Candy Boy - Reviews

Hello fellow anime fans. Its review numero tres from RandomRedneck. Got an issue with my opinion? Then shove it and go read a review from someone else. Today, i offer my thoughts on a show that surprised me. Surprised me meaning, it was actually good. I speak of Candy Boy. A show i sought out for the hope of some twincest yuri,(Don't judge me) and watched through because it was just that good. The story is about fraternal twin sisters Kanade and Yukino, who are living in an apartment together and attending high school. Kanade has a crush on Yukino, and Yukino seems aware of the fact, frequently teasing her over it. This is what the haters try to use against it. But trust me, they play the crush thing very well. The majority of the story is actually about them trying not to drift apart. Jobs and classes threaten this, and the girls(Mostly Kanade) have some bad issues with separation. The animation is pretty good, particularly the scenes they share in the snow. Sound really isn't anything that will blow you away. Nothing real innovative about the score. Hell, the show doesn't even have an opening theme. Character wise, this show is a firm supporter of less is more. We have Kanade and Yukino, Sakuya Kamiyama, a VERY annoying underclassmen who also harbors a crush on Kanade, and a brief couple of appearances by the youngest sister Shizuku, there aren't really any other characters of importance. No male lead, hell, males in this show don't even have any impact on the plot. At all. This is actually a good thing, as the story can focus more on the sisters, without too many distractions, aside from Shizuku for an episode or two. Another surprise, was the lack of fanservice. The swimming pool episode is pretty tame, and though Sakuya hopes for a hot spring scene, it never happens. So, to wrap it up, this show may surprise you. Expecting a fanserive laden, lesbian sister love fest? Then look somewhere else. Looking for a surprisingly sweet show about the bond between two sisters? Then check out Candy Boy. You won't be sorry.

Yours truly,

RandomRedneck.

So... Candy boy. The first thing that i can say about this is that i realy enjoyed these few series, maby becouse of the time i watched it, maby becouse of something else, but still it was an exelent thing to take off all the stress and nerves

Story

There is no actual story in here as its not an episodic anime alsow. The whole anime spins around twin girls who is in love with each other. Please dont think of it in any sick way. These twins have a beautiful meaning of love, they may look as lovers (they actualy call themselves that way) they maby sleep together and hold hands and stuff, but they are something that i can call absolutely amazing. Its worth of watching only becouse of this.

So where was I?.... oh, the story. So these twins live together scare their wories together, and you can say that they live for each other. School life is hard, especialy the time that you have to think about graduating and going somewere up to study. This anime talks all about it.

Everything else

I realy recomend watching this for those that say INCEST IS AGAINST THE GOD AND STUFF AND blah blah blah..... Watch this, it will change your thining big time.

And i can say that every anime fan must watch this. (let me act cool there) "Everyone must have something wonderful in their hearts, and watching this anime just adds some more of that thing in you hearth"

END

P.s Thanks Sothis for scolding me and making me all nervous and stuff. After that i became more easier on everything. ^^

This is what I mean when I say that simplicity doesn’t necessarily have to be a defect. There are works that despite their linearity, their total lack of deep themes or profound character development, or even exciting action or whatever, you can’t help but like. Maybe because it shows a simple but relatable setting, maybe because the characters are a bit flat but still charming, maybe simply because we’re freaking perverts, whatever the reason, it just works.

STORY: 7.5/10
Kanade and Yukino are fraternal twin sisters who have always been very close and are now living together in dormitory in Tōkyō while attending high school. Stuff happens to them.

And that’s about it. There is no actual plot, not much drama or conflict, just a look into the lives of these two girls. It’s a slice of life anime (or as I just decided I like to call them after I made a typo, “slife”); or better, a yuri twincest slice of life. Yes, because it’s heavily implied that the two have some sort of romantic feelings for each other, especially Kanade towards Yukino. So if you’re an homophobic bigot, just abandon the review now. If you’d be watching it just for hot girl on girl action, please follow the bigot to the door, because the fanservice is basically absent, very soft and always played for laughs, and nothing is ever said directly; despite all the hand-holding, sleeping together (not THAT way. Kids these days…) and such, it’s something virtually indistinguishable from a typical Japanese romantic two-girl friendship, or a very close sister-sister relationship. Sakuya, a kōhai with a stalker-level crush on Kanade, is the only one more directly said to be a lesbian, but she’s the comedy relief character so she doesn’t have much prominence.

So anyway, why does it work? Well, firstly, what little conflict or drama there is, consists of little, somehow unimportant things, but things that are, simply enough, real life: it’s the twins wanting to spend time together and stay together, it’s the twins struggling to decide how to afford college and what to do with their future working and studying careers, it’s the little sister having a conflict of sorts with one of her big sisters and feeling left behind… something uncomplicated, but soft and sweet that many of us can relate to, and thus feel sympathetic with even without the heart-breaking pathos other works can provide. Secondly, the comedy elements are genuinely hilarious; never particularly clever, but always effective. Finally, the characters.

CHARACTERS: 7/10
What’s the most important thing in a slife? I think most will agree, it’s charming and likeable characters. And this, even with only four of them, the anime does well. The two sisters have distinct personalities that complement each other and work really well together both in the comedy moments, often following a typical boke and tsukkomi routine (yes, I read TV tropes), and in their sweeter interaction, which manages to be very charming and heart-warmingly cute. Surprisingly, they also later show one deeper level of conflict and development that results in a certainly not original but still interesting reversal of their perceived personality, thus avoiding being completely bidimensional. Also interesting is a conflict of sorts between the twins and their little sister Shizuku, which, once again, is not something of particular depth of complexity, but like everything else it feels realistic enough to be likeable and even involving. I may be repeating myself here, but a girl wanting to spend more time with her big sisters and later helping one of them understand her selfishness is surely simple, but damn it, it’s real life, why does it have to be uninteresting? Finally, Sakuya is the only completely flat character (personality-wise, at least. If you know what I mean.), more over-the-top in appearance and behaviour, given that her only distinct characteristic is her crush on Kanade, but being the comedy relief character (I don’t think she was ever supposed to be anything more than that) it doesn’t matter much, if the comedy works as well as it does. In the end, these four characters are mostly plain, even if not devoid of interest, but feel realistic, charming and likeable enough to make the anime work.

 

ANIMATION: 8/10
I’d say that the art quality is above average for a slice of life. Of course, it’s a genre that hardly ever has scenes requiring particularly complex animation, and this one in particular, besides being really short, has a lot of still or slowly panning shots over dialogue scenes, so it’s not that surprising that the backgrounds and scenery are wonderfully detailed and that the movements are smooth and soft. The warm colours create a sweet and, again, warm atmosphere that does a lot to improve the anime’s impact. Besides, the facial expressions are really detailed and show hilarious art shifts during the comedy scenes; though I think that they did go a tad beyond the boundaries of what could be perceived as natural with the quivering eyes.

SOUND: 5/10
The soundtrack is pretty scarce, with the exception of the ending songs it consists in a bunch of generic background tracks setting a general mood. It mostly works, creating a sort of “visual novel-like” atmosphere that actually fits the anime, and the ending songs are not bad, but it’s not what I’d call a great soundtrack.

CAST: 7.5/10
Unsurprisingly, given the names involved, the voice acting is really good and helps a lot in giving the characters their charm. Nabatame Hitomi, already voice of Shizuma and Eriko in the popular yuri Strawberry Panic and Maria-sama ga miteiru respectively, does a great job as Kanade most of the time, but I found her voice to be a bit too flat in a couple of scenes. Katō Emiri as the comedy relief character Sakuya…well, she’s the voice of Kagami in Lucky Star and Hachikuji in Bakemonogatari (and Fluttershy in My little pony: Friendship is magic!), I think her name is enough of a guarantee for an hilarious performance. Kobayashi Yu (Nice in Baccano! among many others) as Shizuku and Yuzuki Ryōka (Ino in Naruto among others) also do a solid job; in particular, a couple of emotional moments by Kobayashi I found really intense.

OVERALL: 7/10
In the end, there’s not much to add: Candy Boy a simple, linear yuri/slife anime, kind of useless in some way, and still somehow charming, cute, sweet, funny and entertaining enough to give the viewers a warm fuzzy feeling, and thus to be not only surprisingly good, but also surprisingly memorable. If you’re into the yuri and/or slife genres, with this little gem you’ll be in for a treat. If you’re more into exciting stuff with suspenseful plots, it has nothing that would keep you interested, you’d probably even find it boring, so feel free to move along. If you’re somewhere in between or want to give a first soft try at the genre…well, we’re talking about seven 15-to-20-minutes-long episodes here, so the whole series, also counting the first “episode 00” ONA and the two DVD extras, plays like a three hours movie, something you could sit merrily through in one evening, so I’d say it’s pretty harmless to give it a try. I personally suggest watching it, even to non yuri enthustiasts.

Yay for me for not making any lesbian jokes in the whole review!

Candy Boy is an online anime that consists of two twin sisters that love each other. Now, that may sound like a premise that can't be taken seriously, and to some extent, it is, but in all honesty this is actually a rather satisfying and serious anime.

What makes Candy Boy so great is that the story is taken SERIOUSLY. It's not a half-assed attempt to flaunt the shojo-ai genre so teenage boys (or lesbians) can fap to it, it has the same ups and downs that you would find in any other romance anime that takes itself seriously. The story progresses like it would in real life, but seeing as how that's how a slice-of-life is supposed to go, it's not that shocking. The problems that Yuki and Kana face are simply interesting. It has a wide range of problems that couples face from the tiniest things, like what to get each other for a birthday present, to major things, like how will one afford collage and still be together with the other. It doesn't let the fact that Yuki and Kana are twins and of the same gender effect the progression of the plot, in fact, at times, it enhances it.

However, the story could have been a little better with character development. Sure, you only have a limited amount of time to develop the characters, and they do do a good job of that, but our information of the characters is limited. Sure, there are bonus episodes, which may help (I have yet to see them), but looking at just the series itself, there is some work left to be done.

Another thing, at times when Kana and Yuki are talking, the screen is focused off somewhere else, like the top bunk of their bed, or an extra-long shot of the scenery, which is quite distracting. It wouldn't be so bad, if it didn't happen as often as it did, and it's not entirely bad, but it's really distracting.

The characters themselves are just great. Yuki and Kana complement each other as the others opposite. Yuki is the more lightheaded one who is more joyful and does have her moments, where Kana is more smarter, but also a little more emotional at times. While these seem like complete opposite personalities, they're not as different as one might think, and the differences in the personalities are what make it more interesting. Sakuya is a very enjoyable character. She's just like an over the top villain you would find in an action anime, but applied to a romance anime. More or less, she's like the Ladd Russo of this show, where she's insane and over the top it's hard not to love the character. Shizu acts as a sort of counter active voice in Candy Boy. She shows that Kana and Yuki are not alone in their sisterhood, and would like to be almost as close to them as they are. She's an interesting character, and used for an interesting purpose.

The art is rather well crafted. It's not insanely flashy, or unique, but that's what makes it work. The anime itself is not flashy or exciting, but it's still enjoyable to a standard. Like so, the art itself is like that, and replicates how wonderful the show is. The music also works on this convention. It works on how it takes itself seriously and not over the top with its premise, and adapts to it, and as a result, it's very nice, very beautiful.

Overall: Candy Boy may have a premise that might not be taken as seriously as other romance animes, but it's worth watching because it takes itself more seriously than someone could imagine. It's light-hearted, interesting, and overall worth watching, 9.5/10

Short, sweet, charming, emotional and funny; Candy Boy has all those things and despite having only 7 episodes the anime gets so much character development across then most animes can do in 12+ episodes *cough* To Love-Ru *cough, cough*. More in video review: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XH3DZCUklaU

BBFC rating - N/A

My BBFC rating - 12 for moderate sex references