DearS

Genre: Romance/Comedy
Format: 12 Episodes
Allegiance: Bandai Visual / Doumu
Director: Suzuki Yuki
Vintage: 2004
Intelligence Agency Report by: Orax
Ikuhara Takeya is a high school student who has had absolutely no interest in the beautiful alien creatures called “DearS” who crash landed on Earth a year ago. One day, he finds a beautiful person named Ren stranded in the bushes. However, to his misfortune, he also discovers that this girl is a DearS, and she has decided to make Takeya her master. How will Takeya be able to hide Ren’s identity, uphold his DearS-hating reputation, and still be able to maintain a normal high school life?

Field Agent Report by: Orax
Plot
Characters
Impact
Visual
Audio
7.00
6.50
7.00
8.50
7.50
Overall 6.75
(not an average)
 

Takeya finds a DearS and brings it home in the sort of manner Hideki found Chii in Chobits. To make matters a bit more complicated, the role of a DearS is to solely satisfy the needs of their master in whatever way they can. Although the series might not be as captivating as Chobits, I did find this series to be somewhat entertaining, but it had some issues with plot and characterization.

If there was one thing I liked, it was the chemistry between Ren and Takeya. Even though Takeya could be extremely stubborn at times, it was always fun to watch the naïve Ren interact with him and those around her. This masked the fact that DearS’s plot was less than satisfactory. The beginning started off well, introducing the characters and providing some comedy, but the next few episodes were dedicated to some side characters that didn’t really have to do anything with the main story, making it impossible for me to care about them. I swear that the only use for adding Takeya’s little sister was to annoy the hell out of the viewers. She only got in the way.

Before I knew it, there were only a few episodes remaining with nothing really accomplished. The only hint that the series was going to end was when things got strangely dramatic by the second to last episode. It was as if every episode focused on a different character, then suddenly they decided to add plot. The worst of it is that the story isn’t completed. There’s a huge plot hole left on purpose in order to leave room for a possible sequel.

I found the art in DearS to be very appealing, nice, and colorful (probably why I decided to watch this in the first place). The series often depicts Ren and some of the other DearS in chibi forms which I found more humorous than not. As for the music, if you’re not scared by the… *ahem* unique opening theme, then it’s safe to say that the rest of the music in DearS will not turn you off.

Overall, DearS doesn’t present anything new to the robot maid genre, it just looks better. This doesn’t mean it isn’t fun to watch, but those looking to waste their time on something good should look elsewhere.