Koi Kaze

Koi Kaze isn't your average anime. It hits you right in the feels, with a depth of emotion that's hard to find anywhere else. The story itself is intense, but it's the characters that really shine. You get this real sense of their internal struggles, their hopes, their fears.

And the music? Don't even get me started! It perfectly complements the mood, from the soft, melancholic pieces to the ones that swell up during the more dramatic moments. It's like the soundtrack is living and breathing with the characters.

Everything about Koi Kaze just comes together perfectly. It's beautiful, it's heartbreaking, it's unforgettable. ... Just be prepared for an emotional rollercoaster, because this one will stay with you long after the credits roll.

But hey, that's just my two cents. This anime isn't for everyone, but if you're looking for something that will really challenge you and make you think, Koi Kaze is definitely worth checking out.

TL;DR: Those who can't handle grey will back off, and those willing to step into some mud will witness a beautiful series. It's hard to recommend, but I don't want to NOT recommend it, either.

Koi Kaze dumps you into a pond of squick and leaves you there to soak to death, making it very uncomfortable to watch the first few episodes. Especially from Koshiro's side, you witness his clumsy attempts at realizing, controlling, and managing his feelings, and at times it's painful to watch. Meanwhile, our princess Nanoka acts like a normal, sometimes-bratty, sometimes-innocent teenager, seasoned with a generous helping of maturity to quell her ... tongue. They balance each other out wonderfully: Koshiro being an almost thirty-something manchild, and Nanoka being an almost-teenage-adult.

As the anime dives deeper into their pasts, you realize how the seemingly little things in childhood have profound effects. For Koshiro especially, his emotional immaturity is a reflection of what he was and was not given. Combined with his natural underwhelming personality as a child, he grows up to be somewhat of a stewing mess--which has and continues to mess up all his relationships.

The metaphors and symbolism are tastefully done, and several parallels are drawn throughout the series: Nanoka versus her two friends, Koshiro verses his two coworkers, one of them arguably his closest friend. The OSTs really brought out the emotion in the scenes, leaving your stomach dropping with nervousness or fluffy with glee, and they handle what could've been smut scenes very tactfully and tastefully. It's not meant to get the viewer stimulated; it's meant to portray a very staunch picture, and it does a great job of it.

I'm a bit disappointed at the end; it feels a bit weak compared to the rest of the series, as it leaves it on a positive and open-ended note. It doesn't bother to discuss what would, could, or should be; it just gives you an ending, and asks you to be fine with it. Given the controversial nature of this anime, though, I would have preferred something a bit more solid.

That said, I did enjoy this anime. It carries the characters' emotions with subtlety and grace, and doesn't overplay anything. I rate it high, but it certainly isn't for everyone.

Am I the only one that watched this and thought 'god is dead and we killed him'? This isn't some brave subversive artistic philosophical anime about the nature of romance, this is an insane delusion. 'Beauty' is just about the farthest word from what I would use to describe it. Anime like these are why we don't deserve good things.

If you've ever watched to catch a predator or any police or journalist interview/interrogation with a pedophile, you will notice how the predators' explanations and justifications sound very similar to the themes and points in this show. In fact, this show was really just ... a pedophile's depraved justifications made manifest. With every subsequent episode it only got worse. They try to argue why an underage person is 'actually really mature for their age', handwave away all the glaringly obvious signs this person is immature, and try their hardest to convince fellow adults to agree with them because what they crave most (after underage children of course) is the approval of other people, as if to convince themselves that they aren't disgusting for viewing and acting towards children the way they do.

Without spoiling anything here are some of the things Koushirou (28 years old btw) does in this anime:
-go through a box of tissues rent-a-gf-style because he found his little sister's bra in the laundry and took a whiff
-visibly reacts to the sight of and sometimes attempts to touch young children be they at a playground or in public
-becomes seething with possessive rage and grips his sister's arm so hard it hurts her because he saw her talking to another boy her age
-says stuff like 'i cant be expected to control myself around her' in regards to his sister

This list goes on, but one of those things I found funny was how mothers were always instinctively sus around this guy, pulling their kids away from them because they clearly were getting pedo vibes from him. People sometimes get this strange sense around people like psycopaths or predators as like some sort of evolutionary 6th sense instinct, that part of their brain has detected something is up with this guy and to be on guard. Well evidently many people who watched this show did not pick it up. Most of the discussion I see seems to be about how this show dared to question whether or not incest relationships are moral and stuff like that, but that is an entire different can of worms. You know what is a lot less morally grey than incest? An adult man sharing a bed with a girl who barely has hit puberty. This is pedophile propaganda.

It does not matter if they are brother or sister, if they haven't seen each other for a decade, it doesn't matter if she likes him back. No human being's first reaction to seeing a girl who looks like she is straight outta middle school should be to go 'wow, what a babe. love at first sight' and spend the next 13 episodes in some disgusting cat and mouse romance with them.

Do not waste your time with this show, do not give it the time of day, and most of all do not fall for anything this anime has to say.

This show literally made my skin crawl and I feel like the FBI should investigate anyone who thought this deserved anything resembling a high score.