Review for Oreimo: Series 2 Collection

Introduction

Success can be a double edged sword, true in any form of entertainment, and not least in anime. It inevitably leads to second album syndrome, as you are then expected to follow it up. You get a great property under your belt, perhaps the perfect adaptation of the source material, or just a well-executed original idea. People watch it, they love it, they buy the DVDs, the snuggle pillows, all the merchandising. They cosplay as their favourite characters at conventions, and above all, they want more. The only problem is that you’ve already told the story that you wanted to tell, and even if there is still source material to adapt, it doesn’t measure up to the original. Even when the follow up is a success, fans might compare it unfavourably against the original series, K-On!! to K-On!, Durarara!! x2 to Durarara!!.


But far too often it turns out to be a real mistake; The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya’s second series seemed to deliberately troll the fans, while Chunibyou’s first season was so complete in and of itself that the second seemed like an obvious cash-in from the first episode. It’s even worse when modern iterations of a franchise try to recapture the original nostalgia, as happened with Tenchi Muyo OVA 3, and Slayers Revolution/Evolution-R, shows that just make you want to eject the disc and put the original series on instead. And then there is Oreimo’s second season, the show that attracted as much hate online as the first season attracted love. I haven’t been looking forward to this... for all twenty-four hours between finishing the first review and starting this one.


Kyosuke Kosaka is a high school student with a typical relationship with his younger sister Kirino. She ignores him completely. She is after all perfect, perfect grades, popular in her middle school, good at sport, and even working a lucrative career in modelling. Being the average older brother means that he might not get the same amount of parental scrutiny, but he also has nothing in common with Kirino. Then one day he bumps into her outside the kitchen and her stuff goes flying. After the usual acerbic comments she leaves, only she’s forgotten one certain item, a DVD case containing an erotic videogame.


The truth comes out. Kirino is a closet otaku. She loves anime, and she loves videogames, particularly erotic videogames about younger sisters. Kyosuke doesn’t have time to be creeped out, as Kirino realises that she finally has someone with which to share her interests. After all, a middle school isn’t exactly conducive to otaku, especially a magazine model that has to live up to her popular image at all times. But seeing as her older brother didn’t immediately fly off the handle and tell their parents, Kirino decides that he’ll do as someone to share her hobby with. The first thing to do is to get him acquainted with her favourite games. That’s creepy enough for Kyosuke to decide that the first thing he needs to do is to find Kirino some like-minded friends. But he’s not getting off the hook that easily.


Disc 1
1. My Little Sister Can’t Come Back Home Again
2. The Onii-san I Trusted and Sent Off Can’t Get This Hooked on Portable Beautiful Girl Games and Start Sexually Harassing Me
3. My Friend Can’t Take Off Her Glasses
4. My Little Sister’s Rival Can’t Come to Japan
5. I Can’t Be My Little Sister’s Boyfriend, and My Little Sister Can’t Have a Boyfriend

Disc 2
6. My Little Sister Can’t Be Bringing Her Boyfriend Home
7. I Can’t Become a Couple With My Underclassman
8. I Can’t Create a Summer Memory With My Underclassman
9. My Little Sister Can’t Be This Cute
10. My Little Sister Can’t Wear a Wedding Dress
11. Little Sisters Can’t Barge in on Their Brother Who Lives Alone


Disc 3
12. Total Angel Ayase Can’t Descend Upon My Place While I Live Alone
13. My Little Sister Can’t Fall in Love With Her Older Brother
14. I Can’t Confess My Feelings to Her
15. My Sister is This Cute
16. My Little Sister Can’t Be This Cute!

Picture

Oreimo gets a 1.78:1 anamorphic transfer on these dual layer discs, in native PAL format with the 4% audio speed-up that implies. However, Oreimo’s English language releases have been DVD only (Although Aniplex US did import the Japanese Oreimo Blu-ray to sell in the US, which had English subtitles and a extravagant price point), which in this case means that Madman, who authored these discs were apparently working from NTSC SD masters, not HD masters as is usually the case these days. So there is a degree of softness, a lack of resolution that we’ve become unaccustomed to in recent years. That said, it’s a decent transfer, clear, and with consistent colours, and conveyed with the attention to detail that you would expect from a show about otaku, with anime and game merchandising galore filling up the backgrounds. It’s all perfectly watchable, and scales up to an HD panel well enough.

Sound

Oreimo Season 2 is a subtitle only release, and it gets a DD 2.0 Stereo Japanese track. The dialogue is clear throughout, there are no glitches, and the stereo does enough to give the show a decent degree of presence. One thing that’s noticeable is that each episode gets its own end theme, and generally the music for the series is quite decent. The subtitles are accurately timed, and this time comparatively free of errors.

Extras

The discs present their content with static menus, and there’s a lot more in the way of extras with the second season, although much of it is promotional material.

Disc 1

An Adult Day for Me and Akagi lasts 9:37, and features Flash style animation of two of the characters in a comedy skit or two, before segueing into a promo corner for the show.

Usual Day of the Kurusu Sisters lasts 9:40 and offers more of this.

Game Club Activity Report lasts 20:20, collecting three such animations, although there is no promo here; it’s all comedy.


SD Character Preview lasts 3:21, there are 2:12 of WEB Previews, and unlike the first season, we actually get all of the textless credit sequences for the show, five textless openings and five textless closings on this disc.

Disc 2

I Can’t Ask Mikagami for Live Counselling (4:08) and Charge Otome Road (6:07) are two more SD Flash style animations adding to the comedy.

This time the SD Character Preview is 5:03 long, there are 3:19 of WEB previews and you have all six textless openings and all six textless closings for the episodes on this disc.


Disc 3

Galge Style Movie My Little Sister Can’t Be This Eroge (42:23).

SD Character Previews (6:17), and WEB Previews (1:40), 4 textless openings, 5 textless closings and trailers for Sankarea, Outbreak Company, and Kamisama Dolls.

By Disc 3, any interest I had left in the show had vanished, so I didn’t watch any of the extras.

Conclusion

Well, won’t be watching that again... ever! And a pint of your finest mental bleach please. I have to erase any lingering taint of the second series, lest it affect any potential re-watch of the first.

Oh dear Satan in Hades, what did you just do? I freely admit that I had my doubts about season 1 of Oreimo, the merest suggestion of sibling incest as a topic of a romantic comedy anime putting me on my guard. But in the end, the sibling incest was the subject of a computer game one of the protagonists played, and when it came to the show, it was a celebration and examination of all things otaku, much in the same vein as Genshiken. It was all about how the characters related to each other, and how fan obsessions coloured relationships. When it came to the brother and sister of the story, there’s was an arc of reconciliation and redefining their relationship after years of estrangement, albeit under the same roof. You won’t believe the sigh of relief when I discovered that Oreimo Season 1 didn’t go there, and instead I found a really likeable, entertaining, and knowing comedy, a show I intend to revisit on many an occasion.


And then along comes Season 2 and it puts that in doubt, as Season 2 does go there. It goes for the sibling incest angle, and it goes as far as it can without offending broadcast standards, but not before offending my personal sensibilities. Just, no! In the words of Excel Saga’s Pedro, “Very no!” It should be rated 18 merely for the profanity that spewed from my lips when I watched the train wreck unfold through its final episodes. I just wish that all these anime and manga creators that think incest is an otaku selling point, would be made to watch the X Files episode Home on a loop until they’re disabused of the notion.


But it is just the final three episodes that so ruined any appreciation I had for this show, apparently the OVA episodes that weren’t actually broadcast on Japanese television. The first thirteen should be alright, shouldn’t they? Actually, they’re not, as while they don’t exactly go there in terms of the sibling relationship, they do perform a series of character assassinations on the cast as they unfold. Watch Oreimo Season 1 and you’ll get invested in the story and the bonds that form between the characters, you’ll get to know them, understand them, and you’ll be able to anticipate their behaviour. The stories in the first thirteen episodes of season 2 are acceptable enough, well-written in some cases, but they do not honour the characters in any way. I wound up complaining that they wouldn’t do what they did in the episodes, they wouldn’t say what they said. They just wouldn’t do that. But they do behave in odd, uncharacteristic ways that throw you off kilter, throw you out of the story.


At the start of the show, Kirino and Kyosuke aren’t talking again, with no explanation as to why. The next episode, Kirino is playing a hand-held erotic game, in class at school, which would never happen. A few episodes later, Ria’s friend from the US visits, and all sorts of sex comedy antics ensue. Kirino gets an offer to work abroad as a model, and to get out of it, she asks her brother to pretend to be her boyfriend. So would never happen in season 1. Kirino gets a boyfriend, Kyosuke gets jealous. Kyosuke gets a girlfriend, Kirino gets jealous. And the final few episodes send Kyosuke down the harem route, first actually going out with Kuroneko, which would be nice were it not for the way he treats her, and then all the other cute girls in his life confessing to him, and with him turning them all down for the final three episodes of incestuous bliss.


Those three episodes aside, season 2 is still an insult to the first season of Oreimo. If it were a straight up romcom, season 1 would be Toradora, and season 2, Ah My Buddha. If they were mecha shows, season 1 would be Evangelion, season 2, Linebarrels of Iron. Maybe season 2 is a parody, or set in an evil, parallel universe where all the wrong things happen.


Actually, I tell a lie. One and a half episodes of Oreimo Season 2 aren’t bad. Episode 3 is all about Saori’s back story. There’s none of the other nonsense in it, and it’s a pretty nice tale of how this reclusive rich kid came out of her shell, thanks to her big sister, and what happened after that sister left. Episode 13, despite its questionable title starts off in a very interesting way, telling Kirino and Kyosuke’s story when they were children, a little sister adoring her older brother, and how growing up threw a bucket of reality over her perception of him, how the distance between them grew. It’s a nice, charming story, until we learn the reason why Kirino started playing erotic videogames, at which point I’m swearing like a sailor at the TV again.


I know collectors. I am one. If you bought Oreimo Season 1, you probably will buy Season 2, despite this review. Do yourself a favour and leave it in the shrink-wrap. It will only taint your enjoyment of season 1 if you watch it. If you haven’t seen season 1, then season 2 might be worth a try for the first thirteen episodes alone, if you like poorly written, obviously fanwanky romcom, but leave it at that. You have been warned. But if you want to watch those final three episodes, go for it, if you want to feel like Taylor at the end of Planet of the Apes!


No grade for this. The grades don’t go as low as I feel about this second series. It’s not the worst anime I have ever seen, but following the first series, it is the biggest disappointment I’ve ever had with anime. I just have a desperate hope that by the time I come round to watching season 1 again, I’ll have forgotten that this season even exists. The only way my week can get any worse is if they announce that they’re animating the conclusion of Usagi Drop!