Suki na Mono wa Suki Dakara Shou ga Nai!!

Warning: spoilers. The yaoi fangirls are going to hate me for this. Back when this series came out, it was a runaway smash hit with American fans, especially on the internet. I had never bothered watching the series, but did so on the recommendation of a friend while looking for something to fill my yaoi needs. I am a pretty dedicated fan of yaoi, but Sukisho is the genre done wrong. Ordinary I am fairly forgiving when it comes to yaoi anime because I understand that the prime focus isn't much different than that of a soft core pornography. The idea behind most shounen ai/yaoi seriesis to give the girls (and boys) something to gush over. I believe my main problem with Sukisho is that it attempted an actual plot line only to fail miserably. So what make Sukisho's intriguing sounding plot line so horrible? The fact that most of it was so out of the realm of possibility. The two main characters grew up as test subjects. Where exactly was child services? Why are they so ruthlessly testing kids? While these kids are being tested, one develops an alternate personality after seeing the other one walking into the room after a test. His personality develops instantly, and evidently, he teaches the other boy how to have an alternate personality of his own. So thus, ran and Yoru are born. To be fair, this kind of hollywood psychology is acceptable. What strikes me as odd is that the alternates not only have totally different voices than the characters themselves, but when Yoru (alternate 1) appears, he also comes sporting bandages that fly elegantly through the wind after coming out of nowhere. This kind of overdramatic device is common through out the entire series and used mindlessly. The characters are likable enough, but lack substance of any kind. [Characters] got my highest rating of 4. i am mainly talking about the two main characters, as the rest were not much more than empty token side characters used for the purpose of goofy antics and "developing" the plot. Despite my distain for the story, I was at least looking forward to some emotional man X man scenes, only to find that whenever one of these scenes came, they were very stereotypical. To be blunt, half of the cast is so cliche gay that she should have just changed them into women. Suano (lead) Matsuri (the dorm leader) and Kai(the school nurse) all look unquestionably female. This might be making up for the fact that there are literally no women pictured in the show. Sukisho takes the idea of a seme and an uke to an extreme in which i have never seen before, and the romances between these feminine men and their masculine counterparts more resemble a strange sexual fantasy rather than real homosexual relationships. Adding on to this weirdness...apparently every man in the show is gay. No exceptions. The positive points to these characters all go to the main character Sora. He doesn't take a stereotypical role in any sense. He is just an average, decent guy who happens to caught up in this strange gay fantasy land. Sunao also has his moments, and I liked that despite him being the clear submissive, he was still cheeky and didn't always act like a delicate lady flower. The worst aspects of these series were the art and sound. If you are an art junkie, Sukisho will drive you crazy. The main complaint I hear even from Sukisho fans is that all of the characters have absolutely wild hair and are in despite need of a haircut. I can't think of a word to use better than "puffy". Most of these guys looked like they belonged in an 80's rock band rather than an anime. It was bad even by anime standards. Beyond even that, the art was just amateurish and made far too many attempts to be cute. Topping that off with our "so feminine they are androgynous" cast and you have a recipe for disaster. The background score reminded me a lot of a American television shows from the 1980's. It wasn't very diverse and sounded like it popped off a midi keyboard. Considering almost all anime these days has at least a decent instrumental/j music soundtrack, I would put Sukisho's background score at the bottom of the barrel. Overall, I would recommend this series to only the most hardcore of yaoi/boys love fans...especially those who like pretty boys. For those of you looking for a series with a developed and realistic plot line, I would look further than Sukisho.