The Secret to a Good Harem Series at Riuva : Research Institute for Unicultural Visual Arts

The Secret to a Good Harem Series

(5 votes, average: 4 out of 5)

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Popularity: 10% [?] Published by tj_han December 21st, 2007 in Manga Reviews

Is to hire a great artist and then be blatant about it. That’s all!

I just read To Love-ru, which is drawn by Yabuki Kentarou, one of my favourite artists. He really sucks at doing the story, but has a godly talent for drawing beautiful ladies, which is why TLR isn’t written by him. The writer, Hasemi Saki, isn’t James Joyce, but he excels at creating stimulating haremic situations where lots of fanservice can be applied.

Totally nothing is original about TLR. The usual spineless harem lead, his sweet crush, sexy alien princess with no regard for modesty, and exponentially increasing number of competitors and other harem girls, remind one of other series like Urusei Yatsura and Girls Bravo . The interactions between Sweet Crush Girl Haruna and Spineless Lead Rito are completely identical to that of other innocent couples like in Pretty Face, M x 0 and other Jump fanservice comedies. But unlike those series, TLR is totally not funny at all.

But I still enjoyed it immensely. Why?Because the art is sooo deliciously beautiful. Yabuki’s previous work, Black Cat, is a great example of how a series can suck in terms of everything but the art and still be popular. His blonde girls in particular are extremely pretty, like Sephilia, Eve and Rinslet while his brunettes are the epitome of cute, with Kyoko leading the way. In TLR, Eve’s character returns as Konjiki no Yami (Golden Darkness), and there are plenty of other beauties like Lala, Yui and Haruna as well. The best part is, all the girls regularly get stripped and fondled!

Why are some harem good and others bad? The key is to go all out and show lots of fanservice of beautiful people without shame. Do not let serious business such as character development deviate the focus. This is where shows like Mahoraba fail. Half-assed fanservice, poor art and melodrama.

It’s akin to going to a fast food restaurant. You know it’s tasty, you know it’s bad for health, why order the DIET COKE? Get the proper coke!

And in a tribute to the great Yabuki, unrivalled in the arts of beautiful women (his only rival is Oh!Great, even Range Murata doesn’t come close in terms of chara design), this site’s banner shall be changed.

Poor FFT Death Corps Chemist, she got only a couple of days of airtime.

Popularity: 10% [?]

14 Responses to “The Secret to a Good Harem Series”

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1 MistaYoH 42 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 1:42 am

HELL YEAH! HARUNA 4EVAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
2 TFish 9 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 3:02 am

When viewed as a harem series, Mahoraba is indeed one of the genre’s worst.

It’s actually so bad, that I’ve had absolutely no idea it’s supposed to be a harem show. Good thing you happened to mention it here for my enlightenment.

I have now learned that failure can sometimes be the greatest success.
3 super rats 105 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 4:41 am

I’m so used to diet coke that the regular coke tastes funny to me, but other than that I agree! Though there has to be some good fanservice titles that have a good story. I guess most good writers think fanservice is beneath them so they don’t write those types of stories.
4 Orochi 27 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 6:32 am

Funny you didn’t mention Takeshi Obata. And I assume you know the relation between Obata and Yabuki here.

You should check out Obata’s Blue Dragon Ral Grad if you want to see his take on the Harem genre.
5 Zeroblade 163 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 7:02 am

3 Banners in less than two weeks’ time. You might be setting a new record here.

Oh and don’t drink Coke, it’s bad for you! :V
6 Setsuna-san 17 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 8:20 am

Fanservice is what got me interested in anime in the first place.
7 Musa 36 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 10:04 am

Yawn, you want a better harem manga? Go read Omamori Himari. Hentai artist WTF.

TLR is kinda lame. Only good thing is Yami, the Eve clone from Black Cat.
8 edogawaconan 42 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 11:04 am

Hmmm….

…

/me goes checking my mangascan collections…

…

wow it’s there o_oa

…

time to read. LOL
9 Nekonron 12 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 11:17 am

“The best part is, all the girls regularly get stripped and fondled!”

I’m sold! XD
10 Lupus 67 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 11:30 am

Eve > Golden Darker. Fuck that pretender. EVE FOREVER!
11 Owen S 144 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 12:59 pm

I always order Diet Coke at McDonalds only because I don’t like the copious amounts of sugar rotting my teeth. Same goes for harem.
12 Crest 99 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 7:34 pm

Put me on a drip of those please!
13 Sylon Beta 32 comments Dec 21st, 2007 at 9:03 pm

Mahoraba…?

I don’t suppose you’ve confused it with Maburaho? Mahoraba is a slice-of-life series, not a harem one.

1 Fanservice and its place in anime at Hontou ni Taihen desu Pingback on Dec 26th, 2007 at 12:52 am

Do not use any < and > for your own sake. It will end the comment there and then. Also, there is an automatic IQ filter which weeds out comments made by those who accidentally got transported from the stone age.

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