Anime: Dakara Boku wa, H ga Dekinai.

Imagine Shana, except not as a loli and powered based on how aroused her partner is. That's pretty much the premise for this show. It's always interesting to see how far Japan is willing to push the boundary between ecchi and hentai, and this series does just that. So why is this series so poorly rated? I shall borrow a few lines directly from the series:

Antagonist: How is this happening?
Protagonist: Didn't you know? A girl's scent is just as soft and gentle as boobs!!!
Antagonist: NaniiiiiIIII??!?!

It's this type of senseless dialogue and strange plot that alienates all who can still keep a level head after seeing what is pretty much an endless stream of topless or otherwise unclothed girls. Though if that's all you're really looking for, feel free to dig in.

Animation:
Dakara is standard fare animation quality wise. Colors are nice and vibrant but there are scenes where they could have used some more background detail, and also some scenes that would have done better with less CGI. So basically Shinigami are (seemingly) mostly cute girl-like creatures that dress similar to the familiars in C (with weird head gear). These Shinigami transform their uniform in preparation for battles- but they're probably better of in street clothes as the clothes pretty much evaporate when they're low on power. Due to this, expect almost constant nudity throughout the entire series. Styling-wise, everyone is easily distinguishable though the constant addition of new characters is a bother.

There's quite a bit of action with your standard magic elemental attacks though most of the time damage seems to be minimal (other than to the clothes of course). During battles, the Shinigami puts up what's equivalent to a fuzetsu from Shana and uses "life" energy to repair all damage done during the battle. As for ecchi, all the power for these attacks and abilities is sourced from humans, who apparently can increase their "energy" reserves based on what makes them interested. In the case of our protagonist, it's anything ecchi. Thus surprisingly, ecchi is actually baked in as a primary feature, rather than as just fanservice, so expect it in large quantities here.

Sound:
The series opens with an energetic jpop song and ends with a catchy, somewhat playful ED. These fit the mood fine though aren't really collection-worthy. BGM is average overall with
one track that you'll soon recognized as it's overused.

VA performance overall was, as well, fairly standard. I can't really blame the VAs though as, as seen from the lines above, some of the dialogue is a bit dry/strange.

Story:
An ordinary dude (with an obligatory childhood friend next door) finds a mysterious, red-headed beauty standing in the rain outside his house. When he lets her in she tells him he has less than three months to live. However, if he agrees to form a Kurokami-like contract with her, a shinigami, she promises to save him. Her goal is to find a certain person who has a huge amount of energy (apparently famous people have more energy) at his school. How will she locate them? She has a Dragon-ball power-scanner-like device that measures people's energy.

The story follows the pair as they seek out individuals as school and are attacked by other shinigami. The first half of the show is extremely predictable as it follows the same pattern of being attacked by an antagonist, who then somehow becomes an ally and an additional "rival" for the protagonist's harem. The story builds to a seeming climax around halfway through the show, and then the pacing goes awry. The show stops being an action-harem and transforms into an emo show not too different from the majority of Da Capo 2 SS. The story then, unconvincingly, tries to tie everything up with a last-minute climax that feels more like an afterthought. Finally, the show ends with the obligatory open-ended harem conclusion.

The presentation of this story felt jarring at times. A lot of major events happened just because of conveniences. For instance, if the main character had moved 5 or so degrees left or right at the first climax, the result would have been very different. Another example is the power scouters. Just like in DBZ, humans can vary their power level depending on how they feel, so it feels really odd that the Shinigami have never noticed this fact. Overall, it really feels as if the director felt he could get away with short cuts, assuming the viewer was only focusing on the nude girls bouncing around the screen.

Character:
The picture doesn't get much better here as well. Most of the characters feel very generic, yet certain character behaviors and interactions feel contrived and unnatural. For example, our protagonist is a really cheerful and openly perverted dude. As in Kurokami, he learns in the series that his contract enables him to use certain powers as well. Empowered by this new ability, he becomes a brash warrior who thinks he can protect his shinigami, despite never having any real battle training. Fast forward a single episode and he becomes a shriveled wimp unable to leave his bed. These transitions are not adequately developed, leaving to a very artificial aftertaste for many of the characters.

Due to the above issue, you never really feel that the characters are plausible, and thus don't try hard to relate. This dooms any efforts at bringing out the development of the characters, which is pretty minimal in the first place. Add the fact that secondary characters are introduced and, just as quickly, disappear and you have a recipe for a pretty poor performance.

Value:
Despite having an interesting twist to some established anime patterns, Dakara ends up failing in it's execution; falling in the same bucket as other generic harems that go nowhere such as Champione and Hagure. The only characteristic that really sets this one apart is blatant nudity, and unless this is your thing, I'd recommend skipping this one.

At first I thought from the title of the show that is was some sort of social drama regarding poor NEETs who couldn’t score or play erogames, but turns out it is something entirely different. Not for the best though.

THE STAFF
- Animated by Feel, a studio that makes only shitty ecchi anime.
- Directed by Takahashi Takeo, the guy who also did the somewhat nice Spice and Wolf, but is otherwise just another guy deep into passable ecchi titles.
- Based on a light novel, which means a light story. And in this case, just another Shana clone.
Just from the get-go, you already know it will be a dumb story full of ecchi that you will be watching for the fan service.

SPECIFICS
Ok guys, it’s based on a light novel, so there is an 80% probability it will have characters and plot almost identical to that of Shakugan no Shana. Not that Shana was the first anime with that formula (that praise goes to 3X3 Eyes) but it is the one that established it back in the good old days when anime were good and initiated a long line of copycats just because it made a million bucks.

And indeed this is yet another such clone. It even came out at around the same time Campione, and Aesthetica of a Rogue Hero did and you clearly see it’s the same thing with slight variations. And the problem is that they all don’t have a loli tsundere voiced by Rie Kugimiya, neither amazing production values. Well, the artwork is good if your expectations don’t go beyond lots of milk cows and random things exploding and clothes ripping apart without hurting the female skin beneath. Other than that, there is nothing eye catchy besides lots of low quality visual effects and done to death school sceneries. In a similar way, the soundtrack is not bad if you have no problem with mediocre pop you won’t give a damn about after it’s all over. As I said, nothing stands too much so in order to sell they just throw in EXCESSIVE FAN SERVICE.

The plot is quite basic, even for a Shana clone. Some guy has some power, some fiery redhaired slut wants it, sexual tension builds up, and monsters attack. The only thing that stands out is simply the huge sex drive the protagonist has, which is used as a power up for the tsundere. I mean, really, this guy is as horny as it gets, he never misses the chance to say sleazy stuff to pretty girls or jump to grab some skin. This automatically makes him a hundred times better than your typical wimp protagonist of modern anime and half as good as a decent anime character with depth and maturity.

Oh well, better than nothing. I like the idea of how he must be turned on every time they are going to fight but never climax while battling so his empowerment won’t drop to zero. Man, that’s one of the worst tortures know to man, lol. Of course like all running jokes it eventually gets old, since he is after boobs every five minutes and never actually has any sex.

The only other two characters that stand out are his childhood friend, dash, girl next door, which is shy and has a humongous rack but otherwise feels very secured and comfortable being next to a deviant bastard who doesn’t miss the chance to dehumanize her gender. The second one is, of course, the redhaired slut who is after his libido in order to be a stronger fighter, as she is looking for yet another special person in his school. For that reason alone she puts up with enough sexual harassment to be sentenced to castration by most courts in the world. She too of course likes him. I guess the females in this show deserve to be treated as rape targets if they only dig such types of males.

In a similar fashion all the antagonists in the show are after the hornyness of the protagonist as means to beat the tsundere, and they are all conveniently pretty chicks who don’t miss the chance to whore-ify themselves in order to… steal his energy source. And yes, I know this is just guilty pleasure but it sure does not make any of the characters sympathetic or developed in any significant way.

Anyways, this is obviously a dumb show you will watch for the porn aspect of it. Every episode is just some poor excuse for some bimbos to have a catfight where their clothes shred all too easy, and the protagonist saving the day by getting horny and molesting them; the end. Oh, and typically everything they trash in a battle gets magically corrected afterwards, so there isn’t even any repercussions for whatever you do in this show. Meaning, the protagonist saves the world daily, has the fun of his life when groping girls, entire buildings get trashed, monsters attack, and nothing changes by the end of the day, besides needing to seriously ejaculate from all this shit. The perfect escapism show where you run away from responsibilities.

As usual, it turns a bit darker and more serious towards the end but by then you have lost all interest and respect for the show, so it doesn’t matter in any significant way. Instead of feeling dramatic it looks like a completely ridiculous attempt at making something nice out of something trashy. In all, it is a throw away anime you will watch only if you are really bored and want something very contrived and brainless.