like she would have to be tickled during recording. The opening and ending themes are such catchy duos, they never get old, and they never will. The music was all placed appropriately, perfectly set to the mood, and almost all of the music itself I personally loved. I give the sound a straight out 10/10.

Characters:

Every character had their own unique personality, and you couldn't find much of anyone else that was like the other. Unlike most animes, the main character Shungo, sways a little bit towards the nice side, but isn't timid, he is one of the few extremely balanced characters that you'll find in a series, something new for us all to love. As for others; who couldn't love a big breasted, pink haired, innocent girl that is almost naked half of the series (Mayu)? And without the blue haired whiny girl (Reika), we'd be at a loss of a lot of story hints through flashbacks of her memories. A straight out 10/10 for the many different types of characters and a balanced main character.

Overall:

This is a great anime with tons of laughs and many ecchi moments (you'll even catch some nipples in there, but never full nudity), with a good love story mixed in. It truly shows how well balanced an anime can be. From the well detailed art and catchy music, to it's unique characters and deep story with a very good conclusion, there's not much that can really stop this series from being a must watch. Have fun, I know I did. 9/10 for being oh so close to perfection.