AlucardNoYuuutsu

SPOILERS INCLUDED. (I didn't read the manga so I can't compare manga and anime side-by-side). Will you do it with me, here? - random passing girl, age 16. After this awful experience, I have to confirm my theory: don't follow friends' recommendations. I didn't want to watch Domestic na Kanojo, but some guys were saying Wow! It was E-P-I-C, watch it! - and I had time to waste - so in the end I decided to watch it and... what can I say? It was horrible. - Plot The premise is quite dumb, because Domestic Girlfriend talks about a random girl called Rui who asks a TOTALLY RANDOM boy shemeets, called Natsuo, to have sex... well... okay? He accepts. And Natsuo is in love with his teacher, Hina. Okay. Then, we get to know that Natsuo's father is remarrying. Natsuo's new stepmother is Hina and Rui's mother. Wow! What a coincidence! You may think: "This is just the original premise. It'll probably get better later, don't worry!". But you're wrong. Domestic na Kanojo's plot is ENTIRELY BUILT on coincidences. Let's talk about coincidences in anime. There are cute coincidences, like "boy accidentally meets girl" and they don't take themselves too seriously. There can be Deus Ex Machina in an event. But this anime is a constant succession of coincidences and Deus Ex Machina! There were points in which Domestic Girlfriends could end! No. The plot forcedly goes forward, episode after episode. Examples during the series - Natsuo's new stepsisters are Hina and Rui. - Hina sees Natsuo and Rui while kissing. - Rui sees Natsuo and Hina while doing things. - Natsuo sees Hina while mast- Got it? This series should be taken itself seriously. But it's not, because it's not believable. It has more fantasy scenes than an isekai anime. And that's bad. But HEY! BD/DVDs will have explicit scenes! More actual PLOT! - Art/Sound The art is actually alright. Not the best ever, but it's okay, not bad like some shows this season (mmmmh... Date a Live III is that you?) - so we can say art is one of the best aspects this show has got. The OP is really good. The greatest this season for sure. Too bad it's wasted on a series like Domestic na Kanojo... The ED is quite good too. I don't get why a sad music was played when Hina was mast---- - Characters I HATE THEM! I HATE THEM ALL! Except Rui, maybe Thinking: "A character who does bad things is not automatically a bad character" is right. But Domestic Girlfriend's characters are awful. Natsuo is a dumbass. He accepts to have sex with Rui while he's in love with Hina-sensei. Then he tries to kiss Hina while she's sleeping the same day he gets to know that Hina and Rui will be his stepsisters. Seems right, yeah! Then he's sad for Kashiwabara Momo's story so he hangs out and does things with her, too. He says romantic sentences to Hina and then he kisses Rui. Then he constantly lies to Rui because he wants to go to Hina's house. Then he does explicit things with Hina, too! WHAT. THE HECK. IS. THIS. Are you joking? His characterisation? Mmh... let me think... I don't know, he's just an unfaithful boy. He likes to write books and tales about his love for Hina-sensei... okay. Another thing pisses me off: when a girl sees him while cheating, he asks the girl who saw him betraying her: "why r u saddd, why are u angryyyy" - WHAT THE HECK. Then we have HINA SENSEI. The woman Natsuo fell in love with. She has a relationship with a married man. Some days after she left him, she's interested to Natsuo again. Wow! It's right! When she sees Natsuo and Rui while kissing she is immediately HEARTBROKEN and she decides to move to a new house. BUT... she wants to f- with Natsuo, still! Hey! You've seen YOUR SISTER kissing him last day and then you betray her! What's wrong with you! You heartless monster! I hate her and Natsuo a lot. In episode 11 she says: "Natsuo our relationship should end-", then, in like T-W-O seconds, she completely CHANGES idea. WHAAAAAA- We have Rui. The only girl on the right side, probably Sure, asking a stranger to have sex for knowledge isn't normal, but at least she is kinda faithful to Natsuo and she doesn't betray him/go with other guys. She didn't know Natsuo was in love with Hina-sensei, so she didn't betray her sister's confidence while kissing Natsuo by purpose. Natsuo did. We have Momo, a girl who hung out with billions of guys and she's infamous for it. Ok. Natsuo was sad so he decided to have sex with her lol. EVERYTHING IS FINE. Minor characters Natsuo, Hina and Rui's parents! Wow! They don't know their children are constantly cheating! Fumiya! Natsuo's friend he doesn't care about because Natsuo is too busy on CHEATING. Masaki Kobayashi! A dude who works of a caffé. Ashihara Miu! The president of the Literature Club! We don't know much about her, but Natsuo will probably cheat another time, I guess. Other useless characters. - Overall Domestic na Kanojo was painful to watch. It's one of the worst anime I've watched so far. I don't know if I'll read the manga, but this 12 episode-based series was enough for me... I continued it just because I wanted to laugh. Damn.

HellLyter

Have you ever watched an anime and been annoyed at how slow the relationship between characters develops? Sometimes the furthest characters go throughout an entire season of liking each other is hand holding. Well, not with Domestic na Kanojo!!! The very first scene is two of the main characters having sex, almost making me think for a second that I had accidentally stumbled across a hentai. This anime immediately strives to set itself apart from the crowd. It endeavors to be special and throws all sorts of drama at us in the forms of forbidden incestuous love and depressed characters as if attempting to getus to be impressed by how far it’s willing to go to be extra dramatic and unique. Though alas, it falls far short of the mark. Honestly, I'd much rather watch those imouto anime that everyone else loves to hate on over this crap. Yeah, I said it! I’d also much rather watch characters take 24+ episodes to get to the hand holding stage of their relationship over this show. There isn’t really an overarching narrative so much as a collection of short stories. I say this because the flow of the anime is simply atrocious. Characters would go through one event, such as the arc covering heroine Hina’s relationship problems, only for it to be completely forgotten for several episodes in favor of the protagonist dealing with another issue plaguing a different disturbed girl. And the worst part is that none of the characters ever evolved as people throughout these arcs nor do they learn from their mistakes. None of the scenarios were deep or impactful precisely because hardly anything ever amounted from them. They just seemed like halfhearted attempts to create romantic tension between the characters, and for me, it just didn’t work. But don’t despair, for there is one bright spot amidst all of the mediocrity. The opening theme song, Kawaki wo Ameku, is so good that it has its own anime entry on this site. And it’s much higher rated than the anime itself. Deservedly so, because the song is amazing! The emotion that the vocalist is able to convey is really special, and is something that, from personal experience in the music industry, is hard to accomplish. So hats off to her. Unfortunately, the rest of the soundtrack is plain, and the anime often decides to play upbeat songs during “emotional” moments that further ruin the authenticity of these scenes. Aside from Hina’s seiyuu, the other voice actors just sound so dull and uninterested. Yes, I get that that’s the point when it comes to Rui, but that doesn’t mean that the other girls have to sound so deadbeat. And Natsuo’s seiyuu isn’t any different, though I guess that perfectly fits with Natsuo’s character. Our protagonist Natsuo is one of the most generic yes men in all of anime. People complain about isekai and harem anime heroes being boring constantly, but at least they can say no from time to time, particularly when anything sexual is involved. This dude just does whatever he’s told with like one exception when he decided not to kiss one of the girls once. *clap clap* And when the anime tries to show that he regrets some of his more immoral decisions, he just goes ahead and repeats them anyway, proving that his growth as a character is still at 0%. Natsou’s incredible blandness and stagnancy is simply astounding. I honestly much prefer his glasses wearing chubby buddy. Like, by a lot. The heroines aren’t much better. By all appearances, Rui is a character that I should have enjoyed. I like both her personality and design, but she unfortunately suffers from being a poorly written character. Her awkwardness, which was her main trait, was completely thrown out the window after a few episodes, and she just doesn’t do much of anything important in the show. You could honestly write her out of the story and replace the sex scene with her with one of the other girls and nothing would change. The only female character who is actually important to the broken narrative is Rui’s sister Hina, who is the definition of a hot mess. Seriously, Hina has a lot of problems, and I’m sure she was written this way to be an interesting and layered character thanks to her flaws. But like everything else, it just doesn’t work. Why? Because she has no merits. Everything she does is immoral, and like everyone else, she never learns from her mistakes and any remorse she’s shown feeling is completely invalidated by her just repeating the same exact mistakes over and over again. Flawed characters who aren’t set up to be antagonists and don’t even receive a shred of redemption or personality just don’t work, and Hina is a prime example of this. There are other girls in the show, but they do absolutely nothing for the anime. I guess they’re simply there for some more love drama and harem-esque themes down the line in the manga. But from the anime alone, they contribute nothing to the story. They look cute though, so that has to count for something, right? My biggest issue with this anime was that I didn’t enjoy watching it. I was pondering what word could perfectly describe my feelings towards Domestic na Kanojo, and the first that came to mind was “cringy”. I was just so uncomfortable while watching it. Now you might be thinking, but isn’t that the point of the anime? Isn’t it designed to cover discomforting material? While that’s true, the reason why I cringed wasn’t because of the material itself, but of how poorly it was all executed in the anime. Characters weren’t deep, just stupid. They never learned from their mistakes and would just make bizarre choices that would often completely go against their established characters. And the scenarios they found themselves in never felt impactful. They were just random spikes of drama that would never actually go anywhere. Shows are meant to be fun to watch, yet with this one…I just couldn’t get into it. Now excuse me as I go and watch OreImo, Eromanga-sensei, and KissXSis, which all do a far better job with the brother x sister relationship thingy than this one.