Kyou, Koi wo Hajimemasu

mahius Sep 22, 2014

7

Kyou, Koi wo Hajimemasu is 40 minutes of romance between highschool students. And that's all there is to it. Complain all you like about the length and whatever it seems to lack, but it has an actual plot, progression and conclusion. Unlike other animes that claim to be of the romance genre. Animation is OK. They use quite a few still images here and there for impact of 'the moments.' Also, and I can't believe I'm saying this about an anime, the eyes female characters are freakishly large. Sound is very nice, I believe they've got an orchestra playing background music. Nothing so amazing that one would want a soundtrack however. Or at least that's how I feel. Characters are OK. There are only 2 main characters. The guy, Kyouta Tsubaki, seems to be popular among the girls in his school. He is actually a decent human being and if you watch the anime, you'll find out why. Unlike so many other male characters in 'romance' (as they call themselves) anime. Funnily enough, the girl is called Tsubaki Hibino. Just an ordinary lovestruck girl it seems. And the story. Its obvious what happens. But the manner in which it occurs is interesting. I don't read manga so I don't know what's missing, but this 2 episode OVA has more story and a more satifying conclusion, than so many of the other romance anime. Which is why the story is good. It precise and to the point. So, is this worth your time? I'd argue it is, if you actually like romance anime. On the plus side (or the negative depending on your outlook) its just 40 minutes. They could do more, but what they managed to do in 40 minutes proved that it isn't really needed. Give it a chance, if you appreciate a good romance, you'll enjoy it. Family-friendliness Rating: 2/5 Just a bit of lip-locking and downshirt (lower is better) Overall Rating: 7/10

blueangel06661 May 6, 2011

2.5

This was probably one of the strangest OVA's I've ever seen. Being a huge fan of the manga I was quite thrilled to find out there was an OVA. However as I began to watch the show it began to just hit details very quickly and drag on some unrelated scene for a few seconds. It's really like a story book. Basically a steady scene with screen panning or zooming. I understand it's hard to fit everything into 2 episodes but a lot of things were skipped/rushed. It overall wasn't a good watch.

shuffleair Sep 5, 2013

7

I see a lot of people raging about this series on the forums and the review section, so I'm here to give you my two cents. Kyou, Koi wo Hajimemasu is a difficult OVA to recommend. For newcomers who have never read the manga will find the first episode (and probably the rest of the OVA) to be confusing. Why, you ask? Because the first episode starts at the first major climax of the manga. Which I believe in the manga starts at chapter 15, so all anime viewers would be missing 14 chapters of background content of the first episode. If you do want to watch the OVA be prepared to be completely mind blanked at some scenes. But this is the true nature of the OVA of Kyou, Koi. The OVA is suppose to cater to the manga readers and draw the anime watchers to read the manga. Which effectively worked for me again. (Since I dropped the manga and plan on reading it again for the second episode of the OVA.) How do I know this? Because the OVA was bundled with the ninth volume of the manga in Japan. So it was not set to sell to the mainstream audience, but only to the manga followers who continue to read and support the manga. J.C. Staff is at the helm of animating Kyou, Koi. (J.C. Staff is also animating another shoujo alongside Kyou, Koi called Kaichou wa Maid-sama. But Kaichou wa Maid-sama gets a whole TV series to go through the manga.) The art is decent and stays true to the manga, which was a good thing. Obviously, J.C. Staff did not plan on having a big budget to animate this OVA, because it was just going to be an extra bundle to a manga volume. But I was surprised at the background art, which were drawn very well considering the small budget they had to use. Soundtrack and voice acting wise, I thought were pretty good. Lots of piano/orchestra music fitting the shoujo setting of the anime. And Itou Kanae voices the main female lead in the OVA. Who is also know for doing Himamori Amu in Shugo Chara. Coming right from another shoujo is Namikawa Daisuke, who is fresh off the shoujo scene from voicing Kazehaya from Kimi ni Todoke. He voices the main male lead, but instead of playing a cheerful character like in Kimi ni Todoke, voices a rough serious character instead in Kyou, Koi. Overall, I did enjoy this OVA, since it was literally a copy and paste of the manga. Except with added color, voice acting, animations, and background music. But again what makes this OVA so hard to recommend is because it was specifically made for the manga readers and will be a total loss for the anime only watchers. So here's to me hoping that J.C. Staff will do a full adaptation of the manga if they find out the OVA did well. But I'm not keeping my fingers crossed, since it seems to be such a small chance. *Second episode of the OVA comes out bundled with the tenth volume of the manga, so expect that to not follow the time line of the first episode of the OVA. *Review can also be found on MyAnimeList under the same username ShuffleAir.