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like the fourth episode about the phantom of Greenwood. It's about Mitsuru-senpai
and Misako, this girl-ghost who died without having a real romance. So
she decided to have one after death, and Mitsuru-senpai's the lucky guy.
The fact that Mitsuru-senpai is a cool and reserved dorm head made the
whole thing funny. It was kind of annoying how Misako would throw these
tantrums when she can't have her way with Mitsuru-senpai, but it was funny
how everybody would plead with him to indulge her just so she would stop.
This is also the episode when Shun-chan called to a cat with "Kone,"
a name he made up from "neko," which is a term for cat. Shows
he's not that creative with names. As for the main story in this episode,
it's pretty interesting. It's a ghost story that would actually make you
feel warm and fuzzy instead of giving you the heebie-jeebies. Now that's
something that doesn't come around often.
Damn.
I thought I was starting to get the hang of shounen anime when I watched
Koko wa Greenwood. Then I found out that for that most part, it's classified
as shoujo. Some people might consider it shounen-ai. Doh! I'm arguing
anyway that it's kind of different from typical shoujo anime. For starters,
main character Suka-chan is a guy. The whole anime takes place in an all
boys' dorm. And it's probably a stretch to describe Koko wa Greenwood
as shounen-ai, because Suka-chan is definitely straight. Sure, you could
probably fantasize about his classmates, and there were also some standard
all-boys'-school jokes. But Suka-chan's definitely straight.
Koko wa Greenwood, also known as "Here is Greenwood," is a six-episode OAV, based on manga written by Nasu Yukie. It's something that you could watch in one afternoon with plenty of time to get munchies from the fridge and have bathroom breaks. I'm saying this because sometimes I can only have a certain number of hours to watch anime, and I would try to watch as much as I could by staying glued to my seat the entire time. So Koko wa Greenwood was a refreshing change.
Synopsis
Hasukawa Kazuya has a problem. He's in love with his brother Hiro's wife,
Sumire-chan. The situation stressed him out so much that he got ulcers
and had to be hospitalized for a month. Consequently, he ended up starting
school a month late.
Going to school was actually a relief for him because he is enrolled in an boarding school. Instead of living at home with Hiro and Sumire-chan, Suka-chan can live in Ryokurin Ryou, otherwise known as Greenwood Hall. Furthermore, since the school is exclusively for guys, he doesn't have to worry about being around girls. The whole thing with Sumire-chan made Suka-chan decide that he wanted to stay away from girls for a while.
That relief, however, was short-lived. Suka-chan finds out that his roommate is a girl named Shun-chan. His two dorm heads, Mitsuru-senpai and Shinobu-senpai, told him that Shun-chan has been raised as a guy and all this records indicate that she's a guy, but she's a...she. Shun-chan certainly looks like a girl with long, flowing hair, a girly face, a feminine voice, and a feminine figure. How she was able to convince everybody around her that she's a guy was beyond Suka-chan, who wasn't thrilled with the roommate arrangement. So much for getting away from girls. But what else is a guy supposed to do?
It was not long after when Suka-chan found out that Shun-chan is actually a he pretending to be a she pretending to be a he. What? In a nutshell, Shuh-chan's really a guy. Of course, the entire dorm cracked up at this great joke they pulled off on the new guy.
After this initial uproar, things started settling down. Unfortunately for Suka-chan, Hiro's the school nurse, so he can't be rid of his family so easily. Furthermore, Sumire-chan would visit him every now and then to ask when he would be coming home. Suka-chan has this alarming tendency to get a nosebleed whenever he felt that the atmosphere between him and Sumire-chan got too intense. And Hiro's very much aware of this.
Aside from Suka-chan's frustrated infatuation with his brother's wife, there were a lot of other antics at Greenwood. There's Shinobu-senpai's issues with his comically violent older sister, who could be considered a gangster. There's the student production of the "Koko wa Devilwood" show. There's the whole thing with Mitsuru-senpai and a girl ghost who only wanted to hang around him. And finally, Suka-chan learns to move on when he meets a troubled girl, Miya.
Review
For a six-part OAV, this was well-done. Koko wa Greenwood doesn't overwhelm
the audience with lots of storylines. It's a show where you can enjoy
it just as it is, without holding your breath for what might happen next
in Suka-chan's love life--if you have a tendency to be a romantic sap
like me.
I was a little disappointed when I found out that Shun-chan's actually a he pretending to be a she pretending to be a he. It would've been so much better if Nasu made Shun-chan a she pretending to be a he. If I'm confusing you here, that's because I'm doing it on purpose :D But I quickly got over that, because Shun-chan's great the way he is. Also, his seiyuu's Sakamoto Chika, the same person who did Nuriko. And yes, Sakamoto's a she. No wonder Shun-chan's voice sounded familiar. As for the anime character himself, Shun-chan's probably one of my favorites in the show because he's just a breath of fresh air. He's certainly different from the rest of the cast.
Actually, sometimes I think the whole thing with Shun-chan's masquerade helped bring about the manga Hana Kimi, which is about a girl who pretended to be a guy in order to enroll in an all-guys' boarding school. Eh. That's probably a different story.
I think Suka-chan was fairly overshadowed by Mitsuru-senpai and Shinobu-senpai just because they're cuter and have stronger personalities. But Suka-chan himself's not bad. He's a likeable main character. Just takes a while to get used to him, that's all. It's not everyday that you get a guy as the leading person in a shoujo anime. It's pretty adorable how he would get nosebleeds. And even though he's not a hulking, macho, sexy bishounen, he did show Miya that he cares a lot for her. And that always earns lots of bishie points.
If you need a quick reprieve from anime where you hold your breath for the next episode, and you just want to leisurely watch a well-crafted show, I recommend Koko wa Greenwood. It's not emotionally exhausting, and you will finish it with a smile on your face. And Shun-chan's cool. Yeah.