3D Kanojo: Real Girl [Review]

Posted on June 27, 2018 by KiritoNarukami One comment

“Tsutsui Hikari is an otaku, and he mostly avoids social life. Hikari has only one friend at school, who is also a social misfit, and he is mocked brutally by most of his classmates for being creepy and weird. One day, he ends up having to clean the school pool with Igarashi Iroha, who appears to be pretty much everything he hates in real-life girls. She skips school, has a blunt manner, doesn’t have female friends, and seems the sort to be promiscuous. However, she is friendly to Hikari, and even stands up to the people who make fun of him. Hikari’s bitterness and trust issues lead him to say pretty harsh things to Iroha, but she never dismisses him as creepy. After a while, it starts to look like Iroha may become his first real-life, 3D girlfriend! Will he be able to handle it?”

-3D Kanojo Real Girl (manga)

Story:

With these slice-of-life comedies, you would spend a lot of time laughing or crying. Rather than do that 3D Kanojo makes you angry and frustrated because of the absurd situations the characters were getting themselves in. Most of which was lack of communication on both sides causing a misunderstanding which leads to an even bigger argument. I would be ok with the situations if they had different circumstances but they were always caused by this lack of wanting to communicate. It’d be easier to watch had the character learn from their mistakes and then reached a new obstacle that made a complication in their relationship.

Artwork & Animation:

From the opening sequence alone, you can tell that there was a lot of still animation, where they draw one image and move that image around to imply motion. Even with frame animation, it was choppy which made it very distracting. There was a large amount of what I like to call “derpy” faces. There’s nothing wrong with derpy faces, even anime with great art like Free! or Shingeki no Kyojin had “derpy” faces but they were minimal and used for side characters in the distance so it wasn’t noticeable. 3D Kanojo uses “derpy” face for main characters not only in distant shots but also close-ups. Background art was plain and generic, most of the scenes are hardly ever populated with other students or people, which in the overall scheme of things makes the anime feel empty.

Character(s):

Even with all twelve episodes having aired already there are still a lot of questions have been left unanswered. Like the reason for Iroha having two boyfriends at the beginning of the show, the motive behind Iroha’s brother, why does Takanashi like ramen, is there no school regulation stopping Ito from wearing car ears at school? Along with plenty of plot holes, all the characters stay static throughout the entire show. The idea of a love comedy is that the two main characters would gradually get more comfortable with each other and eventually get the courage to confess to each other and end up happily ever after. 3D Kanojo jumps straight into it and this process happens all within the first episode. Which then allows the rest of the show to implode on itself. It’s like waking up early to get to class only to realize that class was actually canceled after you got there.

Sound (OST & Voice Acting):

The soundtrack wasn’t good but wasn’t bad either. The opening and ending theme were both excellent for the show’s genre. The background music is very simple and light consisting of either only a piano or guitar lead.

Enjoyment:

To be honest, half of the time I was frustrated at most of the characters for being ignorant. The other half was spent criticizing the art and animation. I do think the story concept is interesting I don’t think the anime did a good job of executing it.

Overall: Score 3

With poor character development and almost no effort in polishing the art to make it presentable, 3D Kanojo doesn’t quite hit the mark to be considered a “good anime”.

Best Girl: Ishino Arisa

The only character with the most logical sense in the entire show. Except for when it comes to guys….someone help her. But in honestly, Ishino proves time and time again how thoughtful she is, though it may not look like it.