The Blogtastic Blogfest That Is Getmeoutofthis.net!

Animus are always an issue for me. I do like them, when they’re good. The problem is that there is so, so much crap out there. I never feel like I have any idea where to start when looking for the really good stuff, especially when it’s the strange, weird things I enjoy. For example, stumbling into Saki was so, so lucky for me, and I loved that show to death. The method I used, though, was just randomly checking the anime thread on Talking Time, and seeing what showed up. Somehow, I found it.

Through similar means, I decided to watch Ouran High School Host Club.

First off, just look at that picture. Look at the show. This thing looks like it should be a complete and utter disaster. At a glance, you can tell it’s full of Reverse Harem tropes and potentially horrible fanservice, each character crafted to fill a specific niche fangirl demographic. It shares so much with so much anime crap out there.

But then you watch it, and within the first episode, not only does it point out which character plays to what stereotype, but it’s a show about a club attempting to be a Reverse Harem for people, to “bring joy to the ladies” as they put it, and is, at the same time, a Reverse Harem for Haruhi, the female protagonist.
And then it gets silly.

The show’s strength is that it knows it’s completely stereotypical in a lot of ways, and decides to just go all out and over the top with it, recognizing how it works. There’s a character in the show who shows up just to berate them on how shallow their characters are, and how they’re nothing like her visual porn novels. Most characters end up having a secret, but that secret is that they harbor ANOTHER anime stereotype, like the cute boy-lolita being a tournament-grade martial artist who people come from all over to fight.

At the same time, while all this is going on, it treats its characters with respect.

Let me go on a tangent here and talk about South Park. I once watched an interview with someone, I forget who. They were talking about why Jimmy and Timmy are okay characters for South Park to have. It’s not cool to make fun of people who are disabled in some way, right? But they said that the secret to this is that these characters are just people. Sure, those qualities are made fun of, but not any more than any of the other characters. They are treated exactly the same, even though they’re different. That makes it okay.

Ouran does this, too. Everyone is weird, or has some quirk, but it’s all treated as normal, even as it’s played up for laughs. The part that really impressed me in this is that Haruhi’s dad is a cross-dresser, and works at what the show calls a “tranny bar.” (It does bother me a little about what I would call the incorrect use of the word “tranny” in the show. Haruhi’s dad is still going by male pronouns, and still makes it clear that he’s the father. However, he’s clearly transgendered in some way, but is still comfortable, for the most part, with his male body. It’s likely that’s just what cross-dressers are called in Japan, or the translator made an incorrect word choice decision, as happened in an issue of Hourou Musuko. This is all kind of a tangent, though.) However, besides maybe one second of shock when he enters a scene for the first time, it’s treated completely as normal. “Oh, you must be Haruhi’s dad. I’ve never met a real tranny before. How are you?” And that’s kind of the end of the discussion. Nobody is freaked out by how he, and eventually his friends, dress. It’s just a thing, just like how Honey looks and acts pointlessly underage and the twins are constantly romancing each other just to get attention. Al these things do get jokes made about them, of course. For example, in a later episode, they end up waking Haruhi’s dad up early, before he’s shaved, and being a bit shocked about it. However, he’s just a person. That’s certainly the right way to go about it.

Anyway, I’m two episodes from watching the whole thing on Hulu, and I’ve very much enjoyed it. It’s made me laugh a lot. If you don’t have a strong working knowledge of the various shojo and reverse harem tropes that I do from reading tons and tons of manga back in the day, it might not be for you. Additionally, I hear the original manga isn’t nearly as tongue in cheek as the anime is, so that might not be a good choice too. But hey, it’s free on Hulu. Give the first episode a watch if you like this kind of stuff. I certainly enjoyed it.