Anime: Sekirei

While watching Sekirei[/b]'s twelve episodes, I got the distinct impression that I was watching the 1st part in a 4,000 part series. Sekirei[/b] is an ecchi/comedy/action series with a heavy emphasis on ecchi (mainly, massive breasts, frequently revealed) and comedy (it's amazing how many hilarious things can be done with massive breasts).

I went into Sekirei[/b] expecting your typical large boobed fighting anime. Imagine my surprise when I found the first 2/3rds of the episodes to be a frequently hilarious ecchi/comedy, capped off with an exciting, action-packed 3rd act. I am reminded of Divergence Eve[/b], another anime featuring characters with enormous racks. A series which, in my opinion, was highly entertaining in spite of its flaws. Like Divergence Eve[/b], Sekirei[/b] is cliched, silly, and frequently nonsensical. It is also funny, exciting, and consistently entertaining. Just remember to check your brain at the door.

ANIMATION
The animation is fairly well done, especially during the action sequences. Fights flow smoothly, and are none-too-difficult to follow. The character design, while unique in most cases, features a handful of characters whose faces are difficult to tell apart, and who even have similar hair styles. Thankfully, the seiyuu as well as the character clothing makes them easier to differentiate. My biggest gripe, oddly enough, is with the nudity. Sekirei[/b] features plenty of gratuitous nudity. However, the nude forms of the characters seem oddly similar. While most of the main characters have massive breasts, they also seem to have identical massive breasts. An eery thing to notice, I know, but some of the characters are nude so often it would be impossible not to notice. The nudity is used primarily for comedy rather than titillation, as good ecchi should be.

SOUND
Not a lot to say here. The music was the music and the sound was the sound. The OP/ED were pleasant, but skippable, and the seiyuu did a good job at portraying their characters, though none stood out as particularly bad or particularly good. An all around good, though not outstanding, job.

CHARACTERS
For a story that supposedly encompasses 108 different battling characters, the pool of them in Sekirei[/b] is reasonably small. Minato is the male lead, and a rather typical one at that. A college drop out with no prospects or charisma who suddenly finds a half dozen women clinging to him. Where have I heard this story before?...

On the female side, there is Musubi, a close range fighter and simpleton with no modesty, guile, or sarcasm detector. Kuu is the “little kid” character whose facial expressions and constant outbursts of “onii-chan!” consistently put a smile on my face. Tsukiumi is the tsundere (which kind of says it all, doesn't it?) and Matsu is the computer nerd. Apart from these 4 are assorted villains and allies with varying amounts of screen time. With such a large cast to introduce, it's no wonder that so little happens, plot-wise, in Sekirei[/b]'s 12 episodes. There is a decent amount of character development for such a short series. Matsu stops being a shut-in, Kuu learns to trust in others, Tsukiumi goes through the typical tsundere transformation, Musubi learns to be a better fighter, etc.

STORY
108 massive breasted women wearing inappropriate attire and battling in a “There can be only one!” contest. What more is there to say? Well, quite a bit actually. While the premise may seem silly (and it is), it plays out in a kindhearted way that makes it easy to forgive.

108 “Sekirei”, magical women from an ancient ruin (or something) are unleashed by the MBI corporation onto the city of Tentai. The goal of each Sekirei is to find their Ashikabi (a soul mate, basically), make out with him/her, after which they gain their “wings” as well as their highest level attack move. They are then supposed to fight down to the last woman, who gets to go to heaven along with their Ashikabi (no, I'm not making this up). Since this is primarily a comedy, murder is not the goal here, with Sekirei being defeated after their magical crest (think birthmark) is removed by the winner. Sekirei who have lost their crest can no longer be with their Ashikabi, for reasons not explained.

While those may be the rules of this fantasy world, they hardly matter as there is very little fighting overall. Of the 108 Sekirei, more than 100 of them are left by the end of the series. After the initial premise is set, it is discarded in favor of your standard harem comedy fare, with Kuu, Matsu, Tsukiumi, and Musubi fighting over Minato. These scenes are cliché, and have been done before, many many times. However, I not only found myself laughing through each episode, but I moved onto each subsequent episode with anticipation, especially during the final 2 or 3 episodes when the series moved away from the harem and into the action. I tend to find these forays from comedy to action annoying (Mahoromatic[/b] drove me crazy when it did exactly the same thing), but Sekirei[/b] pulls it off by leaving the comedy intact while ramping up the action, coupled with some very fluid fighting sequences with no repeated frames.

There is a certain charm to this series that is hard to pin down. It's nowhere near being finished (12 episodes and only a half dozen of the 100+ Sekirei have been defeated), most of the female characters sport racks that would leave them bedridden in reality, and many of the jokes have been done time and time again in any number of ecchi comedies... yet I laughed. I laughed and laughed... and cared. By the end of the series, I felt invested. There are highly regarded dramas that haven't been able to rope me in as this anime did.

Their breasts are huge, the jokes are hackneyed, the story is unfinished, and, if you accept it for what it is, it'll leave a big old smile on your face.

Finally a worthy successor of Boobs in Space! We call them Battle Boobs!

For anyone who's never heard of the title Boobs in Space, please let me explain: it is the unofficial name of Divergence EVE, which featured enormous breasts which sometimes looked like space rockets. Sekirei manages to pull off a similar thing, by having characters with breasts of the same size – just this time on earth.

Animation: Starts average, only to drop.

The remarkable part here is that characters are absolutely capable of covering their most important parts with hands without having to bother losing a fight despite having that handicap.

In terms of animation, it doesn't look too bad, but there are plenty of flaws to point out, which increase together with the episode count. By the time we have seen the first half of the series, the animations drops down significantly, which is best seen by the faces of the characters, which are suddenly a lot less consistent. Also backgrounds are more often bland and sometimes even reusing frames, which is a very bad thing to use in a show. Lipsync is also one of the aspects which fails every now and then.

Boobs in Space managed to poke out my eyes with the pointy breasts, but this time Sekirei, or perhaps I should say Battle Boobs, keeps the eyes on them by making the show ecchi enough to focus on them. The fact that every fight devoids the entire top half clothing of a character does help a lot. Not that the clothes are hiding much in the first place, with them walking around in spandex and all.

Sound: Average voice acting.

There is a whole range of voice actors in this show. Some are doing a tremendous job (like Musubi), while some others are sometimes missing the point completely. Our male protagonist, for instance, sometimes misses the timing by a longshot, or his emotion doesn't come through properly.
The casting is done pretty well and pretty much all voices fit the character it displays. And if not, then still.

OP/ED and music is done pretty well too. There is not much to comment on though, as most is done well.

Story: Obviously part of something bigger.

The story is – interesting enough – fairly decent. While the idea is good, the execution is done a little less good and the plot is full of holes big enough to fly an airplane through. Nevertheless, they keep the story together and focus on the-least–hard-to-tell stories: the story of just one protagonist with a harem.

The result is that the show is easy to stomach, the story is fairly enjoyable to sit through despite the lack of depth and the events happening are good to see. For a fighting-harem-show, there are numerous flaws to fear about, though none of them are really visible in this show. The comedy works decently, the characters are not annoying enough to hate and the fighting scenes are pretty nice to see as well.

Don't believe the show ends, because with 108 fighting characters, there is no way for them to battle through a mere 12 episodes. Nevertheless, the show ends fairly well, without any pretentions of it being a definite conclusion.

Characters: Simple characters – but likeable.

The characters in the show are not all that sophisticated, or showing a mass of development, but they are there, they are nice to have in the show and there isn't much to criticize them for. There is some development for all characters, but none which is causing them to outgrow the show. They are simple, just like the show, but that doesn't mean they cannot be enjoyable to see in the series. Because they are what makes the show, even more than the plot.

Value & Enjoyment: Boobs have never been so enjoyable.

Don't get the feeling you can get anything out of this show but an enjoyable time, because you will be disappointed. The show is meant to entertain and to please all people out there who're eager to see a bunch of hooters, whether with or without nipples.

The show was surprisingly good for a show in this category though; lighthearted, easy on the mind and fairly comical too, so if you're in for a nice ecchi fighting show which doesn't try to be more than that – this is a good suggestion. Only buy it if you like your ecchi show with some nice characters and some continuity in the plot, but for all others who don't go out of their way for the ecchi, don't bother.

T&A ALERT Woah! Boobs and butts! Rate me, please! This review is based on the Chihiro HD fansubs, and now that the R2J DVDs are out, I've viewed them. This review is final, unless they find a way to unfold additional T&A fanservice.

Quick Take: How do you like your fanservice? Shredded panties, perhaps with a side of boing? This quick watch series, directed by Keizou Kusakawa and animated by Seven Arcs (Inukami, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha etc.), features an extra helping of D+cup 6 women, three of which are seriously in need of breast reduction, and a very cute loli who is a sweet sugar stick. The director evidently has a knack for finding new ways to frame a figure! Appropriate for ages 16+ based on copious fanservice and boing.

It's all about Sekirei, super-powered aliens who are caught in a manufactured game of king-of-the-mountain, though for most of this series, it's a standard harem comedy. The violence is strictly for laughs and a chance to show legs, butts, boobs, and panties, and some extremely cute faces. It's remarkably free from actual sex, but the fanservice is pervasive. Woven around this flimsy excuse to watch is an actual story, but it is so slow developing that it will take another season just to get some dramatic tension (the ending episode teases the second season). However, you'll likely watch it for the cute girls.


Animation: The animation is actually very good. The in-betweens suffer in the later episodes (hands appearing abnormally small, some distorted features) but are quite good in the earlier episodes. Action (mostly super-power fighting that is remarkably bloodless) is present in most episodes, and is above average. Backgrounds are quite good, but there are no shots that will take your breath away (unless you are breathing heavily). It's good 2D with a little 3D mixed in, mostly unobtrusively, and in my HD fansubs it's a very pretty show. The DVDs are slightly cleaner in action sequences. I'd give it a 7.5-8 on my animation scale, mostly because of the action, backgrounds, and the character designs which are faithful to the manga and are really quite fetching. In quality and feel, it mostly reminds me of the previous work by the same director on Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's.


Sound: Technicals are very good, on par with the better shows of the season. Foley is rich, ambient noises good (not fully immersive, but better than your average fanservice harem comedy), and the soundstage is full if not completely directional. Seiyū, led by relative newcomer Saori Hayami (Kou in Wagaya no Oinarisama), are good enough to sell the characters and show energy through to the end. I do find some of the character voicings by others to be sometimes lacking in depth, but after all, it is a harem comedy. Voicing the landlady Karasuba is Romi Paku (with too many excellent credits to list), everyone's favorite older woman. I do think it's a good team, and am hoping for a second season for their hijinks and combat. Background music is thematic and uses several melodies you will recognize from the OP and Ed. It's relatively effective, but again, only a slight improvement from the usual harem comedy.

The Opening Theme is "Sekirei (セキレイ)" by the seiyū Saori Hayami, Marina Inoue, Kana Hanazawa, and Aya Endo. I really found this a stirring, hummable tune, and the montage is pretty good too.

Note: A sekirei is a type of bird, and the text (and storyline) refers back to it several ways. I think this is intended.

The Ending Theme is "Dear sweet heart" by Saori Hayami, Marina Inoue, Kana Hanazawa, and Aya Endo, with the exception of episode 11, which is "Kimi wo Omou Toki 「きみを想うとき」" by Saori Hayami. As you can see, the seiyū were busy! I would rate the sound again at 7.5, perhaps closer to 7 than 8, based on the occasional one-dimensional seiyuu voicings and the lack of a gee-whiz directionality.

Story: Minato Sahashi is a failure at passing his college exams. He's working construction and living alone. Suddenly, our sekirei Musubi appears while under violent attack, and with clothes flying she grabs him and runs. It turns out he's an Ashikabi, one of the mysterious set of masters that have the genetic trait that can become partners with some of the 108 cute girls, extremely endowed women, and thin, feminine bishōnen called "Sekirei". Once all the Sekirei have been paired with their Ashikabi, a competition will begin to determine who is the strongest, best Sekirei, and the winner will be allowed to live forever with his/her Ashikabi.

Pure unfettered hogwash, but then again, it's a fanservice harem comedy! We never get to the final battle; that's left for another season. Of course, we never find out how the gals are allowed to destroy public morals, private property, commit mayhem, and throw lightning bolts in the middle of Tokyo, but never mind that, we're watching boobs here!

Maybe it's an excuse to get tens of gals in skimpy clothing, but it works. Not without a dose of suspension of belief, and not always (the last episode is so full of monologues I wanted to slap someone), but it is a clever, interesting way to spend 5 hours. And I have to admit, I looked forward to the bickering between the gals over Minato! Bad point is you never understand the main  antigonist's motivation or goal. So, 6 for limited intelligence in the drama, 7 for execution of banter, fanservice and comedy elements, for a result of 6.5.


Character: I really thought it was fun watching the gals fight! They each have a different method of fighting, and it's interesting to watch the costumes they get into/out of (lots of cosplay here, including a bunch of bondage and S&M suits). Oh, don't get me wrong, it's not a fashion show, but it is a lot of fun to watch them bicker. Minato is your standard weak and indecisive main man, and the gals are all strong (including, in her way, Kuu, the loli), and it's really all about the gals.

Do NOT expect to learn anything about the human condition, but do expect to have fun watching. 6 for lack of character development, 8 for character design (do you like huge boobs? If so, 8, and if not, 6-7), for a solid 7.


Value and Enjoyment: Well, I did get the R2J DVDs, but no, it's not something I would buy in R1 DVD, but I would still watch it because every now and then, I like fanservice. Not a great outing, but still a worthy late-evening offering, so I'd give it a 6. On the enjoyment scale, your mileage will vary, but I give it a 7.

Conclusion: Jessica Rabbit has this kind of figure! And that's why you'll watch it. Fun for all guys.