Love Get Chu ~ Miracle Seiyuu Hakusho ~
So this is the first all-out seiyuu anime that I have seen. Airing in 2006 in Japan only, I wasnt entirely sure what I was getting into. I originally wanted to watch this because of the title Love Get Chu
.. and the OP that I found. It was enough to make me go Hmmm, yes this might be fun.
Love Get Chu is about a group of girls trying to become seiyuu (voice actors/actresses). Its a very coming of age, slice of life, comedy type of anime. The girls that were introduced to are not experts; rather, we watch them become seiyuu from the very beginning, training school. The girls themselves are pretty great, theyre all very different personality wise, but theyre also full of clichés, so if you hate that, this probably isnt for you right off the bat. We have our super Main girl, the star of the show, the airhead whos entirely naïve, the natural klutz and the one who is always ready to cheer everyone up; Momoko Ichihara. We also have the shy, quiet and reserved girl Rinka Suzuki, the tomboy Tsubasa Onodera, the observing intelligent girl Amane Oohara and the childhood friend Yurika Sasaki.
There is also a male lead, the guy who is a part of a love triangle, the one who wants to become an animator, the filler; Atari Maeda. I call him filler because hes honestly not needed for Love Get Chu. Most of the time hes just sort of there. Sure there are episodes where he helps Momoko get to know herself better or where Momoko can rely on him sometimes, but by the end of the 25th episode, I was rather tired of seeing him. Hes the childhood friend to Yurika and the love triangle involved Yurika, Momoko and himself.
The story in Love Get Chu is that of what I imagine other seiyuu like anime are, but since this is my first time watching one, I have no direct comparison. I think the biggest issue Love Get Chu has is identity. It starts off as a were going to become seiyuu and were all rivals sort of thing. Of course by episode 5, they all become seiyuu and the anime takes a turn for the hardships that are included to become one and the difficulty it is to be a really good seiyuu. It then goes into idol territory and tries to bring up some sort of antagonist; at least thats what it looked like. I cant even remember his name; I swear his name is only said like 10 times or something. There are these business and political aspects to Love Get Chu which just show up for seemingly no reason at all. If the entire anime had focused on either becoming a seiyuu, idol, or a combination of both, instead of shoehorning romantic elements and some fake antagonist, Id give it an 8 or more.
Its a little funny, thinking about the way Love Get Chu started and ended, they could be considered different genres really. The beginning has all this great work, lovely animation, great face reactions, super funny scenes and antics between the girls. A little further than halfway through and despair and sad things start to happen, of course it doesnt last long at all, but my problem is why? Why bother having it if youre not going to expand upon it. Same with the romance elements and things. Id actually have preferred it if Yurika won Atari; her tactics were slimy and really bad, she took advantage of Atari being drunk and not remembering anything to make him hers. Things like that, which when typed out (and watched too) is 100% dark when compared to the Love Get Chu I watched in the beginning. Like I said, I think Love Get Chu had an identity crisis and just couldnt figure out how to make 25 episodes of worthwhile content; would have been better off being 1 cour.
Art style, depending on how you look at it, could be considered bad or good. Airing in 06, most people would expect something nicer to watch, but I actually liked the very early animated art style. Its cute, the eyes are extra big, the mouths can get crazy wide and faces are different. The entire aesthetic looks really pretty and the outfits the girls wear, oh my goodness, super cute stuff. If there is one part of the show that I really really liked, its the art style, the beautiful bright colors, the clothing, the way the world looks; I loved watching Love Get Chu, thats for sure.
Sound and things: An anime with a huge focus on seiyuu, so the best thing is how different each seiyuu can sound. There is one specific episode that really highlights the powers of a veteran seiyuu, I wont spoil it, but being able to do 5 different sounding people, that was really cool to listen to. BGM is very normal and nothing to praise, except for when the sadder things start to happen, the change in both tempo and expected music is very stark and different. OP and ED are pretty amazing. The OP is what made me want to watch Love Get Chu, its cheerful, its super happy and the animation to go along with it is fantastic. The ED, which took a little bit to warm up to, is what I would say J-Hip/hop or something; once the beats drop and the vocals kick in is when the ED shines and makes it good to listen to. Its also accompanied by Usumaru, Momokos keychain mascot usagi doll who dances on screen, so its super cute.
Over all, I think Love Get Chu is a very good anime, it probably does things differently than other seiyuu shows, since I figure this is a genre thats hard to really make interesting. The dark business and politics of hosting and managing seiyuu is rather unnecessary, but appreciated since it shows some different things. The romance is okay, or more like mediocre; the way Momoko breaks down is very anime, very exaggerated and most definitely not real; the way she handles the truth however, can be very real and thats a very delicate aspect of a girls life to pull off, so good job on that front. 8/10, but only because talking about the art raised it a number.
