Makoto's review of Kimi no Koto ga Daidaidaidaidaisuki na 100-nin no Kanojo

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Directed by Satou Hikaru, whose résumé is helping to direct Shokugeki no Souma and has a modestly famous show (Jashin-chan Dropkick) under his belt. This work from Bibury Animation Studios(5-toubun no Hanayome, Azur Lane) is both a refreshing Ecchi and a comforting Romance. The show both parodies and implements tropes in a way only someone very aware of the genre could. Since the original manga is published in Young Jump, which is a seinen magazine, it avoids most tropes Romance for young people tend to fall into. The seinen audience also allows the show to be sexual in a more direct way, which is where the refreshing part of the Ecchi comes from. Kimi no Koto ga Daidaidaidaidaisuki na 100-nin no Kanojo(Hyakkano for short) is a story about Rentarou, a young boy entering high-school after confessing to 100 girls in his life and getting rejected every time. He prays in a Shinto shrine, and the god of love himself appears to tell him he will find his soul mate in high school. There is only one problem: due to an accounting error, he has 100 soul mates. And if someone doesn't end up with their soul mate, they die. Rentarou then has to fight for his 100 girlfriends to accept him. People who disregard a work because of its genre, premise or style should not be given a platform. At this point, we all know if well implemented, anything can be good. So when you hear about Hyakkano's premise, don't fret. The idea of having multiple girlfriends is not unheard of in Japanese media, but it is also not as common as you would think. The reason is we have "harem" as a trope, which has a misleading name. Harem is a trope where the main character has multiple surrounding love or sexual interests. But most of the time, the trope is executed in a very specific way. The main character either has no actual pairing, or one of the interests is set as the "main interest". Classic examples being Monster Musume no Iru Nichijou, Rosario to Vampire and Mahou Sensei Negima. Because of the need to keep the status quo, harems cannot develop the romantic relationships of the cast, as it would culminate in the end of the premise of the entire show. For this reason, I would argue strongly that most harems cannot in any way be put in the Romance genre, as they are often antagonistic as a trope-genre pair. In this sense, Hyakkano does not implement the harem trope. Rentarou actually dates all of them, with all that entails. This more polygamic dynamic is refreshing, because it takes the harem trope to its conclusion and deals with it in a more mature way. Rentarou has to constantly deal with realistic aspects of being polygamic: How to approach his girlfriends to add one more? How to keep them all happy? Of course, this approach has its disadvantages, as there isn't enough Rentarou for everyone. But since the cast of girlfriends ends up in a very fraternal relationship with one another, the dynamic works. Another essential moving part of making the show work is how lovely Rentarou is. He is not a self-insert loser or an average boy. He is simply the purest, most lovely and loyal boyfriend. Besides the fact he would die for any of them, Rentarou also treats them not as sexual fodder, but with the respect any boyfriend would. If anything, most of the sexual situations are initiated by the female cast. And those situations escalate just enough to give the show substance. Kisses are frequent, along with a healthy amount of skinship. Also on the topic of genre. Hyakkano is very genre aware. And that awareness translates to the screen in two ways. The first is subversion. A lot of times, the show knows what response is expected by the medium, and it goes either a different way on purpose or takes it to absurdity in order to create comedy. In other words, it parodies it. The second is flawless execution of Romance tropes. You could easily pack Shizuka's romantic development and it would work perfectly as a romance story of its own. Of course, not all girls get the same depth in execution. But they don't need to. The acting is also phenomenal in this show. Katou Wataru is a young newcomer. But he already shows a lot of promise. His inexperience does show up sometimes, but he does a fantastic job overall and probably will become bigger in the future. Seto Asami (Seishun Buta Yarou - Mai, Tate no Yuusha - Raphtalia, Jujutsu Kaisen - Nobara) might be the biggest name in the cast. And although she doesn't have as many lines as the others, for playing a quieter, kuudere character, her presence is definitely felt. An industry monster for a reason. Hondo Kaede (Majo no Tabitabi - Elaina, Paripi Koumei - Eiko) is also an industry veteran and probably has the best overall performance here. She plays the straight pervert perfectly, the same way Tomita Miyu(Kaguya Sama - Miko, Made in Abyss - Riko) plays a perfect Tsundere. But Naganawa Maria(Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon - Kanna-chan, Hataraku Saibou - Platelet) is the one who shines brighter. Her character mostly speaks through a voice to text engine using her favourite book's lines, and she nails it! It really adds a special touch to it, and although they gradually drop the pretense that they are using book lines. It really adds to the character a lot. As for Asai Ayaka (Mairimashita! Iruma-kun - Clara, Shinmai Maou no Testament - Mio) I am not a fan of her style and I think Kusuri is also the weakest link in the show overall, having the least chemistry and the least interesting romance to tell. But her performance is still solid. I cannot not mention how great this show is when it comes to acting and not mention that during most of episode 8, most of the lines of the main female cast are the word "chuu" (kiss, in japanese) and, as expected, they make it work flawlessly. No subtitle is provided for what they are actually saying. It is all left to the actors and artists themselves to portray through acting/drawing. Letting actors and artists exercise their creativity and range and trusting them to shine in situations like this is the hallmark of a good production. Of course, this scene is probably from the source material and the production did not come up with it, but I can see a lesser production scaling it down and playing it safe. So kudos to them. Visually, this show is better than most anime you will see around. Background characters are not distracting even on a big screen, the background and settings are usually detailed enough, and the character design is pretty good. I really like how they all look very distinct from each other, which would not be a given in an actual harem show. There are not a lot of static frames, movement is always present, characters are always expressive. It is visually very pleasant. The writing is pretty good, but I would say it is the weakest link here. One point I really dislike is lazy naming. It is not going to be apparent unless you speak Japanese, but naming characters Eiai, Shizuka, Kusuri and Hahari is very lazy. And the show does worse for minor characters, like "Friend A" and "Meido". As mentioned, I also think Kusuri's plot line is the weakest one. Every other character could be a romance show of its own, but hers would not work at all. On the same point as the name issue, I think the fourth wall breaks are also sometimes unnecessary and don't bring anything to the table. On a positive note, the subplots that start Rentarou's relationship are very well written. Especially the first three. Most conflicts are resolved in a fun way. And most importantly, said conflicts are not misunderstandings, as is common in Romance, but actual differences in opinion. The audio design is also pretty good. Tsuchiya Masanori has being doing sound for this type of show for more than a decade now, and it shows. An overall well-made show with a refreshing premise. If you want to make degenerate shows aimed at boys, do it like this.