I’ll get all the deferential flimflam out of the way first: I know very little about romance manga and anime and, if Ao Haru Ride (Blue Spring Ride) is anything to go by, I know even less about teenagers as well. Though I often try to forget, I too was once an adolescent but due to circumstances I won’t elaborate on, most of that time was, for me at least, spent surviving high school rather than, well, anything that goes on in Ao Haru Ride.
not just furtive glances and accidental touches, oh no
Futaba had a crush on Kou in middle school until he up and disappeared. And now he’s come rocketing back into her life, with floppier hair, a fancy new last name and a whole heap of emotional baggage. Broken bird meet your new caretaker! Or so I thought. What I expected going into the series was a story of teen romance and certainly the opening episode seems to be heading that way. Only it’s less of a teen romance than a teen drama which, when I sloughed off my expectations, turned out to be a lot better than just a straightforward puppy love schmaltz.
The CLAMP powerhouse whirs back to animated life after the juggernaut of Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle and the most recent xxxHolic, this time with a protagonist that has a more than coincidental likeness to a certain green-haired girl created by Kiyohiko Azuma. Kobato is an undeniably twee production but, unlike other outputs by the all-female studio, lacks a more engaging overarching story.
whereas series like Chobits had a dearth of possibilities, this seems inspirationally barren
The titular character Kobato drifts down to earth in a swirl of cherry blossoms and flowing hair, finally exclaiming that she will "do her best". Not the most original of introductions but the opening melody by the superb Maaya Sakamoto is reason enough to continue. What follows is relentlessly saccharine as the protagonist is set on a mission - by her gruff and obnoxious stuffed dog Ioryogi - to heal people's hearts and collect the fragments - shaped like kompetio - in a jar so that she can obtain her as-yet undisclosed wish. Surviving on a mixture of luck and the grace of strangers, Kobato's mission introduces her to a medley of shrill voiced people, all with faces easily recognisable to those with even a passing familiarity with previous CLAMP works. Calling this a kids show would be redundant, but that it feels mildly derivative and frequently vacuous is surprising given the creators.
