I'm back for more posts on Otome Animes! For this season, I'll be covering 4 otome animes - Uta no Prince-Sama Ledgend Star, Magic-kyun Renaissance, Touken Ranbu: Hanamaru, and Watashi ga Motete Dousunda. While Uta no Prince-sama, and Magic-kyun is your typical music-idol type harem anime, Watashi ga Motete follows a slightly different path.
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Uta no Prince-sama Ledgend Star
Basically it's the 4th season of Uta no Prince-sama, and a continuation from where season 3 left us off with. Only this time, instead of focusing on the two existing groups - Starish and Quartet Night, they will also be focusing on the 'enemy' group which had appeared before - Heavens.
I'm sure you guys already know the characters and voice actors of Starish, but I'll just list it down. P.S. I really like this season's OP.
(from the top right to bottom left)
- Ittoki Ootoya (Leader) - V.A. Terashima Takuma
- Hijirikawa Masato - V.A. Suzumura Kenichi
- Shinomiya Natsuki - V.A. Taniyama Kishou
- Ichinose Tokiya - V.A. Miyano Mamoru
- Kurusu Shou - V.A. Shimono Hiro
- Jinguuji Ren - V.A. Suwabe Junichi
- Aijima Cecil - V.A. Toriumi Kousuke
Quartet Night
(from the top right to bottom left)
- Kotobuki Reiji (Leader) - V.A. Morikubo Showtaro
- Kurosaki Ranmaru - V.A. Suzuki Tatsuhisa
- Mikaze Ai - V.A. Aoi Shouta
- Camus - V.A. Maeno Tomoaki
And finally the 'new' group - Heavens. The first 3 or 4 members have already been introduced in the previous seasons as the rivalry group that has bad attitudes, but I'm sure in this season they will show us a new light to them.
(from the top right to bottom left)
- Eiichi Ootori (Leader) - V.A. Midorikawa Hikaru
- Kira Sumeragi - V.A. Ono Daisuke
- Nagi Mikado - V.A. Yonaga Tsubasa
- Eiji Ootori - V.A. Uchida Yuuma
- Van Kiryuuin - V.A. Takahashi Hidenori
- Yamato Hyuuga - V.A. Kimura Ryouhei
- Shion Amakusa - V.A. Yamashita Daiki
Heavens seems to have a mixture of very popular senior voice actors and the more young and newbie voice actors.
Midorikawa Hikaru also plays Ayato Sakamaki in Diabolik Lovers. Though I have yet to hear much of his voice, I feel that his voice is pretty similar to Toriumi Kousuke, and they both give off very similar vibes.
As for Ono Daisuke, Yonaga Tsubasa, and Kimura Ryouhei, I'm definitely looking out for their voices. Though they are such good and prominent voice actors, I feel that because of the line up of this anime, it can get really clogged, and it doesn't really feature the voice actors.
Uchida Yuuma, who is known to be the brother of voice actress Uchida Maaya, has been gaining more attention as of late - a favorite of mine would be his role in Re:Life. Looking forward to seeing what he can do.
Yamashita Daiki has definitely been improving a lot lately, and his voice type is similar to Yonaga's voice (higher pitched voice). Though in the midst of all this good and charismatic voice actor line up, he has to step it up in order to make his voice more noticeable. Although I think that if he can give us the quality of voice acting he did in Boku no Hero Academia, it would be good enough.
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Magic-kyun Renaissance
I've actually seen and heard some of their music before there was an announcement of an anime, and there was a PV made, which was really really good, so I'm kind of excited for this.
(from the top right to bottom left)
- Rui Anjou - V.A. Hatano Wataru
- Kanato Hibiki - V.A. Eguchi Takuya
- Mone Tsukushi - V.A. Aoi Shouta
- Rintarou Tatewaki - V.A. Ono Yuuki
- Aoi Suminomiya - V.A. KENN
- Teika Ichijouji (Leader) - V.A. Umehara Yuuichirou
They then went on to introduce the different characters, and their talents.
Rui Anjou, voiced by Hatano Wataru, is a dancer, who seems like the 'player' in the group. Kind of similar to Jinguuji Ren from Uta no Prince (even their hair styles look kind of similar).
Kanato Hibiki, voiced by Eguchi Takuya, is a first year who plays the Cello.
I was pretty shocked when I heard Eguchi's voice, and kinda thought that his outlook was more of a Ono Yuuki voice. But I think it maybe a fun combination.
Mone Tsukushi, voiced by Aoi Shouta, specializes in painting (or drawing) in monochrome. Although he has a seemingly similar aura to Mikaze Ai from Uta no Prince, I feel that this character is something a little different from the characters which Aoi Shouta usually does, so I'm really looking forward to seeing how this character turns out.
Rintarou Tatewaki, voiced by Ono Yuuki, does wood carvings, although his talent is a little unknown right now, and no one can tell what he is making... I'm sure it'll come around. His character is unexpectedly short, and gives off a cuter image, which is kind of different from the impression which Ono Yuuki's voice give (I usually imagine a more 'fierce' looking and taller character.) But I think his character is adorable.
Aoi Suminomiya, voiced by KENN, specializes in calligraphy and is known to take calligraphy to another level, and seems to faint every single time he uses too much energy. He seems like the quiet character, which is something really different from KENN's usual characters. (I think it'll be quite fun to see Ono Yuuki voice this character).
Teika Ichijouji, voiced by Umehara Yuuichirou, focuses on singing (english?) songs. I honestly haven't really heard Umehara sing solo before, so I wasn't really anticipating him to be good at singing for anything, but he exceeded my expectations, and I thought his singing voice was really really nice.
Umehara, although probably the most inexperienced in this line up, has been gaining a lot of attention, and have been more involved in otome-related works. Overall, even though I feel that his emotional expressions could be improved, I'm really looking forward to seeing Teika, and hearing his voice.
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Touken Ranbu: Hanamaru
Touken Ranbu is a very popular online game. Alongside the main series - Touken Ranbu which is to be aired next year (2017), they decided to animated Touken Ranbu: Hanamaru first. Which is kind of like the 'girly' version of the main series. So instead of 'hot', 'handsome' males, we have 'pretty' and 'cute' males.
Honestly when I first saw the PV I thought it was going to be full of females, so I was pretty surprised that they were male.
(from the top right to bottom left)
- Yamanbagiri Kunihiro - V.A. Maeno Tomoaki
- Kasen Kanesada - V.A. Ishikawa Kaito
- Ishikirimaru - V.A. Takahashi Hidenori
- Shokudaikiri Mitsutada - V.A. Satou Takuya
- Hachisuka Kotetsu - V.A. Okitsu Kazuyuki
- Souza Samonji - V.A. Tai Yuuki
- Shishou - V.A. Osaka Ryota
- Mutsunokami Yoshiyuki - V.A. Hama Kento
- Heshikiri Hasebe - V.A. Shingaki Tarusuke
- Tsurumaru Kuninaga - V.A. Saito Souma
- Imanotsurugi - V.A. Yamashita Daiki
- Gokotai - V.A. Kasuya Yuuta
- Maeda Toushirou - V.A. Irie Reona
- Yagen Toushirou - V.A. Yamashita Seiichirou
- Kashuu Kiyomitsu (Main) - V.A. Masuda Toshiki
- Yamatonokami Yasusada (Main) - V.A. Mitsuhiro Ichiki
A mixture of senior voice actors, voice actors I know, voice actors I don't know... All in all there are people who matches really well with their characters and people who don't quite match. So far I really like Yamashita's acting.
More characters will be added into the anime in the next few episodes, and it gets a little confusing here and there, and what's more is that they didn't really explain to us what is going on, and what are their purpose. So overall, this anime doesn't even have the foundations laid down. There are a lot of doubt, and it doesn't really reflect well on the anime.
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Watashi ga Motete Dousunda
Watashi ga Motete Dousunda was written by a BL author, who decided to write a story of a fujoushi and her harem. It's a little different from your normal Otome setting, and contains a little bit of BL material. Basically many fujoushis can probably relate to this anime a lot.
So the main girl starts off as someone who will and can never be popular, because of how she looks (basically she's fat and ugly), but she even if she gets treated badly, she doesn't really care much because she loves to take the 'observer' role (what fujoushis does best). But one day her life changes when she slims down due to a depression period she was having due to her favorite anime character dying. She becomes a pretty and slim girl, who starts getting attention from 4 different guys.
(from the top right to bottom left)
- Yuusuke Igarashi - V.A. Ono Yuuki
- Nozomu Nanashima - V.A. Koumoto Keisuke
- Hayato Shinomiya - V.A. Matsuoka Yoshitsugu
- Asuma Mutsumi - V.A. Shimazaki Nobunaga
I was kind of shocked with Nobunaga's and Matsuoka's characters. While I'm pleasantly surprise with Nobunaga's character, and thought he really suited the character, I wasn't too sure about Matsuoka's character. I don't think his voice can ever be that cute yet fierce type, but it may all play out all right in the end.
Ono Yuuki and Koumoto on the other hand felt like they were in their element (though I think it'll be interesting if they both switched). I haven't really heard Koumoto much, so I'm looking forward to his voice acting.
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Overall, except Uta no Prince, I feel that Watashi ga Motete Dousunda is by far the most interesting anime, followed by Magic-kyun. Although currently Touken Ranbu: Hanamaru doesn't seem interesting, and is receiving much criticism, and isn't very well liked, I feel that if they can bring us interesting background stories, and good action scenes, it may turn out to be a better anime.
