With that random note of information being said, let us begin.
Da Capo. What can I say about it? It is a nice, deep drama about a brother and sister...
Okay, that is entirely a lie. Actually, this is a comedy with some twists that is all about the misadventures of Junichi and Nemu, following every typical cliché that we all still find ourselves enjoying in most anime comedies due to the way they are always done slightly different.
To top things off, we have this little girl named Sakura whom is all cute, frantic and innocent, but starts things off with...well, I will get on that later.
Aside from her, we have Junichi's exotic friend, Suginami, whom undergoes so many personality changes that it is best not to keep up with him at all.
So on and so forth, there are lots of other cast members in this anime and you will enjoy all of them. The humor is actually quite good and you will get a few laughs out of it, despite what I mentioned earlier about its repetition of most comedy elements of most anime. It still has its own unique branding of it, too
As the warning reads below, this is what I consider the spoilers. This is for you to read in case you are wondering why I was disappointed in the anime, but it spoils the story so much that I have to just leave it under a warning if you still want to watch the anime and experience it for yourself. However, the end of this review is not a spoiler, so you can just skip down to the end of the spoiler to read that.
(SPOILER BEGINS)
Also, there is also one more episode that you should skip, and that is the tedious episode fifteen. Well, I did not want to say it alongside the other one, in case you were curious about why I only said there was one episode you should skip; as to avoid making you cringe too much, and because I feel like this might spoil the anime in some way. Firstly, this is, in fact, ANOTHER recap episode; only seven episodes separated from the other one.
But, why did I just not mention that and move on with the rest of the non-spoiler review? Well, this episode has a pretty noteworthy sentiment that brings up a genre that this website lists about this anime: Drama, which I thought I should not just casually mention.
But, as it implies, the anime becomes a drama, Yes, from this point onward, the anime will finally be what it should have been fifteen episodes ago: an actual drama. As such, the comedy aspect is still there, but now mixes in with real drama for the first time. And not the comedic drama where Nemu gets mad at Junichi for hanging out with other girls.
The drama is...stale. Very stale. Quickly, you notice that it turns into something entirely different from what it made itself out to be. It was fine, given this website mentioned it was a drama. In fact, I was actually in the mood for a drama that was already one from the BEGINNING of the anime and mixed that in better with the comedy.
Okay, I will first say that the abrupt introduction of the drama was not horrible, as it slowly went into it. There are lots of minor elements that were so stale that I can not even remember them; and I just watched them the other day. But, it was a bit strange finding out a lot of these story elements that I did remember, towards the end, all just seemed to lead back to one destination: The Agony of Nemu.
As I appropriately titled it, the main story of the drama all leads to Nemu suffering quite a bit. Firstly, once you watch the beginning of this, you will be aware in a few minutes that Junichi and Nemu are lovers as they are about to kiss...only for this to be a very misleading buildup to Junichi actually just trying to put his head closer to Nemu in order to check her temperature; something that is common in most anime. And from there, you find out they are siblings.
However, they are not related by blood, as it also mentions; and this is not referenced again until we get to the drama half of the anime. At least, that I can remember. They might reference it in comedic ways during the comedy half.
The drama portion takes an unexpected turn for the worst where all this back-story hooha comes into place out of nowhere and we get into one of the most bizarre triangles you will ever see in an anime.
Remember Sakura, the frantic little girl I mentioned earlier? Yeah, she loves Junichi in a sexual kind of way and wants to be his lover.
As I said earlier, this is a love triangle, so there is another girl. Is it one of the other female cast members, perhaps?
Nope, it is Nemu. Well this might not sound wrong, given Nemu is not related to Junichi by blood, they did have a sibling relationship for many years. However, apparently, Nemu loved Junichi the whole time...also sexually as a lover. Which was quite the well timed realization of why Nemu got so jealous whenever Junichi was hanging out with a girl during the comedy half. So, Nemu never saw him as a brother, but Junichi saw her as a little sister.
Nemu gives light hints of her love for him during the comedy half, but makes it much more articulate during the drama half; with Junichi eventually finding out when she confesses it. However, Junichi apparently loved Sakurai back as well, but was just shrouding it as brotherly love. So, in the end, there is no true incestual problems with them dating, in a cosmic sort of way.
Then, Sakura takes a turn for the worst and develops a heavily repressed hatred for Nemu. If you noticed in the genres, "Magic" was one of them. Well, truthfully, I actually still do not want to spoil this part as it will require too much elaboration to explain here, so I will disregard that last statement.
Ironically, despite Sakura being against the two dating because she still believes they are siblings in some way due to her seeing them that way for so many years, even though the two are not actually related, Sakura is Junichi's cousin.
Yes, when I said "I will get on that later" this was not for my non-spoiler portion of the review. What Sakura did when she first met Junichi again was kiss him, which shocked Nemu. And, well, now we know why. It was not just because they were cousins, as we innocently thought...well, also maybe because of Sakura being a little girl too, which we also thought. I know I said I would not elaborate on the Magic aspects in this review, but I will just spoil one instance of it: Sakura is actually not a little girl, but is the same age as Junichi; only still looking like a little girl because she never actually aged physically.
So, the love triangle is of Nemu, Junichi's non-related sister; and Sakura, whom has a heavy infatuation for her favorite male cousin. Of course, this anime has a very heavy harem element too, so nearly every other girl that Junichi meets actually...loves him as well. But, those loves do not really compare to Nemu and Sakura's.
So, in the end, the drama half is basically just light comedy elements, and other drama ones too; that build into this whole love triangle between Junichi, Nemu and Sakura.
(SPOILER ENDS)
In my personal opinion, I do not recommend the anime...beyond the first fourteen episodes. The later half just brings forth this weird atmosphere that I did not really get into as much as I did the comedy.. Funny to get into the comedy aspect of an anime that is singled out as a "Drama" on its page. But, I did like it a lot more than the drama that it had, so what can I do? It is the truth.
Again, as I said before, unless you are just reading this now and did not read the spoiler portion, the way you see the anime is mostly up to what you enjoy. If you like dramas a lot, you might have a heavier understanding for this anime than I did. Otherwise, if you usually prefer comedy and the occasional drama, just skip the drama part of this anime. To me, this would not be worth your time.
