Shoujo Ramune

This had to be the most uncomfortable I've ever felt watching a hentai. And I've seen stuff in what were supposed to be far more extreme genres over the years.

I can't honestly even joke about it. Too grounded in reality to even make fun of it.

The premise is literally about portraying a real-world middle age man grooming, exploiting and sexually abusing real-world prepubescent girls.
Let me make this clear: not "adults stylized as kids", not "400 years old magical girls/dragons/vampires assuming a loli appearance", not "lustful teens with a small body frame" either.
You can't even call these loli, because they are underage even by ... the definition of the term (12-13). We are talking about some bona fide nine-ten years old girls.
This is straight up child pornography in an animated format.

The series goes on involving the old creep and these girls into full sexual intercourse, anal, fellatio and what else. And it should be stressed that these are not even fully consensual relationships either.
Each setup can be summarized as "Girl asks for a favor, child rapist exploits her naivety to push her into sexual intercourse ignoring her initial protests, she grows more or less into accepting or even enjoying the sexual act in the middle of it".

If the setup wasn't more than distasteful enough on its own right, the genuinely creepy side of the entire production is that the serial child abuser at the center of these events is not even framed as the slimy monster he is, someone in the process of paving his way to prison or hopefully to some sort of hell; instead he's genuinely portrayed as a someone "slightly perverted" but overall considerate, caring and somewhat fatherly toward the girls.
All the girls despise some initial protest and a late full recognition that he's a "pervert" (because appropriately calling him a child rapist didn't sound nice enough, I guess) tend to part ways with him in extremely friendly terms, too. Occasionally even growing more fond of him in the process.

I realize that a lot of people will keep making the same disgusting self-indulgent jokes to justify it, hand-wave it nonchalantly with some tired "FBI, open up" meme or making lame excuses about how "they are drawing and not real kids anyway".

I don't really feel any of that changes how this production feels overall: a straight-up endorsement of grooming and sexually exploiting children.
It honestly made me feel as if I was witnessing genuine child porn and I still feel nauseous for it.

This is my first formal review as I normally just write my review-esque analysis in the comment section - I clarify this on my profile. I did not think my regular style would be enjoyable to write up so I gave this overall review a chance. None of the reviews on MAL really gave any effort, so I figured why not try something difficult and review a Hentai. I also welcome feedback on all my writings so don't be shy! There is only minor detail spoilers and bare in mind this review should read as a someone who just joined the Hentai genre with only ... some prior knowledge.

Some things to note: we have no idea how old these lolis are, we don’t have any background on Kiyoshi Tachikawa (other than the synopsis of the anime), the initial art concepts of the shop are lacking all detail (looks like brushed paint), and the first sexually physical encounter with Kiyoshi is without protest or suspicion from Chie Sayama. So, this begs the question, have they already had other sexual encounters? If so then why wouldn’t this have been mentioned as it would have at least given some fluidity to this atrocity of a story? The naivety of characters is defined by their ages and that alone - yet this can only go so far with respect to the manipulation that Kiyoshi has over them as well as the dialog.

I suppose I should first tackle the fundamentals of this anime before getting into the specifics of my critiques; If the category is Hentai, and the goal is to maximize the sexual lust of your audience, then wouldn’t the inclusion of all aspects related to the story be of value? Hentai as defined by encyclopedia, “a subgenre of the Japanese genres of manga and anime, characterized by overtly sexualized characters and sexually explicit images and plots.”; Wikipedia puts it simply as “outside of Japan, Hentai is anime and manga pornography. In the Japanese language, however, ‘hentai’ is not a genre of media but any type of perverse or bizarre sexual desire or act”. This is obvious to anyone familiar with Anime and Manga, though I wonder to what extent is having a story at all if one tries to argue that its only purpose is for arousal/masturbation? This cavate is something to take seriously with regards to the question of what this anime really is and how they are planning to impact the audience.

Already one should be thinking to themselves “why am I really watching this and can an anime categorized as Hentai be taken seriously?”. Of course, the majority of opinions would disregard any type thoughts on the matter as waste time or irrelevant given the value of this production with respect to many others. There are a number of reasons why one might watch Shoujo Ramune, such as: curiosity, boredom, loli lust, meme humor, and another “tally on the list” to name a few. If we’re honest, the majority came for the lewding of lolis as well as second hand interests – of course I would put myself in the same boat along with my curiosity.

Parallel to those reasons, each and every review one can read on MAL or watch on YouTube is drenched in this guilty-dismissal of possible thought-crime (discussion boards are more optimal) – those who try to pick other routes have this innate condemnation or weak satirical conjectures regarding their side. Feeling the need to prime one’s position almost in an apologetic or ethical way, is a clear indication that they surmise they have done something wrong or lack all confidence in discussing the matter. One should only be worried if they associate the anime characters as real humans, as well, reach the same emotional status from an imaginative rendition of our own species. With today's culture in finding offence to everything and anything, it’s understandable that people are wary of what they say or how someone will perceive them – on the other hand, the legality of this is completely unclear no matter the opinion.

To expand, having the luxury to travel and gain relevant information on others perspectives (or you can simply research online) – allows one to broaden their mind and understand the extent of sane art. Many would argue that Shoujo Ramune, in particular, is apart of the most controversial art category that exists – though this is a false dichotomy. Many forget that paintings, photos, and various other various forms of art of the same magnitude exist and no one has an issue with that. Of course, that isn’t saying two negatives make a positive or that all art is equivalent, but the majority are not going travel to a museum like the Louvre or the Sistine Chapel and disregard that art as something that can jail them. Think of how ridiculous it is to suggest that someone who looked at something imaginary is a felon? The very notion of it is Orwellian in nature and extending the law beyond real human interactions/situations is scary. Controversial conversations are a fundamental tool for our species to evaluate and grow from – whether its Balthus or Mary Jane studios there’s always something to be gained from dissecting the material. Extending even further would be movies/TV shows with real humans and the extent of what’s acceptable – though that is unnecessary and distracting from breaking down some key elements of what makes this [s]anime[/s] Hentai tick.

While on the topic of controversy, the story was abysmal when you consider everything that’s missing: Character personalities are non-existent, each loli repeats nearly the same dialog, only a few scenes with unique intercourse, absence of teasing/playfulness, and the lack of script for Kiyoshi. Playing devil’s advocate, one could argue a few things – (1) that since the majority of the show is ~porn, tailoring to loli fanbase was the first priority, (2) compared to conventional pornography the ideas of each character are enough for the imagination fill in the rest, and (3) this was just for fun and not to be critical about.

First, the intentions of the producers were to create the most lewdacris/dream worthy condition for someone in Kiyoshi’s situation. However, they didn’t want the path to turn darker than it already was and so they kept everyone happy by the end of intimate exchanges. It is also clear that they valued leading characters into scenes with something of an excuse – this is seen almost every time as a matter of fact. If they didn’t value story at all they could have just jumped right into them having sex, but they decided to actually add conversations and events. The reason for this is simple, it immerses you with the characters more and gives rise to events via the manipulation that Kiyoshi has on these lolis; the predatory like instances of using candy, yogurt, stardom, or even love as enticement rather than brute force showcases this.

Second, another part of storytelling is the tone and atmosphere of the scenes. We don’t see Kiyoshi aggressively pin or hit any of the lolis, nor do we ever hear him use aggressive/abusive language. This lets the audience relax even more rather than thoughts of the more sinister or thought provoking events taking place. To say nothing was thought of is a mistake, but to not be able to identify missed opportunities is an even bigger one. This is evident in the fact that they went as far as to break Tenka Adachi’s hymen in episode 2 - timestamp 5:45, where blood was coming out of her vagina. They played with more mature dialog even though these lolis are extremely oblivious to what’s acceptable adult behavior.

Thirdly, under-utilization of the loli’s innocents was not only a disservice to everyone, but to not discuss the matter at all would be disappointing in of itself. What makes the ideas here so unsatisfactory is the lack of dynamic emotions and discussion. Kiyoshi is raping these lolis and so why wouldn’t they have included a wide range of emotions from all characters, as well as, a variety of more interesting situations? For instance, there wasn’t any crying during the scenes with pain and distress; There wasn’t any attempts to stop Kiyoshi by pushing, hitting, kicking – nor was there any one who openly said they liked what he was doing (aside from the last episode with Tenka’s thoughts). The picture painted for the viewer shows the lack of commitment and direction that the creators were striving for – if the goal was just to do enough work to make money while trying to keep loli fans happy, then they completely failed. The fun aspects of getting to see a multitude of sexual positions with three different lolis is as basic of an imagination as you can get.

They even brought up some twisted realism about the possibility of getting pregnant or “getting caught” – of course these adult sentences are unsuitable and prove that the lines given to the lolis are completely inappropriate. There are many contradictory situations where they seem to have knowledge of the sexual conduct that is occurring, to being the naïve loli that is being taken advantage of. They could have contrasted the characters better by having Chie be the oblivious one who is indifferent with the intercourse, Tenka who loves the intimacy, and Komako who despises Kiyoshi for raping her. That is no more work than what they have done and would have given some value to this Hentai. Though, I will have to give credit for the animation as it looked pretty fluid with many camera angles. The FOV was particularly decent in contrasting the positions of the characters with respect to motion, definitely need to create more isometric views for me to be impressed. They did not even peruse Kiyoshi being chie’s dad role play anymore after episode 2 (fragments of conversation appeared but nothing worthy of a fetish). Also, I don’t understand why they blur out the private parts when they have come this far… but I suppose if anything it does lessen my immersion, thus dampen a bit of arousal (but not much). They should take some notes from Yosuga No Sora.

Finally, though Shoujo Ramune is my first introduction to Hentai – and I was initially excited to watch this for the lolis – the lack of ambition, cohesion and the sadly missed opportunities only serves as my comparator for the next Hentai.

This review is coming from someone who is not really a fan of Lolis, I think they are cute and can understand why people like them but they are just not for me, but for people that do like Lolis don't waste your time reading this because you will like it. With that being said on to the review.

So the main plot is a middle aged man opens up a candy store in hopes that he will attract young girls and get to hang out with them, and hang out with them he does, his dick is hanging out of his pants for pretty much ... the whole show, and initially the girls are weirded out by it but like all lolicons worth their salt he ensures them that his dick is the meaning of life and the saviour of mankind and the girls end up having sex with him. Which they do in a variety of different ways which include, blowjobs, vanilla, anal and the use of onaholes which I must admit I have never seen before so this was something new which was nice, there is also one scene where two of the girls who like each other have sex, this happens in episode three I believe so the old man isn't in every scene which is a plus, so yeah not too much else to say here, for the most part the scenes are regular scenes that you'd find in any other vanilla hentai except with lolis.

The characters were pretty forgettable, one was trying to become an idol, one was a lesbian with white hair and pigtails and the other one was generic loli with brown hair number 3723 so don't expect to find your new waifu here if personality and character matter to you. The art and sound was well done, everything looked nice and the sound all fit the scenes, the noises made during sex were all nicely done too, everything sounded like it should and the voice actors did a nice job of making it sound realistic.

Overall my personal enjoyment of this wasn't very high, I'd say a 4 or 5 out of 10 simply because lolis aren't for me #TittyAllDayEveryDay, but if you like lolis and aspire to own your own candy store one day then I'd give it an 8/10.