Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai? Tensai-tachi no Renai Zunousen OVA

As you've probably noticed by now, Kaguya-sama: Love is War is not an ecchi show. It's so not an ecchi show that both seasons had a gag involving Ishigami getting beaten up for sexualizing Chika. So, what are we doing here, with voyeuristic shots of things like Chika's breasts bouncing around as she and Kaguya look for some dropped soap in the girl's locker room showers? Well, we're here because fanservice sells and fans don't care.

If you're a fan of this not-ecchi series, then presumably, you like the characters for reasons besides their masturbatory utility. You like them because they're good characters, or in other ... words, because they make convincing imitations of real people. Characterization is, after all, the process by which a person is created inside of a narrative context. They might not actually be real, but they're real inside of the fantasyland the show exists in. The 2D Realm. You might not be able to touch them, but they sure~ can~ touch~ you~, or something like that. Anyways you wouldn't want to see Chika get Robert Sylvester Kelly'd by Papa Shirogane, a gross violation of her autonomy like that would make you upset. So why wouldn't you get upset when the show's creators force you to be the one doing the violating, with intrusive camera angles that place you right up in there between Chika's thighs? There's two answers here. The first, more rebellious one, is that you would be upset, and that I'm dumb for assuming that you wouldn't. Ass out of you and me, and all that. In that case, good on you, you make a good Kaguya fan. The other answer is that you don't care about Chika, and that I'm dumb for assuming that you do. You know fully well that Chika would have no issues bringing out the fan for some higher-dimensional ghosts spying on her in the shower, but you don't care. You're fine with being that ghost. If you don't like the characters that much to begin with, then whatever, it's just some ecchi, uhh, I feel bad calling it fanservice since you're not a fan, but you get the idea. If you ARE a fan, but don't care about Chika, well then you're pretty spooky.

But here is where I have to give credit where credit is due, and let the fans that don't care off the hook just a little bit for being horny. This is a review for a 5, after all, I'm not gonna browbeat the entire time. Anime titties are pretty cool, and how often do you see them animated at such a high quality? You don't. I mean, Chika's boobs alone had more keyframes than the latest episode of The Seven Deadly Sins. This is some seriously impressive ecchi content. So impressive, that it can apparently make fans forget all the characterization that they had subscribed to going into it. As an ecchi short, this might just be a 10/10 for its ability to do that.

But ultimately, this is an addendum to a show called Kaguya-sama: Love is War, which already has established characters, themes, and metanarrative morality. This OVA ignores all of that and prostitutes its cast for a quick buck. It gets points for being visually in the upper crust of the ecchi genre, but OVAs are not standalone, and have to be coherent within the context of their series. This is not.

First of all, I'd say that this is a completely biased review, so be warned.
I also will keep comparing this to the manga, be warned.
Note that these were also one of my least favorite chapters in the manga, but I still enjoyed it more than the anime.

As an ecchi/fanservice, this is good.
As your normal Love is War comedy, this is awful.
As an adaptation, this is meh.

General:

... The animation and art were as expected, no less than amazing, but I have no comments whatsoever.

The soundtrack was fitting to every scene and hearing Daddy Daddy Do and Kaze ni Fukarete felt so nostalgic, I loved it.

The voice acting is just as good as the previous two seasons, you can feel that they're giving it their all, and every line to each character was filled with life, I won't go any further because I want to keep this review short.


First Part (Darkness 1): 2/10

Disappointing. Like, excuse you, what the fuck? Where did all the comedy go? What I liked about this part in the manga was how Aka kept roasting cliche fanservice like he usually does while still attracting horny weebs. But this, this was just normal fanservice and they exaggerated everything. Completely annoying.

Second Part (Darkness 2): 6/10

Meh. Nothing much notable about it, I'd say they followed the manga properly in this one, and I don't want to rant about how much I liked the voice acting because it will take forever.

Third Part (Cooking Contest): 8/10

Yes. This. This is what I've been waiting for. It was the Love is War I was waiting for. And it was fucking beautiful. I have no comments other than the art was a bit off, but that's probably because I was watching low-quality raws, so no complaints from me.


I'd say the only good things that came from this adaptation:
1) I got to hear the lines in the voice actors/actressess' voice, I live for this.
2) Daddy Daddy Do and Kaze ni Fukarete nostalgia.
3) Hayasaka in glasses. Hell yeah.
That's about it, I guess.

[This is just my opinion btw, nothing more, nothing less.]

I felt so happy when I discovered this OVA. I can't describe how exactly I felt, it felt like your favorite show that you've watched two or three times has another episode that you haven't seen yet.
So when I first discovered this OVA an hour ago I went to buy ice cream then took a shower to prepare both physically and mentally.

Honestly, I have mixed feelings about this OVA. During the first half of the episode I felt betrayed disappointed and I basically thought this wasn't the Kayguya-sama I know.
However, during the second half I felt kind of nostalgia although I watched the ... third season when it aired not too long ago. The second part was usual that I actually felt relived.

In conclusion, if you'd like to feel betrayed then nostalgia for a kind of "Mixed feelings" feeling. Just be careful! The first part is very inappropriate, especially regarding to the rest of the series. If you just want to feel some nostalgia, go watch from the second half.

While I'll try to not go over the top, I still have to wholeheartedly agree with people disgusted with parts of this OVA. The fanservice scenes it opens with, basically 90% of its first half, are completely detached from the tone of the show and honestly quite distasteful even by the average fanservice episode standards. Particularly because you don't get just fanservice happening in some typical setting like a beach of a swimming pool, but the male part of the Student Council imagining it while browsing magazines, which just goes directly against their characters. If this was some very brief skit that immediately let to ... some karmic retribution against them, I wouldn't complain much, but it also drags for an uncomfortable amounts of time and offers no real punchline.

Honestly, if the second half of the episode didn't bring the very wholesome and relatively fun cook-off skit, I'd be tempted to give it all a 1 or 2. There's just nothing witty or fun about the whole porn arc – it clashes horribly with what the show is about usually and isn't even good fanservice by any measure. If you watch this OVA, just skip to around the 13 minute mark immediately and enjoy the funny parts.

Kaguya sama that feels like food wars - unimportant ecchi scene here and there kinda ruins the first 8 minutes of the OVA, lucky it gets better in the 2 and 3 episodes. They just gone too far

Dont get me wrong - i love all the characters and the seiyuu performance are still as good - the jokes is on point just like in the regular season - but i can't handle all the unimportant and kinda trashy fan service. Its unnecessary and sexualize all the girls that we love, its so bad even though i know its just an OVA. Some fans really need ... something to turn them on, eh?

Lets just forget it and focused on the funny pun, narrator great performance, and cute hayasaka with glasses The fried rice competition is so funny though and Miko Iino is such a cute judge. Glad they still use the season 2 opening for this OVA, it bring memories for sure

Eu até ia escrever essa review em inglês, mas tô afim não...
Esse episódio é composto por 3 histórias, sendo 1/3 dele bom e o restante péssimo.
A primeira história é puramente fanservice, um hentai velado que não deveria sequer ter sido criado, a não ser pros punheteiros que queiram bater uma pras personagens do anime e não sabem achar na internet, estar no conteúdo original do anime é nojento.
A segunda história também é meio fanservice, até tem umas piadas mas também bem desnecessária e sem importância.
A terceira história é a única trufa nesse episódio, se baseia em uma competição de quem faz o melhor arroz ... frito e realmente tem a vibe do anime, me tirando boas risadas.

Então é isso, se alguém que entende português ou acabe traduzindo isso se importar com a minha opinião, indico pular as duas histórias iniciais e assistir somente a última, e seja feliz!

First of all, what's going on?

I love love is war (proof of this is that I wrote this review 4x, and if it goes wrong with that I give up), the whole direction, comedy, production, representation of the mind of a young man pleases me a lot. However, the beginning of this OVA scared me, full of forced ecchi, with a speech that was made to mock scenes like this. Just weird.

I will divide a review into 3 parts as well as the OVA, because it makes my job easier.

1) Bath scene

Bizarre. The scene in fact has a good idea, it puts those thoughts that ... every young man had while reading an eromanga in Ishigami; as for example: "why is the door there? where did this shadow come from?", but the anime sins when applying these "jokes" with female characters from the anime being clearly eroticized, thus nullifying all the author's criticism of scenes like this. The way this scene unfolds only goes from bad to worse, everything decays a lot, the reason for the scene ceases to exist with time. There is no direction and production that would hold this scene.

2) Scene from the magazine on the floor.

I would say that it is not the worst part of the OVA, in fact, it is "meh", but it has some nice dialogues next to depressing ones. As I said before, one of the strengths of Love is War is to put young people's thoughts perfectly in characters, this part ironic the "pure young saints" you know very well what they are. Despite this, OVA again gets lost in making imaginary characters its friends like characters from porn magazines, which is a horrorible. Scenes like that put a very sexualized look to all the characters, draining the meaning of the work.

3) Culinary battle

The best part of the OVA. Miko is exactly the type of person I would love to cook for. I especially like how this part gets to bring the group more together, showing signs of development. If you take that away, I don't have much to say, this scene deserves the "Love is War seal of quality".

Finally, despite the scary and pointless start, Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai: Tensai-tachi no Renai Zunousen OVA is not exactly the OVA we all wanted, but it is what it has for today. Counting with the genius direction and wonderful production, the episode is sustained in the beginning only in that, but managing to recover the mood that we love from Love is War more towards the end.

Alright, I have not finished the entire episode... but I will update this review and perhaps clean it up when I do. However, I understand there are 3 parts to the episode and I watched the first two.

All I can say is that this episode has really had a negative effect on me thus far. So much so to the point that I might find it difficult to approach this show and its characters the same way. Listen, there are plenty of ecchi shows, I have even seen a good number and can tolerate them even though I do not really like them and try ... to avoid the genre. However, I felt like this crossed the line that even many other shows knew not to cross. I know people are praising this episode's first part because of the fantastic animation, but it probably would have been better appreciated elsewhere. I read some reviews say they were insulted and disgusted, and I am beginning to think I feel the same way. Hear me out.

Some shows are already ecchi and the OVA episodes do not stray too far from the main series. In this case though I feel like they just objectified the two main female characters (that I love) using them to elude a sexual act and have them basically bare naked for the entire duration with almost nothing left to the imagination. It goes so far that it just seemed like a scene from a hentai. The problem for me with this is the show is rather about understanding and relating to teenagers dealing with feelings of budding romance in school and just growing up in high school in general. This part of the show degrades the naitivity and innocense of youth. Sure, even kids are not innocent, which is why I think part 2 is still a somewhat good part even if it might still seem insulting to some. But there is something more significant to scenes like in the second part in my opinion. This first part has no reason to exist outside fanservice. It prides itself in being a parody of ecchi (which it nearly does), but then undoes everything by going full porno.

I was so shocked I had to look up the chapter that it was based off. To my surprise, the scene barely existed. Or rather, the original manga seemed to understand that it was a parody and thus kept the scene very brief with innuendos but rather tame. I understand that animes need to expand on the source material since we are not watching still panels. However, I have a feeling the parody the manga created was lost in this adaptation. It is strange because up until a certain point it seems like a parody, albeit lewd, but then it does not even embody ecchi shows but rather surpases most. It actually frightens me to imagine what might be in the next 2 OVAs or S3. I watched S1 and S2, then rewatched it with my siblings. I would have liked to watch this with them too; not gonna happen. I can only hope this does not represent the future of the show. People generally do no think much of OVAs and scenes like this but I think the issue in this anime's case is it opened up pandora's box. And I am afraid that means it cannot be closed. Now we have to live with the fact that people will circulate legitimate images and videos of our favourite characters nude around the internet.

I kinda glossed the second part but I actually thought it was alright. The prez and Ishigami act indecent in this part but it feels more grounded and realistic at least. I might not be remembering everything about it because it is less impactful than the first part obviously. As for the 3rd part, I have not seen it but I heard good things. I felt so overwhelmed I felt I needed to stop the episode half way. I'll probably watch it once I douse my brain with soap.

Okay, hear me out on this. I am a huge fan of this anime but this episode disgusts me beyond imagination. I won't be able to look at this anime the same way I did before. It was easily in my top 3 most entertaining anime. Now.. Not anymore.. That is all I have to say. There are people acting disgusted by this, but at some point in our love we will have sex, at some point in our life we'll masturbate, it's just normal stuff. But come on now.. There was absolutely no need for this to happen AT ALL. This is ... not the type of anime to suddenly add THIS MUCH fanservice. I simply don't know how to look on this show anymore. But this episode definitely influenced my future views of this anime. If I wanted to watch a hentai I would simply go to nhentai, but I never go there in hopes of finding anything hentai-ish related to Kaguya sama love is war, simply because I DO NOT WANT to imagine ANYTHING from this anime this way.. I don't know how to score this OVA, so I will give it an average grade. I love this anime so much not to give it anything bellow 10, but this is not what I was expecting. ANYTHING ELSE would be fine in my eyes.

Although I love the Love is War franchise, this OVA was insulting.

The first part of the ova was too awkward to watch and to some extent I found it very insulting, not nnly because I hated seeing Chika and Kaguya naked, but because the way they expressed it is no longer ecchi but directly porn. Besides that, in the manga Aka Akasaka draws them with respect and knowing how to balance with the fan service, but in this ova that respect was passed completely gone. The bathroom part made me sick and I skipped it.

The second part was more enjoyable, they didn't put ... Chika or Kaguya in a disgusting situation.

And the third part, the ricewar one, was naturally the best part of the ova. It actually felt like it wasn't ova and was instead a normal anime episode.

It is also important to mention the incredible work of the seiyuus, especially Koga Aoi.

So yeah, tjhis ova was disapointing, and the mos insultant part is that AI Pictures put a lot of work in that creepy bathroom scene. I really hope to not se this kind of ovas anymore.

While I haven't read the manga, Kaguya-Sama is one of the anime I enjoyed because there wasn't any forced fanservice and ecchi moments. This ova was really a turn off for me because it doesn't really seem necessary and could've just been wholesome but instead it had to be this. It wasn't bad just a bit disappointing because now I know there's going to be more fanservice in season 3 which I'm not looking forward too. It's like damn, does every anime have to have fanservice?

Overall, this didn't really add anything to the plot and is just here for ecchi and fanservice which I ... didn't need. Like I could watch this anime around my siblings but this ova is something you might want to watch by yourself.

I was already taken aback by the trailer, and came here to see if I'm the only one who found it out of ordinary. Being an anime only, i hadn't any clue that something like this is there to be animated.
I read reviews and many were comparing it to the manga stating that they even surpassed manga in terms of ecchi on this OVA. Guess I'd have to see it for myself.


It's not that I've not watched echhi stuff, but the the 2 seasons didn't had anything like that, so totally unexpected for me.

Still I'd watch the OVA, because why not? Now that I'm ... aware of what I'm about to see. Who knows? I might love it :D

The first half is pretty degen. It's nearly a hentai OVA, and definitely NSFW. Some might say that the film criticises the ecchi/hentai industry, but if you take an honest look, it doesn't really go beyond just lampshading. If it's really trying to critique the industry, how does putting the characters into ridiculous sexual scenarios do anything meaningful criticism? It's basically just fanservice trying to pretend that it's not.

The second half feels a lot more like a normal Kaguya-sama episode. There's a cookoff competition, and the usual antics occur. I'll admit that I found it quite funny, and I actually laughed several times. That said, ... the main joke does start getting a bit repetitive after the first time, and it becomes pretty predictable.

Honestly, it's hard for me to rate this OVA as a whole, because the two halves are so much different from each other. I've decided to give it a 5, since I guess the fun of the second half more or less makes up for the first.

*MAY HAVE SPOILERS FOR SOMEONE*






In my opinion, this OVA had so much fanservice and that's one of the things that I hate in any anime, I think that some scenes could also be qualified as p*rn, and the worst thing of this ''episode'' was the hent*i manga that Ishigami and Shirogane found and comparing the characters to their friends, that thing was disgusting, more than I would ever imagine.
The cooking part wasn't that bad and could be even educative, making fun of Miyuki wasn't a thing I liked, but I understand that is the humour of the series beacuse they've been using it since themfirst ... episode so is understandable.
So, beacause of that I give this OVA a 5/6.