JVAnimeReviews

This is a review of both seasons.

Positive

*My first positive point of SWwtRH is the medieval setting of this anime. It’s always refreshing to see something else than the standard high school setting that we see in 90% of the romance anime’s. Not that I have anything against those but once in a while it’s nice to see something else. Also I find the middle ages an interesting period to use in anime, it delivers other opportunities that you can’t use in high school romances. So a medical setting is always an extra plus like in other anime’s like Re:Zero, Hai to Gensou no Grimgar, Berserk and SAO in the Aincrad arc.

For a video review, check out my Youtube channel. Link on my profile page. 

*The second positive point must be the OST. The OST was beautiful. SWwtRH was one of those anime’s where the OST already caught my attention when I was watching the anime and that’s a good sign. I immediately wanted to listen to the full OST as soon as I finished the anime. Full orchestral OST is the most perfect kind of OST that you can use to please me. And on top of my eternal love for classical music, the atmosphere felt very fairytale like. It all felt a bit dreamy and at its core SWwtRH is still a “fairytale” prince-princess story. So the OST was composed with the entire atmosphere of the anime in mind and therefor suited the anime very well.

*Now I just said that SWwtRH is a prince-princess story and at its core that is true but this anime did throw out several stereotypes about fairytale like anime’s. And this was shown most clearly with our main protagonist Shirayuki. She was a great female main character, she was a female character with balls like we don’t get to see a lot in anime. In most of this kind of anime’s the main female would just follow the main male’s lead. But Shirayuki threw that stereotype overboard by pushing the story forward herself and not waiting for Zen to make it progress. She was a very strong female character and I liked that.

*And there were several other interesting characters like Izana. First he comes of as a total ass. He looked like the character that would oppose the incoming relationship between Shirayuki and Zen. But also this stereotype was thrown overboard because Izana wasn’t an ass all along and he even supports Zen in his feelings.

Also Raji was interesting and I was particularly happy that they gave him development in the second season in stead of leaving him to be the “evil” character. And look at that another stereotype down the trashcan. 

But the most interesting character to me was Obi. He was both the goofball and the voice of reason in this anime. He had the most interesting personality and it’s a shame that it wasn’t used to the fullest.

Negative

*Because I would have liked to know more about Obi. We get a little glimpse of his past near the end of the anime but we never really learn who he is. He stays kind of a mysterious character. Also in the second season, we never really learn how Obi felt about Shirayuki. It seems like Obi starts to have romantic feelings towards her but maybe he suppressed them because of his loyalty towards Zen. But overall Obi’s story could have been told more in detail.

*The thing that felt most random to me was the meeting between Shirayuki and her father in the second season. That came completely out of the blue, how did she even recognize him, she had only met him once when she was young. But either way that encounter came out of nowhere but I see why they included that. See because of her father being a former noble, Shirayuki, in theory, has noble blood. And Shirayuki having noble blood makes a relationship between her and Zen that much more likely and possible in the future. Zen, a prince, having a relationship with a civilian girl would be almost unthinkable, even with Izana's consent. So that bit of information was crucial for their future relationship in the original manga.

Conclusion

So as a conclusion, SWwtRH was a standard prince-princess story at its core but it spiced things up a bit by doing the opposite of some fairytale stereotypes. I had a good time watching this anime, I like a good shoujo romance anime now and then. So overall I’m going to rate Akagami no Shirayuki-hime at 4 stars. This was a very heartwarming anime from studio Bones. Although I saw in the credits that they did get some help from JC Staff which might explain the very good romance in this anime. Definitely a recommendation to watch if you’re a romance fan.