Aaron's Review: Shuffle!

Normally, wasted opportunity leads to a bad show. While I think they didn’t use the right arrows, they still hit the marks.

Guys, Gals & Non-Binary Pals, This is Aaron’s Review of Shuffle!

!Background!

Ten years ago, ‘The world of the Gods’ and ‘the world of the Demons’ opened up to our world. Today, the three live together in peace. Insert the main character, Rin, who is introduced to the King of God’s daughter, Sia, and the King of the Demon’s daughter, Nerine. Why is he being introduced? Because he’s been chosen to become either the next God or Devil. This decision will be made based off of which girl he chooses. However, it’s not just Nerine & Sia that want Rin as a boyfriend. Rin’s childhood friend, Kaede, and his best friend, Asa, are also interested.

So, the series is slice of life harem anime about a teenager who could become the King of Gods or the King of Demons.

!The Show!

Okay, so my main problem with this anime is the missed opportunity! This kid is supposed to be the next God or Devil, but they stick with the romance and comedy of a bunch of girls all wanting the same guy. Am I insane, or does the premise of a show where Gods and Demons both inhabit the world in a domestic lifestyle sound WAY more interesting than ‘who is this guy going to fuck?’

This isn’t to say that what the show does is bad. Hell, it doesn’t just have an idea and go nowhere with it. I’m just upset that they didn’t do much more with it. I want to see a spin-off about the world and its changes do to this concept.

But that’s it. It’s still the same old Japanese town we see in every anime. There’s nothing that stands out about the school, town, or even the background characters. That doesn’t mean they’re bad, just nothing new.

!The Characters!

With my little rant out of the way, Rin is a pretty good main character. 

While a bit arrogant at times, he’s a gentleman towards his friends (mostly female) and it’s easy to see why the girls would actually like him. He can be rather dull on his own, but almost all of dialogue is a conversation with another character so, it’s more of a nitpick.

One issue that I have with a lot of harem anime is that the main character is often a jerk (Kanon, Heaven’s lost property) or a punching bag of a character (Negima, Love Hina). So it’s nice to see a character that would actually be a nice guy with a touch of an attitude as opposed to the other way around.  

Now, a harem anime (in case it isn’t obvious yet) is when a bunch of individuals (mainly women) are after the affection of one person (mainly a guy). This means the people who are after the one in question have to share a lot of screen time and it can either lead to them being cliché characters or just boring ones if not handled the right way. While I’ve seen most of these characters before, that doesn’t make them horrible here. In fact, Kaede, Asa, Sia, & Nerine are fantastic.

I’ll do a quick run through of the characters since there’s a lot.

Kaede is Rin’s childhood friend who often puts others before herself and is a nice person. Her crush on Rin is rather obvious even if she doesn’t out right say it at the beginning. Her character development happens a lot later in the show but the hype up to is wonderful and it’s my favorite arc of the show.

Sia, the daughter of the King of Gods (insert Jesus joke here) is actually quite devious. While by no means a trouble maker or an antagonist, Sia does have a temper but it’s mainly used for comic relief. What isn’t used as comedy is still entertaining. Sia is always smiling and the voice actress does a very good job getting me invested in what Sia is doing even if it’s daily objectives like grocery shopping. Basically, Sia wears her emotions on her sleeve.

Nerine, the daughter of the King of Demons (insert hated celebrity joke here) is very polite and light hearted where as Sia is very confrontational. She’s not a push over however. When a few boys were talking trash about Rin, she used her demon magic to cause an explosion. Don’t worry, they’re fine. She’s not Sia’s polar opposite since they’re both head strong and passionate. But it’s at two different speeds and in different cars.

Asa is the girl who is constantly flirting with Rin. While also being Kaede’s best friend, Asa is a cook who never runs out of energy and is always trying to brighten the mood or tease Rin with her advances. Whichever comes first. Like Kaede, her character development comes a bit later and would lead to spoilers. Also like Kaede, she’s a treat to watch even before then.

The last girl I want to talk about is Primula. She’s the ‘emotionless doll’ character in anime that I’m not fond of. I’ve touched on it before, but I don’t like a character that’s meant to have little to no emotion because I can’t really grasp onto them. However, the show gives her just enough from the beginning for me to be a tad interested and an effective reason for her tone that betters as the show continues on. I don’t consider her one of the girls Rin had a possibility of getting into a romantic relationship with because she’s the age of a middle school girl. It wasn’t going to happen and the show doesn’t act like it was a possibility from the start. So while by no means a bad character, Primula is okay only do to my personal preference.

!The Story!

So, the show follows a lot of tropes in slice of life anime. There’s an episode where they go the beach. Rin accidently walks in on a girl changing. Like I said from the beginning, there’s nothing really new but nothing really bad. Some jokes fell pretty flat for me, but others were knocked out of the park. That being said, if you’re not okay with sexual humor, you’re probably not going to like this. However, it’s pretty tame and it’s presented effectively so it’s not overused or obnoxious. It also doesn’t overly rely on black comedy for its laughs.

!Summary!

The characters are what make the show so enjoyable for me. Seeing them all interact with one another for the good and the bad was a rollercoaster.

It was fun and has a high rewatch factor that I always want a show or movie to have.

If you’re not familiar anime, this would be a good first try.

If you’re a seasoned anime fan, this is good romance show to watch.

!Grade!

Shuffle!: B

Final Word: The best harem anime I’ve ever watched.

What’s your opinion?