Masou Gakuen HxH – 02 [NSFW]
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“Is there anything about this show that’s rare or special or interesting?” That’s always a big question and the answer is usually “no”. But maybe there’s a chance… |
Genuine
Is Hayuru more interested in suppressing Aine or Kizuna?
Of course, that’s a leading intro. Most of the time shows don’t have a whole lot of originality, and that leads to a lack of being special. And a lot of the time, the creator thinks the path to ‘special’ is some chimeric combination of individual pieces that have been used countless other times, like an Enlightenment-era alchemist trying to create gold from base metals. And usually it has about the same success rate. Well, actually it’s probably a little better than that, because noone ever figured out how to turn lead into gold without the help of a star, but there have been some good shows. But the good shows don’t get there from the Chinese menu method of “Pick 3 things from Column A and 2 from Column B.”
Well, there’s gold and boobs, and everything else
Now, after that kind of start to this article, you’re probably thinking that I’m going to call Masou Gakuen HxH the rare exception that makes gold from boobs. Well, no. I’m definitely not going to say that, especially not after only two episodes. But…
Butt?
But I think there is something that may be a little different to this show. Want to know one reason? It actually made me laugh. Think about how many shows you watch where you literally laugh out loud while you’re watching it. I know that most of us watch anime by ourselves, and I’m not going to say anything good or bad about that. But the fact is that when you’re watching by yourself, it’s very rare to have an out-loud reaction of any sort. Partly because there’s nobody to signal your enjoyment to, and partly because there’s noone else present to amplify emotions.
What???
But yes, I actually did laugh when, at the beginning of the show, Kizuna’s face was projected on the screen. It certainly wasn’t unexpected, it was led in conventionally by Reiri’s expository speech. But even with that, his reaction felt very genuine, and so did the reactions from Yurishia (“Wow! I thought he was the shy type!”) and Aine. And as ridiculous as the whole thing is, with Reiri making this big pitch that anyone who wants to join the elite team is going to have to do H things with Kizuna, and Kizuna argues that “it really wasn’t like that”, they project that scene of him taking his shirt off and shouting “EROS!” This was actually darn good comedic timing, and a good buildup to a payoff.
What’s My Motivation?
“Why don’t you escort me… over there.”
Another place where so many of these shows fall super flat is the characterization, and most especially regarding their motivation. Why do all these pretty girls fall madly in love with Mr. Average Guy Harem Lead? Usually, the only conclusion you can make from the show is “because they were written that way.” We usually accept paper-thin justifications like “He was nice to me 10 years ago!” and “He was nice to me that time 10 minutes ago!” or “He’s always nice to me!” Even the ones where it’s “He saved me 10 days ago!” feel pretty flimsy as well, and I think a lot of the reason is that they take the majority, if not all, of the agency away from the female characters. But in this one, the reasoning for getting with Kizuna is at once more flimsy and yet more authentic than those maidens in love. Aine and Hayuru both try right off the bat to appeal to Kizuna, but it’s not done with any expectation of love. It’s just sex, although I think that Hayuru probably wants to think a bit less about the ‘sex’ part and try and have at least some of an emotional connection.
Don’t forget Sylvia
Basically, this show is hanging a lampshade on nearly every usual trope. “Why does the boy live in the girls’ dorm?” “Because he’s gotta be close to them if he’s gonna sex ’em up.” “Why are they going after him?” “Because it’s in their best interest to.” “Why is there a half-pint middle-school kid hanging around all the sexy people?” “Because she’s the personal assistant to the commander.” And then they do things like hang “No Entry” banners across the aisles in Kei’s lab that just happen to look like the ones in a porn store. Or they have Sylvia jumping up and down to even get in the frame. The whole show figuratively looks like the lighting section at Ikea.
Just a little farther…
That did the trick
But it pulls it off. The beats in the battle in the second half of the episode are nothing new. Yurishia and Kizuna are isolated from the others, she runs out of energy, he fills her back up, this time mostly through her own imagination (since his hand never moved off her breast), and then destroys the enemy mecha-Pokemon (noone will ever say that the enemy designs in this show are inspired, unless you add on “by other shows”) in the expected one blast. But from start to finish, the show embraces what it is and presents it straight: Yurishia’s transformation into her battle armor isn’t figleafed by light beams or ribbons and goes full frontal nudity. And they don’t soft-pedal her power up sequence either, although I liked, again, that it wasn’t all artless groping by Kizuna.
And her panties are the last thing to be put on
More H
I think that the girls are probably all going to fall in love with Kizuna, because that’s how these shows go. But I am liking that they actually flipped the script by having them compete for Kizuna before he is the guy they want to be with. And I like that it’s just going in guns blazing. High art this show isn’t. This episode was mostly bare-faced exposition, and mostly just put it all out there. And that was when it didn’t have jarring continuity breaks. But it had funny parts that were actually funny, and it had sexy parts that were at least somewhat sexy, not super-cringeworthy or embarrassing. I’m still not going to watch this with the volume blasting, but I think HeartxHybrid is off to a pretty good start, for what it is.
About Highway
Proving that you don't have to be young to love anime, I enjoy all genres and styles of shows. If it's not hurting anyone else, you should never be ashamed of what you like!
POWUH: and LOLi Defender with 10997 comments
You know, every little bit helps, every little counts. But yeah, this one is never going to cross the originality event horizon. But we do get the approach vectors. Yurishia got the most attention this ep, so we go the the “American” heads up, hands, on, no holds barred approach.
Next, we get shy girl? Or the LOLi? Or is she just going to do the doujinshi?
POWUH: 400-499 with 462 comments
Everyone, and then some, gets their chance in the novels. As always, what we’ll see in the anime depends on how much and how closely it’s adapted.
While I’m here, I might as well mention: the story in this series actually is not bad. Sure, it’s not original, and it will (probably) never win a Nobel prize for writing, but it was interesting enough to keep my attention, to the point that I would skip past a majority of the ero scenes so I could get on with the story. Now, due to the nature of the series you can take it for granted that “do erotic things with (insert name here) and it will solve (insert problem here)” is how they handle almost everything, but the world and the story, and in some cases the characters, surrounding that were interesting enough that kept on reading.
As above, how well that will come across in the anime depends on how much is adapted etc.
POWUH: 400-499 with 462 comments
Oy. Spammy. Relinquish my post.
I’d make a snarky comment about dealing with Spammy in some fashion relating to the show, but with this show those would all be about sex in some fashion, and that just doesn’t seem appropriate.
POWUH: Meta Resident and LN Informant with 1529 comments
Lewd, although you can see the budget was kinda stretched this ep. Compare to Hundred, where most times the animation was still in model.
I’ve heard later volumes can reach hentai-level erotic.
Show ▼
so readers are unsure if the later books could even be adapted, decency boundaries and all.
POWUH: Meta Team and Spammy Tamer with 7115 comments
You know, I don’t know if a slightly cheap feeling is a bad thing for a show like this. *Slightly* cheap, that is. Yeah, there were a few off-model drawings (I looked askance at the one between the two Hayuru shots up there, when we saw Kizuna, Aine, and Yurishia standing there looking back at Hayuru), but I’ll take that in this show compared to Hundred, which just felt uninspired throughout.
And for my dissing of the big monster in this show, it’s almost like every other monster that we get in these magic battle harem shows is worse. This one was kinda like when the kaiju monster shows up in a Toho film and you go “That’s a guy in a suit” but it doesn’t stop you from enjoying him stomping around on the miniature landscape.
This show has already featured Kizuna’s face between Aine’s legs. I think they could manage to get the point across of whatever is going on.
POWUH: Metanorn Regular with 110 comments
feel sorry for kizuna give chance of normal life got smash by his own sister all cause save world from mech army invasion.
yet give 3 girls sure big blonde, japan anti-perv doing, white hair universe earth ace, etc give they need kizuna to power them up or else below 5% there doomed.
& yet anyone notice another in green armor but look like on mech army side?
POWUH: Meta Team and Spammy Tamer with 7115 comments
I think everyone noticed that, it was made very obvious. It’s just at this point it’s not worth mentioning that there is going to be some bad guy organization. That’s kind of a given.