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If you are looking for a different kind of rom-com, Yahari Ore will offer you plenty. It has more complex characters than your average anime. It's story (while slowish) has plenty of development as it plays out. The authors philosophies and character design are not superficial. It is well rounded even though it has its flaws. If you are not a fan of more serious rom-coms with lots of drama, you might want to pass.

This anime is about a anti-social protagonist who's in the center of a dramatic romantic comedy. Unlike your standard light rom-com, this anime discusses philosophies through its characters. The philosophies are ... then acted upon as the impetus for character decisions. It is interesting to watch these characters attempt to stick to their ideal, or discover new ones. That in itself creates much more character development than you would expect from your average anime. This also might make the anime seem more realistic. It is not. The main character magically finds himself forced into a club with the smartest hottest girl in school. How is that realistic? Most of their problems are also easily solvable in my opinion without breaking character traits or ideals.

The story setup is not realistic. It might appear so because the character are more developed and the problems they face are less superficial. But take a step back and examine the introduction of this anime. The main character is forced to join a club with the smartest and prettiest girl. She turns out to be an ice-queen tsundere. Shortly afterwards a cheerful girl with the opposite personality joins. Thus the anime has setup its love triangle in no time flat. Did I mention the MC's teacher is single, sexy, and smart? None of this is realistic. He just happens to be thrown into the den of two cute girls and the rest is history. Since this is where the anime starts, none of it feels genuinely realistic.

After the setup, the story does feel more realistic with the problems the MC has to solve. These issues are not crazy but rather everyday high school issues that might come up. Its the details that the author goes into that makes it realistic. But the solutions feel forced as there are many ways to approach these problems. The author however, feels that he needs to force the MC and other characters to act on their ideals as a method of solving the issues. There is almost no compromise. There is almost no genuine rational. To this end, the solutions do not feel realistic and the story feels more like fantasy.

The story does steer clear of your standard light romance rom-com drivel. The characters develop over time and communicate in the way you would expect. You also get a diverse amount of emotions ranging from the cheerful and romantic to the bitter and hateful. Too often average pump and dump rom-com animes focus on one spectrum or the other. All this is told from the perspective of the three main characters. As one of the characters puts it: "You must change the world rather than change yourself to win."

The characters themselves are more complex than your average anime cliche. They all show change incrementally which is good. There are some character flaws however. The MC unfortunately contradicts himself early on, something I believe the editors miss. This isn't important in the long run for most anime viewers since they will forget. But it leads to a less convincing MC who may not be the person he claims to be due to unfortunate events. As I said earlier, his solutions are also forced and appear contrived rather than intelligent. I believe the author wanted Hachiman to appeal to viewers by being both smart and anti-social but largely fails in the former department. The other girls also have design flaws. Both are given plenty of screen time but little of it is used to plug the holes in their character design.

Yukino Yukinoshita's problems are never really explained to the audience. This might be OK in real life and OK from the MC's perspective, but its bad for viewers. You never really get to know the why's and the hows. It is a constant mystery why she acts a certain way and none of the relevant parts address the issue. It is almost as if her character was designed with the traits without the backstory that the author would address later on. My point here is that it makes for a weak justification for how her character behaves. Its OK to hide this from the MC for romance story purposes but its not OK to hide it from the viewers. The entire point of this story is to understand the characters. The hook is the romance so you don't need to worry about the mystique. You don't need to solve this issue during the season but it needs to be explained in a way that makes sense for her.

Yui is similar in that she doesn't feel complete as a character. While she doesn't have a meta problem like Yukino, her issue is that she has no real problem aside from the romantic one. Her reasons for being in the club are entirely circumstantial. Perhaps its that she is looking for something real but the author doesn't even go there. Instead the author hamfists through their teacher advisor that she's the glue that holds the club together. I just don't buy it. Instead of letting Yui develop something more she's entirely there for the relationship aspect. That's OK at a certain level but it makes her superficial. Her character is there to strike a balance between Yukino but she cannot do it. Her personality is the only thing that shines but her character isn't fulfilling enough. The author attempts to do something with the dog but later on the dog is completely missing from the story. Of the three main characters, she is the weakest.

Aside from plot and characters, there is also the philosophical side of this anime. The monologues from Hachiman serve to explain why he does what he does. His anti-social views however are weak compared to the real thing. He also likes to egotistically assume he approaches problems from a rational viewpoint. So why does he always take a flawed approach? The reason is simple, hes not nearly as intelligent as he is supposed to be and this I would say is not a character flaw but a design issue. I believe the author designed Hachiman to be smart enough to solve these issues in in a way viewers can relate to. But because his solutions are not even close to the best ones, he fails. This seems to be purely the fault of the author. The character itself is supposed to showcase the anti-social ideals that he holds by making good rational choices at the expense of his personal relationships. Instead however he choose poorly multiple times though this is camouflaged by the ingenuity of his solutions. Since we are dealing with people this is not a good thing. Nobody wants to make a situation more complex than it needs to be just because its a solution. So in this sense the Hachiman ideals are actually quite weak. If we factor in the issue where he questions himself, it becomes even weaker. Furthermore the author interjects to soap-box his ideas through Hachiman. These musings are a different view than what Hachiman's philosophies are. I suspect the author is presenting personal views rather than Hachiman's views because of this. The anime however refrains from preaching to the audience in most cases.

The social aspect of this anime doesn't really do it justice. While it examines the social structures of society well enough (compared to other anime), its still falls short. Many situations are not throughly thought out, many reactions are either overdone or ignored. Some of the drama even seems to be manufactured. My point here is that this anime has potential to extrapolate on the social aspects even more than it does. Instead of digging deeper however it waltzes around so that it does not damage some of the stereotypes it establishes.

The humor in this anime is subtle and good if you like deadpan writing. It pokes fun at every character's cliches and their developments. While it stops short of parody, it does ask many questions and does so through comedy. The comedy also serves as a nice break inbetween the dramatic sequences. One of the key features of this anime compared to others is how comedy is used by the characters as well. In that aspect I would say its more realistic than most animes which elevates the comedic factor.

At the end of the day this is an anime that you should watch if you like rom-coms as it will expand your understanding of the genre. It is not like your typical rom-coms and like many decent ones, it can stand on its own. It however, has a lot less romance than you might expect. If you're looking for something like that, I would pass on this anime as its more about trust than love. But on that note, the romance develops at pace that is much more believable than many other animes. Just don't expect to believe that this anime is that much more relatable than other rom coms.

If you are a fan of Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Comedy wa Machigatteiru season 1, then watch this OVA for some light fanservice. It is non-canon and features many popular characters from the series.

The point of this OVA was likely a response to fan mail post season 1. It also serves as a teaser for season two without spoiling any story points as its non-canon.

Story - The service club must help Shizuka Hiratsuka with a wedding magazine request. This allows you to see all your favorite female characters and side characters dress up. The story doesn't matter since its non-canon but it ... does setup a harem-esque ending. For fans of this anime, most people should welcome this OVA as a way to satiate their appetites. Yet I was hoping that there would be more in this OVA than a throwaway episode.

Characters - All the characters act just like they do in season 1. Part of the charm in this anime is that some characters are less superficial and more developed compared to other anime. Expect all the hijinks you would in this light fanservice OVA. Unlike the anime series, you will not find the philosophical monologues from the MC.

The bottom line is that if you are a fan, you should watch this. The reason why I rated it average is because many other anime have done a lot more with OVAs than what we get here. The possibilities are endless. We could have seen more of other characters that get less screen time. The other factors are that it was used to promote/hype the second season. So I also see it was a marketing gimmick as well as a way to respond to fans of the show. Brain Base had an excellent opportunity to do more here but instead what we get is almost a throwaway OVA in retrospect.

This is not a romantic comedy or a romance. Instead, you get a groundhog day adaption on young relationships in high school with a small amount of generic slice of life. We can sum up this anime as heartwarming but uneventful. This anime is adapted from a manga (partial 4 koma) by the same name and covers 4 of 6 volumes. Also, the manga is better than the adaption as much of the interesting dialogue that gives characters personality is absent in the anime.

Watch this if you like sickeningly yet bland sweet slice of life that moves at a snail's pace and enjoy fictional relationships. ... Do not watch this if you enjoy dramas, are looking for romance in your anime, or want to punch weak characters in the face.

Story/Plot/Summary

The anime about a young boy (Yuuki Hase) who tries to befriend (and romance) a young girl (Kaori Fujimiya). The twist here is that Kaori's memory of anyone she's friends with disappears at the start of every Monday. The twist makes for a interesting anime but the plot, dialogue, and writing fails realize the full potential of the twist. Any semblance of friendship or romance is weak, and the interaction between characters is simplistic, fragile, and boring.

The plot twist should have provided many unique events that could lead to interesting developments but it fails to do so. Instead, the author decided to insert random events (deus ex machina) and provide forgettable drama between Hase and Kaori. Also, you get immersion breaking actions either when characters break character or the author uses deus ex machina to revert any progress making you wonder why anything happened at all. These also seem to be decisions the production studio made over the author's original work. Anyone who steps back and thinks about their own relationships will be frustrated at the simplistic nature of how the characters interact with the plot.

In the latter half of the anime spirals into the slice of life category until the end. There is even an episodic half episode mixed in which was questionable. Some of the episodes are also entirely devoted to developing Kaori's character just a tiny bit. A new character is introduced to help bring closure to Kaori's non-medical related amnesia twist. In fact, the last 3 episodes can be watched as a summary of everything this anime has to offer. Sadly there is no major resolution at the end of the anime.

Characters

Kids are as complex as adults and should not dumbed down as it only hurts the potential of this anime. The pacing of the anime could kill a corgi and the characters and anime studio are partly to blame.

There are four characters. Hase and Kaori who are the protagonists. Kiryuu and Yamagishi's who are supporting characters. All the characters are weak in this anime because the supporting characters are the author's portrayal of the "better half" of Hase and Kaori due to how shallow Hase and Kaori are as characters by themselves. Perhaps if the author spent much more time fleshing out Hase and Kaori, this anime would be great with just two characters. Instead its clear that you need supporting characters so that you get the "whole" Hase and Kaori experience.

Kaori in the first half of the anime flip flops between different personalities much to the viewers chagrin. Then halfway through she abruptly starts to develop her character and become more human which is a positive change. Yet prior to that her interactions with her classmates (who were trash talking her) she comes off as meek and unwilling to confront or defend herself. It is difficult to understand who she really is which makes it hard to care. The result is a unwieldy heroine who's difficult to take seriously but unfortunately she's a better character than Hase. Why is this? She shows the most depth and development out of all the characters which is the most important aspect of an anime that revolves solely around people. Due to her amnesia trait and plot, she was bound to develop the most anyways. Despite all this, in the latter half you keep thinking she's going to say something of interest but it always ends up as fluff.

Hase is a forgettable and weak male lead. He has a standard male sheepish personality who jumps to conclusions and makes assumptions rather than approaching an issue with reason. While this is an attribute many people may have and is seen as normal, the author forces his character to behave in a way which drags the plot down instead of adding to it. Worse, every time he starts getting weepy on the audience he seeks out Kiryuu who then, like clockwork, offers him the most simplest of rational advice. This really speaks volumes about Hase as a character. Kiryuu ultimately manifests as Hase' other half. If Kiryuu was removed and Hase was given character development to seek understanding of his own emotions and follow the exact same rational advice, he would have the potential to outshine Kaori in the anime by far. As a side note, it seems the author cast Hase in a extremely naive and idealistic nature which isn't a bad thing except she (the author) combines this with unlikely events leading to breaks in immersion which again, is not good for an anime trying to deliver a strong story based on relationships. Also, author seems to be channeling her ex-boyfriend's jealously into this character because daaaaaamn, hes green, if you know what I mean.

The supporting characters are what make this anime even bearable.

Kiryuu basically acts as the more mature, more laid back, less excitable, more logical, better half of Hase and Kaori. If Hase ever showed a bit of self consciousness or intelligence, it is manifested in Kiryuu. Or Kiryuu will play the third wheel and provide advice to Kaori if there's a problem with Hase. People like Kiryuu in this anime because hes grounded, not because he's a good character though. Also due to the weakness of characters/plot, even he gets shipped with Yamagishi rather subtly in an effort to add development. This development is tacked on towards the end, probably because the author is attempting to salvage readership.

Yamagishi, the female counterpart to Kiryuu, is one of those light headed possibly lesbian (to attract more viewers) girls who wears her heart on her sleeve (unlike crazy Kaori's split personality). Yamagishi also has a "forgetful" problem but unlike the twist that Kaori has, its closer to absentmindedness, a standard anime character trait. Her role in this anime is to act as a counterpart to Kaori, and fill in the void that Kaori's character fails to do (provide comic relief). She also enters the anime halfway through, at a time when the anime is starting to suffer from a lack of "things happening". In other words, this character's value is unable to stand alone and who's purpose is to prop up the plot itself at the same time while providing contrast to Kaori. Again, if Yamagishi was merged into Kaori, I think this anime would have had much stronger protagonists and a much more creative outcome rather than relying on happenstance. Then again, if they merged, their laugh would be "Teehee ehehehue", creepy.

Art: Pastel colors and fits the anime well, perhaps to complement how bland it is.

Sound: Not bad but not memorable. Fits the anime well however.

Want something that has relationships, romance, and a great deal more done better? Nodame Cantabile. Or a number of other anime I could easily recommend over One Week Friends for the relationship category.

If you expect anything more than a harem anime from this harem/comedy anime you're in for a bad time. The problem is that this anime serves up some plot faster than you can pop a pop tart which drag down the harem/comedy that starts out strong.

We can sum this anime up as quoted from a character: "I found the rest but I just can't find my panties[plot]." ...possibly because the plot is like air, its everywhere but you can't really see it, just feel it. Yeah I don't really get this analogy either.

What could have been a half decent harem/comedy anime with a semi interesting ... main character (because he's not the goody do-er that's overused in these types of anime) instead attempts to focus a little too much on overall plot which leads to its downfall. Though it bombards the viewer with girls of all types and interests leading to sexy scenarios with our MC, the overall plot keeps driving new developments that take away from the comedy and harem aspects that the first few episodes excel at. And obviously nobody is really watching this for the plot. So turn off that brain and watch a few episodes if that's your fetish. Otherwise there's better anime other there for either harem, or plot, and maybe a bit of both as well. (Sekirei, Familiar of Zero, Kampfer, World only God Knows, Rosario Vampire, etc). By better I mean, at least the pacing and the story are told better than this anime.

Story - Starts off strong. Rapid development after first arc is as unexpected as its unnecessary. Ending even more rapid than the middle episodes. The ending is so extremely rushed even the fans of the series audibly complained about how a second season could have been made out of the last 5-6 episodes alone.

Characters - Lots of characters. Character development on the four that stand out the most is actually decent. The bad: Rushed plot means extreme change with several characters that is so absurd and uninteresting that you'll lose interest in them..

Art - Some of the fight scenes were well animated. However, equally there were many scenes that were lazily animated as well (not talking about panty shots though).

Sound - Its fine, nothing special here.

Enjoyment - The most enjoyable parts of this anime were the first handful of episodes which was strictly more about harem/comedy than whatever the plot is supposed to be. The action was "ok". Generic at times and not very memorable.

OVerall: I would have given this a 5 if it only considered the first few episodes where the anime starts off strong. Unfortunately the last four episodes brought it down a notch with its pacing.

Watch this: There is a dragon named Peterhausen. If you'd name your dragon Peterhausen then you should definitely watch this.

Dont watch: There is a dragon named Peterhausen. If that sounds like a stupid name for a pretty awesome looking dragon don't watch this.

Despite a few plot holes, this story about the far future 2700s cyber criminals forced to become cyber police to reduce their sentences, provides great entertainment value for its one track character archetypes and episodic storyline.

Of the 3 OVAs you'll watch, each one tells the story of one of 3 protagonists, hardened criminals with 300+ year sentences. They are forced into solving other A class criminal crimes in order to reduce their sentence as otherwise the police will detonate their explosive neck collars. You will explore the psych, past, and present lives of each three in quick sequences as they often work together to ... terminate other criminals.

The english dub can be found on youtube (search for the anime title). While I typically avoid dubs the english actors (who seem to sport a bit of the brooklyn accent) do a great job at conveying a closer down to earth rendition of what criminals would probably say (though the writing clearly dates from the 90s).

Watch this if you enjoy a little bit of plot, a lot of action, and character development within cliched characters that provide a lot of entertainment for 3x30m OVAs.

You'll enjoy this a lot more if you shut your brain off...entirely (except the breathing part because you need to be alive to watch this). Also possible spiritual successor to Demon King Daimou.

This is a harem anime where your main character (male) accidentally kills a god, becomes uber powerful, then all the girls fall head over heels for him because hes god like literally. Before he even gets powerful, he meets two sexy girls, one which immediately asks him for sex, and the other who first threatens him with a knife, becomes his buddy, then gets drunk and asks him to unzip her dress revealing ... her lacy white unmentionables. The first girl then locks the two in the bedroom and the rest is history. Fast forward literally 10 minutes later and she's professing her love, kissing him multiple times, and the dude just became the new god slayer.

The rest of the plot is him using his godly powers to fight other gods around the area. This plot of fighting gods, which are just monsters really, is secondary to harem/ecchi comedy since there are literally girls every 5 minutes trying to bone this guy. Even in his dreams there's a god girl trying to lock lips with him, crazy. I wish the MC would act a little more like a real person and just give into his inner desires instead of playing the "poor me I am so unfortunate to become godlike and have women want me so badly". That would be pretty cool imo.

If you dont want to think and want to watch sexy women try to bang this guy while he feebly tries to move the plot along so he can fight some monst- I mean gods, then this is just what the doctor ordered to kill some time with.

Don't watch this if you're looking for something with a well written story or some semblance of logic behind the plot or because the synopsis sounds like its going to be a survival apocalypse anime and instead you get a cookie cutter anime that tries to do everything and fails at everything. Do watch this if you enjoy wish fulfillment where everything just kind of lands in your lap; women swoon for you, you power up without even working 1 second literally for it and no explanation is really given.

Some admin told me to watch more of this before writing a review and killed ... whatever I had written. The reason why that review was dumped was because I had only watched one episode. Yep thats right. It only takes 1 episode to see how flimsy of a cash in light novel conversion anime this is. What was worse is that the more I watched, the worse it became plot/character/story wise.

The story is bad. It jumps around more than Game of Throne does and that jumps around chapter by chapter. The story isn't even about the humanity or apocalypse, its about some really egotistical cliche villain who is only there for a few episodes. And about the "plight of the lolis" who are considered second class citizens for unexplained reasons other than they have the blood of the virus which enables them to fight back against what almost erased humanity. It isn't worth going into the numerous plot holes that these two themes have in this anime. The anime just jumps between the two and adds some crappy twist or intrigue to try and keep it fresh. Just too many logical fallacies, plot holes, and poorly explained plots arcs.

The characters are bad and can be described as a whole as "one size fits all". MC is a great example of how a large segment of anime watchers love wish fulfillment and enjoy pretending they can be this character who literally has girls falling in love with him with almost zero interaction, as well as suddenly getting super powerful without even trying to train for it (sword art online anyone?). At least Naruto and Luffy do something before getting new moves (MC literally doesn't do anything and becomes ultra powerful). The MC is so into fulfilling every different aspect of the ideal character that he even won't lay a hand on a guy who clearly was trying to destroy the lolis around him because he was saved. And at the same time he rolls around yelling at people trying to convince them loli's are people too. On the female side the first episode introduced 3 women: loli with flatchest, same aged girl with big boobs, mature woman with big boobs to cover all the major bases of the male population. This wouldn't be an issue if they had a bigger role besides a few lines a episode if the are lucky. Later on more and more girls are introduced to fill in any missed gaps and in the end they're just there to appeal to the male crowd as they all fall in love with the MC (unexplained).

Whats good? Art is done well enough. Also if you really like lots of lolis that's good too. If you're looking for deep interactions with lolis on a frequent basis, there are better animes for those kinds of fetishes though. Also if you like harems, it gets more harem like later on. Maybe the light novels are better but I seriously doubt it.