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I am going to admit this right now. Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid isn’t a masterpiece. There are a lot of things that I don’t like about it. Even so, I still personally think it's good for a number of reasons.
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General Information (MyAnimeList)
- Type: TV
- Episodes: 13 (+ OVA and Specials)
- Aired: Jan 12, 2017 to Apr 6, 2017
- Producers: Lantis, Pony Canyon, ABC Animation, Kyoto Animation
- Source: Manga
- Genres: Slice of Life, Comedy, Fantasy
Facts:
- According to ANN, the manga had sold 1.2 million copies in total.
- The anime won the “Best Comedy” award at Crunchyroll’s 2017 Anime Awards.
Story
MyAnimeList: “...the circumstances behind the dragon's arrival on Earth seem to be much more complicated than at first glance, as Tooru bears some heavy emotions and painful memories. To top it all off, Tooru's presence ends up attracting several other mythical beings to her new home, bringing in a host of eccentric personalities. Although Kobayashi makes her best effort to handle the crazy situation that she has found herself in, nothing has prepared her for this new life with a dragon maid.”
Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid is set in the human world. Kobayashi works at an office job and one day encounters a dragon with a sword stuck on it’s back. She surprisingly removes it and the dragon is saved, introducing itself as Tohru. Tohru wants to return the favor by becoming Kobayashi’s maid. Along the way they encounter other dragon friends and crazy experiences.
The story is pretty unique and not half bad, however there seemed to be an endless amount of possibilities, and so I feel it could have been better. For example, Tohru destroying the universe. This plot was hinted at once in the anime, with Tohru saying that she can destroy the world easily.
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Characters
Kobayashi: A woman who has an office job and lives in an apartment. She is kind-hearted to her friends and the people around her but when she’s drunk, she’s less serious, more careless and, well, how a drunk person acts. She was a pretty good character in the anime.
Tohru: Dragon from the dragon realm that was saved by Kobayashi while she was drunk. After that day, she started living with Kobayashi, became her dragon maid, and even loved her. She was a weird and unique character that at the end of the day was a good character overall.
Kanna Kamui: Dragon and Tohru’s friend. Because she pulled too many pranks, she was forced to leave the dragon realm. She goes to Oborozuka Elementary School as a third grader, as she is very young. She is a very cute and funny character in the show, similar to Tohru. She was the main character for the punchlines/humor.
Elma: Another character from the Dragon Realm. She was once friends with Tohru but then Tohru started hating her for eating too much, and after that they became rivals. I feel that she wasn’t necessary in the anime and was used for filler moments/arcs. However, on 7/4 they announced a monthly manga based on Elma’s daily life, so at least this has a happy ending.
Lucoa (Quetzalcoatl): Former dragon goddess and is friends with Tohru. She stopped being a goddess after she drank cursed wine, and it went off from there. She’s kind and wise, but lacks common sense. She’s probably the worst character in this series, mainly for her stupidity and pedo attitude towards Shouta.
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Romance
Let’s speak about the most popular relationship in the anime, Kobayashi and Tohru. It is very evident that Tohru is deeply in love with Kobayashi. Every episode incorporates this relationship into the anime as a punchline, and my advice would be not to repeat a joke over and over again and expect it to still be funny. However, I still think the relationship is cute in the anime. Even though Kobayashi doesn’t show any affection of love back to her in the anime, she actually does in the manga, which is surprising.
While Kanna was in school, Riko loved Kanna, similar to how Tohru loved Kobayashi. Both do love each other, as seen when Kanna agrees with Riko that they should get married. There are other relationships not mentioned here, but most of them are funny, the reason being how ridiculous they are.
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Humor
Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid has humor, it just doesn’t execute it well. They use repetition as humor throughout the anime, especially for the romances. Kanna is probably the funniest character in the series. For example, when she accuses Kobayashi for seducing Tohru into living with her, it was honestly pretty funny. Tohru always tries to make Kobayashi eat her (regenerating) tail that is poisonous. It’s a good joke as it wasn’t overused, but there wasn’t an actual good/real reason why she would do this, other than to show her affection. Kobayashi is flat-chested, which creates a running gag whenever she sees someone that isn’t (which is always). As you can see, the anime has humor, it just doesn’t use it correctly at all times.
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Audio
There are no audio errors (or any obvious ones) throughout the anime. The opening theme and ending theme are both amazing and catchy. One thing that I despised about the anime is the dubbed version by Funimation. There was a lot of controversy about them changing things that don’t fit in at all. For example, in a scene with Lucoa and Tohru, Lucoa explains why she’s more clothed than usual. “Everyone was always saying something to me, so I tried toning down the exposure. How is it?” The dub, however, changes what she said more to their fitting. I personally don’t feel it was right to do something like this.
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Final Thoughts
Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid is an anime that I’d go back to re-watch. It’s a slice of life, so it doesn’t need context with whatever episode you watch. It also has good humor, which made me laugh a lot of the time. The characters are unique in their own way and their plots are good too. Overall, I honestly enjoy it for many reasons and I hope you do too. But hey, that’s my opinion, what’s yours?
