Keitai Shoujo

Cell phones...we use them in our daily lives, they help us communicate with each other and also come in handy with emergency situations. Amongst the popularity of them is the all famous text messaging! Why am I pointing this out you may ask? Because in "Keitai Shoujo" it plays a little bit more of a role when compared to other shows.


Story: 6/10
I really did like the story in this ONA, while it is pretty standard as a whole, the situations of each episode was pretty fun to watch. There are a total of 5 girls in the story, and each of the five episodes revolves ... around one of them. (plus an epilogue at the end) It stays pretty basic with its school life formula, as you make your way through each skit you will notice that each girl seems to like the main male lead called "Hiro." Which in turn will make you realize that by the end of the series you were simply watching nothing more than a harem style anime. Yes that is what this title basically is, though a much more lite hearted one. There is no "real" sexual kind of themes to any of the females, least not when compared to other anime series. Most of their attraction to him is done in a more innocent way, and the whole story feels very down to earth in its approach in story. Its very suttle and well...nice! Yes, even though this anime is very basic when compared to other "school life harem" titles, it was also pretty enjoyable too. I liked the sort of calm atmosphere that each scene seemed to show, and it really brings more a realistic flare of appeal. Even though this series main drawing point is its whole "cell phone" idea, it actually comes off more as gimmicky, as the phones themselves play little to no actual role in the story, and you will simply see the characters text messaging one another every so often. The main plot to each episode is watching the girls living their daily school lives, most of which come with a certain style approach. (such as one girl getting pestered by strange guys, to another girl having problems with little kids wanting to lift up her skirt) It was never really made clear as to if these girls were even real friends with each other, since most of the time Hiro and his best friend would only end up bumping into one of them by chance. While the skits were indeed quite enjoyable, they also come with a heavy negative. And that is; the episodes are just too darn short!!" Even though the running time is technically 7 minutes an episode, almost half of that time will be spent watching the opening and closing themes. Which makes every story ark in the anime feel like 10% of the overall pie. Perhaps if they would have made the series without any kind of opening and/or closing scenes, and just made the full 7 minutes actual story, would it have felt much more satisfying. It isn’t enough to kill the series as a whole, but may come off as more annoying or frustrating to enjoy to its fullest. Then again this is an ONA series, and its pretty standard for them to be this short. On a big plus side though, the "epilogue" episode actually has Hiro end up with one of the girls, and its not even who you would expect it to be! But I won’t spoil it for you!

Nothing really offensive to mention in this, other than two episodes where the women’s underwear is slightly shown. Only lasts a few seconds and is never brought much attention to.

Artwork: 8/10
Man this title has some appeal. Even though some may find the art style to be a bit pretentious, it looks just great in general. I really dug the clothing and character design to all of them, its bright, colorful and smooth to look at. It seems many of these ONA series always look good, I wonder why that is? Though I did find something weird--The characters look digitally drawn, while the backgrounds may tend to mirror more that of a watercolor picture. Which might make the characters stand out oddly from them.

Soundtrack: 8/10
The background music is very lacking in this, which gives this series a much more calmer kind of feel to it. Yet the opening theme is quite nice, as its all sung from the main female cast members in a sort of harmony style party rhythm. Now the characters voices are indeed good and match well enough, but I couldn’t help but feel they were a bit lack luster too. None of them ever really stands out amongst the others, and some may feel that they are all default voice acted.

Characters: 7/10
Well even though the episodes are so short that it gives you little time to connect with any of them. They are however, fleshed out enough for you at least able to care about each one. Even though they are all pretty brief with their personalities, it will probably make you want to learn more about them and want an actual standard running time for this anime. Now don’t get me wrong they are nothing in the way of fabulous--but do have a decent appeal to them.

Bottom Line: 7/10
So is Keitai Shoujo involving? No. Is it a bit pointless in story? Somewhat perhaps. Is it bad? No not at all! In fact had this anime actually been a more standard length, I feel it could have really been much more than it currently is. Its not ground breaking in any of its aspects, but it is indeed a "nice" ONA series to invest your time in. Especially considering it is very short. I would recommend watching an episode of it in between other titles you might be watching, this way it makes it seem longer than it actually is. So overall...

Keitai Shoujo gets 7 text messages out of 10!

It isn't all bad, and considering the fast pace you might as well check it out.. but don't get your expectations high.

It feels like this series tried to be some Omnibus/Dating-Sim style series, but even for those it would be way too plain. Each of the first 5 episodes introduce one of the girls, some of them not even really meeting the male protagonist. Then in the 6th and final episode, it fast forwards to christmas eve where he confesses his love to one of them.

So, there is no depth to any of the characters nor is there any romantic development - girl gets ... introduced, timeskip, mutual love confession, the end. That's it. And considering which one was the girl he ended up with, it felt quite random.

EN:
An anime that defends what characterized the slice of life of the 2000s. In these 6 episodes of 6 minutes (actually less than 4 minutes), they briefly tell us stories of girls in love or interested in a boy who apparently they do not adequately reciprocate their feelings. In essence it reminds me of a strange mix between Hatsukoi Limited and 5 Centimeters per second. Although of course, saving the distances.
It should be noted that the characters of the first episodes become concurrent in the following ones, since everything takes place within the same high school.
Perhaps the most remarkable thing about this show and the ... only reason to see it is that it is a kind of documentary on how the first cell phones penetrated the culture of adolescents at that time. Those times when, in addition to calls, the vice was SMS. And the first with built-in cameras.
On the technical side, it's nothing special but it does the job, or so I imagine since on the one hand it was very difficult for me to find this anime in a minimum quality, fortunately I was able to see it on YouTube (how ironic). The Hibari studio, who are responsible for it, can't boast much in these days of supposed past glories either.
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ES:
Un anime que hace apología a lo que caracterizó a los slice of life de los años 2000. En estos 6 episodios de 6 minutos (en realidad menos de 4 minutos), nos narran brevemente historias de chicas enamoradas o interesadas en un chico que en apariencia no les corresponde adecuadamente a sus sentimientos. En esencia me recuerda a una extraña mezcla entre Hatsukoi Limited y 5 Centímetros por segundo. Aunque claro, salvando las distancias.
Cabe destacar que los peronajes de los primeros episodios se vuelven concurrentes en los siguientes, ya que todo transcurre dentro de la misma escuela secundaria.
Quizá lo más destacable de este show y único motivo para verlo es que resulta una suerte de documental de como penetraron los primeros teléfonos celulares en la cultura de los adolescentes por aquellos tiempos. Esos tiempos en que además de las llamadas el vicio eran los sms. Y los primeros con cámaras incorporadas.
Sobre el apartado técnico, no es nada del otro mundo pero cumple, o eso imagino ya que por un lado me fue muy difícil de encontrar este anime en una calidad mínima, afortunadamente lo pude ver en Youtube (que ironía). El estudio Hibari, quienes son los responsables tampoco pueden presumir mucho en estos días de supuestas glorias pasadas.

*Spoilers ahead, but I still wanted my review to be seen, so I didn't check the box. Don't bother with worrying about spoilers for this show anyway. I implore you to read on.*

Keitai Shoujo translates into 'Cell Phone Girl', but despite that name, the titular 'Cell Phone Girl' Rin is nowhere to be seen, save for a strange cameo at the very end, but let's not get ahead of ourselves here. Beginning with the story, it's certainly nothing to write home about. It is neither good nor bad, just incredibly basic, and beyond that, very sparse. The 6 minute episodes, which are really only 3 ... minutes when you factor in the minute and change the OP and ED take, cover a fundamentally basic story, with some stereotypical anime tropes thrown in. It follows a group of friends and acquaintances in high school, who are connected by their phones, which are supposed to be a central theme around which the show defines itself. They show up to each other's sports events, are late to club meetings, talk about crushes, all the usual fare, and at such a short runtime absolutely nothing sets it apart from the crowd. Of course, something would set it apart, but even the weird plot point of a cell phone turning into a magical girl is absent here, so you're left with this bizarre shell of an anime. I try not to include spoilers in my reviews, but here I must, to discuss this anime's greatest sin, episode 6. Episode 6 is just an earlier episode where they introduce Sayo, followed by an extended credits sequence, and then a time skip where the entire main story happens. That's right, the viewer is shown three slides of text, describing how the protagonist Hiro meets the magical Cell Phone Girl Rin, and how she opens his heart to love. Then the anime resumes, and Rin is dying for some reason. A tearful goodbye is had, and Hiro confesses his love for Sayo at the Christmas festival. I was stunned. Why would they give us 5 and a half episodes of prologue only to skip the entire main arc and plop the audience down at the last 2 minutes of the show? Why they decided to even bother making this thing is beyond me. Even for its intended purpose as supplementary promotional material for a visual novel, it feels hollow and woefully incomplete. There's really nothing else to say about this profoundly underwhelming anime. The art is standard 2006 stuff with competent character design, the sound is perfectly serviceable, the characters are fine, but that damn story structure is what I'm hung up on. Everything about this anime blends into the crowd, save for the bizarre decision to reduce the bulk of the story to 3 text slides at the very end. Do not bother with this incomplete, unremarkable garbage.