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Let’s make one thing clear. If you love penis jokes, gross indecent crushes and a siscon then this series is perfect for you. If you don’t; welcome to the world of common sense.

*PLOT PART COVERS LAST EPISODE SPOILERS*

Hatsukoi Monster was a show that I was looking forward to quite a bit. I’m a sucker for cute girls in plotless romance series (Ore Monogatari, Orange, etc). You see I don’t need a smashing ingenious plot to enjoy something. What I //do// need is a plot that doesn’t ridicule me. And well. That’s where this show went wrong.

Plot:
While the first few episodes introduce us to our characters ... and how they handle each other. (This actually had me rooting for the show and shunning everyone who dared speak negativity of it.) Soon enough some questionable things got introduced. A girl who steals clothing and lives in the same house as the man she stalks. An elder brother with a siscon so bad that he saves her bathwater to drink from. And a butler who gets nosebleeds from his 10 year old master. To say the least this show went for a shocking approach. By episode 6 it’s safe to say that the plot has little to nothing to do with romance anymore and it’s more about how many shocking jokes we can fit into one ep. Personally I don’t find any of these matters to be joked about. Stalking, paedophilia, incest. Haha I’m having a blast. The great resolve of the romance is also something that I missed I think? We get a daydream. A huge out of character confrontation about everything that didn’t make sense about the show (Why Kanade is so tall. Why he only acts childish when the plot calls for it, etc) and after that promises to be together forever that’s it? Also there’s a dog that feels up an underage boy.

Characters:
Usually I’m a sucker for cute girls. I love moe girls that make me want to protect them. But Kaho is just from another dimension. She’s so dense, yet empty at the same time that after 12 eps I’m not sure what her character is like, minus the fact that she loves Kanade. Kanade himself is this weird crossover between a bishie and a child, which is also all there is to his character. The same goes for most of his friends. They look old, act young. All they do is make penis jokes. There’s a mean dude who doesn’t want Kanade and Kaho to date. There’s a few funky housemates who do have interesting characters yet none of them are ever explored enough to be truly likable. And their relationship to Kanade and Kaho seems to be made of nothing but ‘we live in the same house so we’re friends right?’

Sound:
I’ll be honest. One of the main reasons that drew me in for this show was the cast. I’m an avid seiyu fan and seeing so many talented ones in one show was what got me hooked. That was also all I did enjoy about the show.
The opening is generic and the ending had me wonder what it had to do with a romance anime. The OST is decent. It reminded me of grade school.

Art:
The art is. Decent? I’ve seen worse. I’ve seen better. It’s not striking despite its colour palette. It has it’s good and bad moments. Key moments especially are the generic ‘wow I’m so in love with him’ shots and they’re pretty cute. But they easily get balanced out by laughably bad backgrounders

Overall:
Like I said in the opening you can probably not enjoy this If you like decent plot. I only finished watching it because I was waiting for it to regain the grace it had in the beginning. I can deal with whimsical, weird plots. But the plot has to be there. This show completely gave up around episode 4 and sailed onwards with nothing but penis jokes and drama that had me laughing more at being expected to believe it than actually enjoying it. Add to that the risky/downright gross subjects brought up and I personally can’t believe this series is supposed to be anything but an insult to the people who spend time on it.

If, on the other hand, you love series that need you to turn your brain off to enjoy it. By all means this is the series for you.