Man, can you imagine watching the genderbend anime and being surprised at the ecchi? Couldn't be me.
Nah, I was genuinely shocked (SHOCKED) at the first episode of Onimai. Despite not indicating it at all on my anilist, I am a one time reader of the series (back when it was called "Onii-chan is Done For!" or something along those lines (which, now that I think about it, never made much sense)), so going from the wholesome cutesy memories of Mahiro hanging out with the girls and the perversion mainly being found in Mahiro's reactions, to an episode that made me wonder if this was illegal to view in my country, was quite a jump.
The anime continues amping the perversion way up, breasts get super sized, there are many comedic scenes where the comedy is in how everything looks like depraved sexual acts thanks to the anime direction, and there's a constant 'male gaze' around much of the cast. It is without a doubt a remarkably horny anime.
But, why do we give works like Monogatari the free pass when it comes to adaptational horniness, while Onimai is looked down on, the many pseuds bemoaning its inability to keep the ecchi in its pants? Sure, Monogatari may be self aware, it may be construing its ecchi as being due to the various perspectives of the work, most notably Araragi's, but how can we be for certain that Onimai is not of a similar ilk?
I hold that the ecchi is important to Onimai. That the perversion contains only the soul of an artist at work, much like the manga's intoxicating moe features contain the soul of its artist. Because, what is the male fantasy other than to know what women are up to? Kamina of TTGL, the epitome of masculinity, feels this way when his desire to know what lies on the otherside of the wall separate the male and female baths corrupts him in episode 6, and in that moment he evokes a desire all men have felt.
Onimai appeals to this base desire in its very art and animation. Mahiro is the vessel for the viewer in a sense, exploring this foreign world to her heart's content, leaving few stones unturned in her quest to understand the female experience, once she gets past her NEET life.
Oh yeah, that's the actual themes of the show. Anti-NEET/Hikki propaganda. Truly, there is no better way to appeal to the heart of a NEET than to make a genderbend eechi. I sympathize with their efforts on this front, truly it is challenging to make the men of Japan leave their rooms.
As a genderbend show though, and this is the sole genuine part of the review (or is it?), this is great. Genuinely funny (though not outrageously so), treads the line between moe and ecchi, all while absorbing the best qualities of both, and has an adorable main cast with plenty of equally fun side characters. One may even say this has surpassed Ranma 1/2 as the genderbend ecchi in many respects.
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