Shiratori Reiko de Gozaimasu!

“Shiratori Reiko de Gozaimasu!” is a 1-episode shoujo romance OVA that has a standard premise and decent production values. The manga it’s based on has even inspired 3 live-action TV shows and 2 movies, so there must be something good about the story. However, ultimately the unlikable characters and lack of runtime to establish key elements make the anime version unpleasant to watch. The story follows Reiko Shiratori, a young woman whose crush, Tetsuya, confessed to her back in high school. She turned him down due to peer pressure, but she actually likes him, and decides to follow him after graduation, enrolling in the university heattends and renting an apartment across from his. She still can’t admit her feelings for him, though, so every time she gets close to him, she ends up acting all haughty and mean and basically sabotaging herself. She finds out that her friend Kyoko, who back in high school had discouraged her from dating Tetsuya, is also at the same university, and her presence complicates matters. Will Reiko eventually be able to openly admit her feelings for Tetsuya? The way this anime treats romantic relationships could be considered toxic and distorted. Characters sleeping around with people they don’t like is presented as normal and just a way to “vent out pent-up feelings” or “fulfill one’s feelings of lust,” and the characters handle this in a contradictory way. In one instance, you’ll see a character telling another character that doing such things is wrong (with a slap in the face for good effect), but then later see the same character attempting to do the very same thing themselves. The characters all act unrealistically to events that occur, and their interactions with each other feel sterile. Also, it’s difficult to sympathize with any of them. Since Reiko is the heroine, we’re supposed to root for her, but she comes across as being selfish, rude and immature. Tetsuya is dense and doesn’t have much of a personality. The other characters don’t stand out, either. Since this anime is only one episode, there’s not enough time to establish the characters’ backgrounds or relationships with each other, which adds to the superficiality of the whole thing. And although it ends on a satisfying note, the ending itself is cheesy and rather difficult to believe. The technical aspects are fairly decent. The animation is fluid, although the art is not that detailed. The character designs are not appealing, however. This could be more of an issue with the designs in the original manga than the anime, but the characters all have large, pointy noses and chins. Also, their torsos are puffy, and they look like they’re wearing shoulder pads. With designs like these, it’s difficult to believe that Reiko is as beautiful as the other characters seem to think she is. The music is good; all of the songs are composed by Hitomi Kuroishi, so they’ve got a catchy, nostalgia-filled feeling to them. The voice acting is average. There’s not much objectionable content in the visuals — just an implied sex scene (nothing graphic), a love hotel scene, and a scene of a man taking a shower (from behind). The real objectionable content is more in how the characters react to the idea of sleeping around, etc. as mentioned earlier. Overall, there wasn’t a lot to like about “Shiratori Reiko de Gozaimasu!” except for perhaps the music. The characters are just too obnoxious, and the relationships don’t feel organic at all. Also, there’s currently no English version available, so I would not recommend watching this.