Cinnamon Ass

And on this week’s Ouran High School Sub-Utena Imagery Watch - whirling tea cup rides!

Haruhi turns up at the Host Club to discover that, for no real reason other than they look good doing it, the Club has decked out their room like they’re in Bali and are all dressed appropriately (all save Haruhi, since she knows that Tamaki will dress her up like a serving wench). The hot topic of the episode is the forthcoming Host Club Dance; Haruhi will be forced to learn to dance for it, a prospect she dreads, but one of the rich girls, Kanako Kasugazaki, decides she wants to take Haruhi to the dance.

So while Haruhi learns to dance (and gets Tamaki all in a fluster) it comes out that Kanako is being pressured into a forced marriage with Tohru Suzushima, the heir to a vast crockery empire; of course, Kanako does actually love Tohru for his knowledge of crockery (?!?!?!), but their relationship has become frosty since their childhood friendship. As the Host Club’s existence is to make girls happy, apparently, the Club sets about setting up a way to patch things up between Kanako and Tohru at the dance; it involves getting Haruhi dolled up like a proper girl, luring Tohru into a situation of temptation with a rather overwrought love letter, and getting him to reveal how he really feels; which works, of course, until Kanako walks on in them and gets the wrong idea. All seems lost, but being forced to dance together in front of everyone at the party cures all ills and all is well…

However, there’s a little twist in the tale for Haruhi. At the dance party, one girl will be crowned Queen and given the chance for a kiss from Tamaki (the King of Bishounen, if you remember); however, in a twist, Hikaru and Kaoru change it so it’s Haruhi, and if she complies they’ll knock some cash off her debt. The winner is Kanako, but Tamaki is determined that Haruhi will not give her first kiss away to anyone but him; Hikaru and Kaoru, meanwhile, conspire with banana skins against him.

I have a secret.

It’s so secret that I sort-of admitted it when talking about the first episode.

I don’t really think this show is particularly funny. But I love it anyway.

Perhaps it’s because I’ve read the first volume of manga, but knowing the jokes beforehand and the storyline always kills comedy; I do find Ouran funny occasionally, but that’s usually where the manga is embellished with jokes that only work with timing and visuals - most of the scene in the Bali Host Club falls under this category, and the flying text enlivens things as well. The rest of the show is generally pedestrian shoujo comedy.

(an honourable mention must go to the “RABU RABU” letter scene, which is genuinely hilarious thanks to Haruhi’s “girly” voice reading it)

The joy in Ouran, of course, is that it’s brilliantly directed and animated, and that’s really what I’m getting my kicks out of still; sure, the swirling teacups may be a bit less fun than the lightbulbs from last time, and there’s nothing quite as awesome as the Shadow Bitch scene from episode 1 here, but all those CG sakura petals and the attention to detail in the Host Club really enliven the show; just imagine if something like Kirarin Revolution had the amazing production that Ouran does, it could actually be half-decent then!

So don’t expect me to be going “LOL SO FUNNY!!1111″ about Ouran; it’s always going to be a bit hit and miss, and it doesn’t really have enough of an emotional core to be as complex as Honey and Clover, for instance. But for a tour-de-force of what talented staff can do for a relatively average story, you really don’t need to look any further than Ouran.

Have I mentioned just how excited I am about Ju-Oh-Sei on Thursday night? Because I am SO excited about Ju-Oh-Sei on Thursday night…

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 11th, 2006 at 9:57 pm and is filed under Ouran High School Host Club. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.