The other thing I'm bothering to watch this anime season is Kimi ni Todoke (Reaching You), an almost unbearably sweet shoujo romance. It's relatively uncommon to see shoujo manga adapted to animation, and it's even more unusual that big-deal studio Production IG is handling something like this. Watching this show kind of makes you wish they did it more often: I haven't read the original (I think I'm going to be doing that soon), but it's clear that IG has nailed the atmosphere of Karuho Shiina's original work. I mean, everything's so shiny and everybody's so nice!
The gimmick-- you can kind of tell this started out as a one-shot-- is that our heroine kind of looks like Sadako from the Ring (Samara in the US remake, if I recall?), who would crawl out of your TV and kill you. The people around her are either shitty to or terrified of her, completely socially isolating her. It goes without saying that Sawako isn't scary at all: she is meek and sweet and stupidly earnest. Eventually she meets a guy who's about as earnest as she is, and I presume that they will dance around whether or not they are dating for the rest of this show. Together with the girls who appear mean but are totally nice and the cool, silent guy (who's probably really also really nice), a little Sawako clique forms and the girl starts to learn to break out of her shell.
As I hinted before, things move as slowly as I usually see shoujo move. The leads can't seem to figure out they're in love. The current arc is about Sawako being accused of something that she obviously didn't do, and her friends tormenting themselves with "what if she did it" even though they themselves have figured out she didn't do it. There are vague statements spun off into emotional meltdowns, there are super-deformed heroines worrying, and there are sparkles. None of it is really outside the standard, but the execution is so solid and the characters are such nice people that I really can't say anything against it. It's like watching puppies and kittens go to high school.
I guess this explains what people like and dislike about it?
Posted by: usagijen | November 08, 2009 at 07:54 AM