Handsome Girl

I did not see a review on this so I decided to write one.

I literally watched this just to kill time while waiting for stuff so I was not exactly going into this with high expectations. As you know Handsome Girl is a one episode shoujo OVA from the early 90s. The art has that 90s anime fuzzy look to it and dull audio quality, but this may just be Youtube. I actually like that about 90s anime but some may think that's distracting/off putting. I like how the scenery looks, painted backgrounds with ferns and such. I personally think the picture MAL currently has for this looks really dope. But they look rather derpy and low budget typical shoujo style in the actual show. I liked some of the background music, it sounded like sped up vaporwave.

The story in this OVA was really rushed and mashed together without properly explaining things. I feel this OVA would have been better if they had at least four episodes or hell two episodes to organize and pace the story better. In the mere 37 minutes they were not able to have any real character development and I didn't feel anything for the characters when stuff goes wrong/well. Handsome Girl does have a story tho and if you don't mind it flying at the speed of a motorcycle with malfunctioning brakes then you may actually enjoy it. I've actually seen people really enjoy it saying such stuff as "Omg I'm in love with this ova :)" It's only 37 minutes so it's not the end of the world if you end up disliking it and it makes a quick addition to your completed.

Overall I give it a 4/10 I feel my time would have passed quicker watching a pot of water on the stove.

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Handsome is one of the worst things you can call a woman. I know this because I constantly do it.

Handsome Girl is the story of a young actor slash model girl. She gets offered a role in a film by a guy who thinks she’s a terrible actor. She falls in love with him because he’s super focused on directing his weird and confusing movie that makes no sense. Because drama has to happen, her best friend is also in love with director boy except this is largely ignored. They are all in high school. This should be the dictionary definition of shoujo.

I expected some Cipher-level disaster but this is actually a real OVA. It has a clear beginning, middle, and end. It’s still kinda boring though. I found none of the shoujo shenanigans to be fun and the late 80s/early 90s aesthetic isn’t enough to save it. Honestly my favorite part was the opening credits, and that was mostly a slideshow.

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There are parts of this that look very nice, particularly the very pastel 90s fashion sense and the motorcycle scenes. However, this is first and foremost a romance, and that part of the story never really came together. There's no motivation shown for the leads to get together, not much of a romantic conflict keeping them apart, and not even any chemistry. Their meet cute goes badly, they spend more time together, we're informed that they have warmed to one another, and that's really almost the extent of it. They just don't care much, so I'm not sure why I should be expected to.

A significant part of this OVA is music videos of a minor character singing, and I did enjoy the vintage tunes even if the style isn't my favorite.

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