Ookami-san
Title: Ookami-san Genre: Action, Comedy, Romance Rating: 6.0/10
Review: Well guys if you read my first look for Ookami-san you are probably a little let down by what I ended up thinking about it. There were a couple good traits though, so let’s start with that before I go on my rant spree. The art style was probably the best part of the anime. I really enjoyed the fight scenes, small fan service, and backgrounds. The fight scenes were rather lengthy (good thing!) and I was a little surprised to find the artist/director creating new moves each time. On top of that, there was actual fighting progression, specifically by the character Ryoushi. Generally in action anime you find two types of fighting changes: 1) absolutely no change or 2) unbelievable, unexplained power boosts that take them over the edge to defeat their opponent despite a clear disadvantage. OOkami-san did a good job keeping a well paced change in experience. Now the next best thing was the soundtrack. The chorus for the ED was strangely addicting, the beat reminds of my childhood playing 2D games on my Sega. Now let’s move onto the elements that sort of killed the anime for me. First is the narrator, I understand why she is there with the whole story-telling of little red riding hood, but probably the most annoying person ever. At first it was pretty cool and funny, but after episode 4 it was just a hassle to listen to both her and the characters. As an English speak it was difficult to read both subtitles, but I don’t see a native speaker having that much ease either considering the narrator completely masked over the voices. Probably could have cut back on her role, or removed her completely. Next comes the character sets. Probably the only person who I legitimately liked was grown-up Tiaga - I mean Ryoko. Toradora! didn’t create a biased opinion at all…heh…heh… yeah. Ryoushi was a little boring. The whole phobia was a bit dumb. However, Ookami-san did a great job with development. You actually watch all the characters slowly change over time in attempts to rid their faults. I probably would give the anime more credit if the character development actually mattered though. Within the 12 episodes I felt like nothing happened. The director would tease you with main story progression, then quickly change to more filler. Even the last episode was basically a filler. I say last episode because no second season has officially been announced despite the wide open story. Absolutely nothing was resolved, another annoyance. So in terms of story Ookami-san was definitely lacking.
Final statements: I would say this is an avoid watch if a second season never comes out. I doubt the director intends to leave the anime at this point so a low priority watch may be the right thing to say. Despite the great start Ookami-san ended as a complete let down this season.