Ouran High School Host Club
Oct 7, 2009So oddly most people that watch this anime seem to love it and for me it was really more or less a "meh". I actually stopped several times and only came back to it because I had nothing else in the hopper and in truth it only got a 3 of 5 because of the final arc. Up to about episode 20 there were only 3 episodes that I can say I actually enjoyed and all of them were outside of the host club...
So anyhow, here's my review:
Positives: At moments the show has some really good things to talk about. Namely the episodes about how things got along outside of the school and the way that the rich kids related to Haruhi outside of their native environment. Now I've known some pretty well off folks and I think with Ouran we're blowing things way out of proportion, but there are some bits of truth in there and occasionally a gem that really made me smile.
I really wish that the whole story had been much more about that relation as well as the things that were finally brought up by the end of the series in the last 4 or so episodes. It suddenly went from gee, why did I waste my time watching this rubbish to oh, well, it wasn't a total waste. If there had been 26 episodes of what we got at the end I probably would have really enjoyed it...but I guess most people really like the monotonous nothingness of them dressing up in the host club.
Negatives: Since I already started in on those I'll just keep going. Basically the problem with this anime, for me, is that it's about nothing and nothing really happens. Now the big item was supposed to be the humor, but again in my case it just fell flat and I am pretty sure that other than the 3 episodes before the last arc that I didn't laught but maybe two or three times.
It seemed that anytime we were about to get into something that was remotely interesting the story would quickly jump off of that and go back to the same old boring host club.
I guess in the end this show just really wasn't for me, though I'll be honest and note that if a second season does show up that I'd at least try it out hoping that it would take a vastly different direction from the first season. If, however, it was to turn out much like the first season I'd drop it long before we got to the final arc. There's just not enough to keep me interested.
Maybe I missed something.
Who knows.
Ouran High School Host Club, you barely dodged a 4-5 rating. Barely.
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Thanks for the comment. I enjoy people who can disagree with me without being all angry about it. =) I do agree with you in that the humor just wasn't on the proper wavelength for me. It wasn't that I didn't ever think things were funny or enjoy the show, just that I have seen so many other shows that I enjoy more.
I think the thing though that bothered me the most is that most people who seem to watch Ouran really enjoy it and I really struggled to just get through it other than those few episodes I noted. Maybe if it had been a 12 episode season I'd have enjoyed it more as it would have compacted down the bits that seemed to drag for me and hopefully retained the episodes that were more interesting? I dunno.
In the end I know there were some good bits because I can clearly still remember the episodes that I enjoyed even now months later (which is more than I can say for a lot of shows...haha) so it wasn't all bad, just for me there wasn't enough to make it all good.
Ah well. =)
While I respect your opinion I think you were taking Ouran a little too seriously. The show was first and formost a comedy that rarely took itself seriously at all. It frequently made fun of itself even.
Overall, the humor, or more specifically the -type- of humor displayed here was more my wavelength than say yours, so this is most likely why you weren't as impressed with the show as a whole vs myself.
My only real problem with Ouran was that it kind of dragged on a little bit in the middle towards the end. They did try to mix it up and introduce new characters and interesting situations but for the most part the laughs just weren't as many as the first half, for me.
This wasn't really a "meaty" show, having a rich and diverse story driven plot, it was just there for situation and character driven jokes and puns. In the end, if you're not really into Japanese Slapstickesk comedy, Ouran probably not going to intrest you.
Still, good review, honest, and to the point, I like it despite my differing opinion ;)