Things take a serious turn.
What They Say:
The story follows Hime Arikawa, whose absent parents have left with saddled with a huge debt. After being saved from debt collectors by three girls on the student council, in exchange for paying off his debt, he agrees to spend the rest of his high school career dressed as a girl.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
When we get a couple of guys looking to peek into the girls changing room, things go bad when Hime shows up to stop them. He’s a student council member, even if an abused one, and he wants to do the right thing here but the guys just beat up on him because he crossdresses. This kind of abuse happens to him repeatedly and he’s unable to really resist as they take advantage of him, which is amusing in that we see how the student council girls watch as they’re rather into it. But there’s a really good sequence that follows as he gets saved from elsewhere and the student council are put in their place for what they do in enabling such things to happen and then watching it for their own pleasure. Regardless of genders involved, it’s a whole lot of what’s right and what’s wrong that’s touched on here and seeing Hime really stand up for himself, even a little, is a big change that’s welcome to see.
In Summary:
While I fully expect resolution and a semi-return to normal in the season finale next time, what we get here is useful as there’s a real issue with what the student council does to Hime, and obvious what the guys who were trying to peep did to him as well. That the student council just watched is, of course, part of the kind of humor that populates a whole lot of anime shows. Here, of all series and after all these episodes, it gets called out as wrong and inappropriate. Suffice to say, it’s a conflicting message in a way, but it may be the way to point it out in the end by showing the abuse that’s played out on women – and a lot of men – and to turn the tables on the viewer to make them realize that they’re participating much in the same way as the student council by viewing it. Conflicting indeed.
Grade: B+
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Apple TV via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.