Title: Nyan Koi! Complete Collection (new english dub)
Director: Keiichiro Kawaguchi
Studio: AIC
U. S. Distributor: Sentia Filmworks / Section 23
U. S. Re-Release Date: Dec. 31st, 2013
Format: DVD / 300 minutes / 12 Episodes
Genre: Comedy, Harem, Supernatural
Age Rating: TV 14
Overall Grade: C+
Synopsis:
Saying that Junpei Kosaka’s allergic to cats is something of an understatement. Just thinking about cats can make him sneeze – a fact that seems to be lost on his mother and sister, who both ADORE cats. And if that wasn’t bad enough, when Junpei inadvertently damages a statue of a cat deity, he becomes cursed with the ability to understand felines. Now Junpei must perform one hundred great favors for cat-kind or face the fate of being turned into a cat himself!
Life quickly becomes a purrfect hell as every cat in the neighborhood starts sending Junpei their list of “requests.” But it’s not just the cats: the local Yakuza’s daughter is playing cat and mouse, the monk’s daughters are acting catty, Junpei’s childhood best friend is ready to use him as a scratching post, and the girl he has a secret crush on is as cat crazy as the rest!
Commentary:
Nyan Koi! starts off strong with the simple premiss of a unlucky boy who ends up gaining a strange curse just because he tries to kick a soda can into a trash can. With him discovering that he can now understand cats and being allergic to them it sets up s wonderful play between him and the cats that ends up being somewhat of a lost leader later in the series. This uncomfortable connection proves to add some fine laughs early on and just as he is embarking on his journey to fulfill the favors for the cats in order to lift the curse. It did’t begin to loose its charm until the focus turned to the women. The focus moving to the girls and the typical high school boy and his girl crazy imagination. That is where it lost its way and became just too much like a stereotypical harem.
Nyan Koi! felt a lot like AiYori Aoshi but they just don’t live together and the main two are not together, but they want to be. It just seems as though every time things are looking somewhat up for Junpei he gets put in a situation where he comes across as nothing but a prevue. This is funny a few times but it becomes rather redundant and it looses its charm. The best times of the story are when he is helping and interacting with the cats. It works well and you can tell that the original extent of the story was to put some person in that cursed situation. The rest of the harem aspect is nothing but a added distraction.
Overall Grade: C+
In the world of Harem anime Nyan Koi! is mediocre at best and in the world of strange curses it is fun and entertaining. Unfortunately the harem tends to weigh down the rest of the series. The animation is rather standard for AIC and there is nothing special about the voice acting, with the level of writing being both the strength and weakness of the series it is clear that someone got to the creators and talked them into watering down the central idea with a classic harem subplot. I would love to see this remade and only have a simple high school romance as a side story. I bet there could be some very funny and wonderful option of ways he would have to help cats. I also noticed how much more effort was put into creating interesting cat characters over the human characters. I is proof that this series wasn’t meant to be aimed at the 15 to 20 year mail population but rather a wider audience how would enjoy a simple comedy about a guy who has to fulfill 100 cat request before he turns into one himself.
Even with the harem getting in the way Nyan Koi! was funny at times and easy to watch. I have a feeling plenty of people will like this and be very happy with the outcome.
