DVD Reviews: Love Hina Volume 1: Moving In

Love ♥ Hina is the story of a young man trying desperately to get into Tokyo U, the most prestigious university around, for the one reason of filling a promise he made when he was very young, to a girl of course.  As a young man Keitaro isn’t the most popular boy in school, he has two loser friends and a slew of women who unfortunately for him avoid him at all costs.  His parents insist he get a part time job because he’s a lazy kinda bloke, he will try anything to get out of it at all costs.   

After three attempts to pass the exams for Tokyo U and failing miserably each time (two true attempts and one mock exam), his chances don’t look so great.  A mysterious call from granny puts him in a predicament as he must visit her today. Meanwhile his granny is running an all girl dorm and is about to go on a long holiday. The girls living there can’t live alone without a manager to run the place and the new manager must be responsible and of course good old granny believes her lovely grandson is in his second year of Uni by now.  So no guess to who’s got the job.  Unbeknownst to young Keitaro when he gets there granny’s already left, and no one knows he’s the new manager. Walking into the building looking for his granny he spots the hot baths, next thing you know he’s in the nude and in the bath, although the bath is only for women. 

The entire story from here on in is a basic cat and mouse situation, Keitaro walking in on or falling over and grabbing the wrong part of one of the girls he’s staying with, which in any and every case results in a swift kick, punch or even sometimes sword play.  The poor guy is always being belted up left, right and centre, it’s very annoying and uninteresting when he’s getting punched up.   

Every time one of the lovely ladies are in the room or in a compromising position the anime is exceptional especially in the T&A locations though when the bloke is on the screen the anime isn’t that great as it could be, in one spot when he is running away from his assailants he’s just a black line filled in with skin color and black on top for his hair.  Pretty dodgy, I also don’t like the animation when they draw silly swirls for eyes and the whole tear drop thing, however the story line is catchy.  I’m definitely getting into it and the theme music rocks.  I’m looking forward to the rest of the series with a total of 5 sexy chicks including; one annoying idiot, one who wants to kill the male pig, one who’s actually the young girl he made the promise to, and two chicks that want to get him in bed! That’s one lucky guy and chances are by the end of the series he should get belted up 500+ times and with any luck score at least once.  Not for children. 

Whilst the disc doesn’t really do any wonders for the DVD format, it looks and sounds as good as a Saturday cartoon. The extras are only a number of slideshow pictures from the series and some sketches from Keitaro's Sketchbook.

Overall I’d have to give this first installation of Love ♥ Hina a 7.5/10 for its originality and good anime and I hope they keep up the good anime and avoid the amateur animation, me thinks the original Jetsons had better quality.