pwhodges wrote:I understand this, and agree completely. I'm still enjoying the show; it's simply more fun to watch than
The Disappearance of Nagato Yuki-chan, for instance, while being hugely less interesting than
Oregairu.
I don't blame
Nisekoi entirely for its troubles, as it's serialized in Shounen Jump, which means a long, drawn out publication was invetible, thus the writer was going to have to resort to cliches and feet dragging to keep things from ending.
There was potential for a good story if narritive had been allowed to be tighter. As it stands, it just feels like a longer, mediocre
Love Hina, with better stylization.
I can certainly relate though, in seeing the image of the show being somewhat redeemed in your eyes if you were watching something even worse at the same time. In my case, I've been watching
Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?, and the characterization there are just painful with how horribly cliche and wafer thin they are, especially after coming right off of
Oregairu.
If not for competent world building, and my love for drawn out, knuckle busting, no-holds-barred fight scenes, I would have dropped it immediately.
Nisekoi however suffers in comparison too, because there's yet another slice of life show I've latched onto, one that seems to answer the problems I had with the former.
Ore Monogatari.This show is, in my estimation, nigh the
Kung Fu Panda of slice of life, Romcom anime, in that it's intentionally breaking the rule, by having the MC be a huge, lumbering oaf instead of a bishounen or "average-looking" archetype. This, while the actual series bishounen is regulated to the friend/3rd wheel,
who doesn't have a girlfriend (!) (or a stated love interest).
But even in breaking the rules, it's not being malicious or spiteful about it. Like
Panda, it's a good-natured ribbing on its home genre, while living up what the genre is as its core. In its case, a good natured love story.
The show starts out slow, as both of the male characters are rather typed lipped about emotional matters, and the MC has to struggle in realizing that he, and not his "cool" friend, is the object of the main girl's affection.
But once the show gets going, it seemingly just keeps moving from strength to strength, with stories that don't rehash each other, but instead compliment what came before, building upon the growing relationship between the MC and the girl, and how this effects the MC's relationship with his friend.
BTW, the confession part is done with by episode 3, which means the bulk of the story has been about the two leads sorting through the nuances of
having, not just
wishing for a relationship. I only wish
Nisekoi had that kind of courage.
The MC does have another, one-sided love interest as it turned out, but he doesn't know about it, and her actions only end helping to further uplift the series pairing. She also isn't a series regular.
So in the end, the show is really just two guys, one girl, and
no love triangle. What a concept.
If there 's one thing I'd fault the series with, it's the comparatively exploitive Shounen bits where the MC breaks into hero-action mode. He's built for it of course, but it feels a tad contrived.
Regardless, this too is meant to contrast yet again how he isn't the typical bishounen protagonist, so I can forgive it.
