As a fan of Doga Kobo and its classics like New Game and Himouto Umaru-chan, I expected some good laughs and of course yuri, despite the big elephant in the room called the questionable interaction of the maid and the Russian loli. I’ll put some spoilers from now on, so go with caution.
Story (8/10):
The premise is simple; a former JSDF member called Tsubame Kamoi tries to reinsert herself into civil society by being a maid, so in a snowy day, she passes by a house of a family of Russians, in where she sees a young white girl called Misha Takanashi playing in the snow with her Russian mother, Tsubame gets instantly in love with the little girl. A few years later, Misha is alone with his “father” Yasuhiro after the death of her mother and is known for driving out the maids from her house; enter Tsubame who gets hired to take care of Misha and the house. The now 8 years old girl is determined to drive out another maid to protect her feud, but Tsubame is skilled enough to keep her pursuit of little Misha while taking care of the house.
In one of the most disgusting moments of the anime comes early is when Tsubame starts talking about why she’s in love with Misha, and in a flashback, she confesses that she prefers “girls who haven’t menstruated”; but for the rest of the series, it’s more focused on the interactions of the former JSDF member with the Russian girl, with the occasional stalking from the maid to the girl in the most outrageously funny ways possible, like climbing an electricity pole, or putting CCTV cameras everywhere.
Unsurprisingly, it touches sensitive issues like why Misha doesn’t go to school, explaining that she gets all the attention because of her blonde hair and she feels “ashamed” of it, Tsubame explains to her in a Martin Luther King way that she shouldn’t be worried of her hair color, because sooner or later, they’ll judge Misha by the content of her character, showing a small transition from lolicon maid to lolicon maid with motherly attitudes.
After Misha gets back to school, she meets Mimika Washizaki (Washiwashi from now on) who’ll be her best friend, and supposed rival Yui Morikawa who only cares about beating Misha. The group will now be entangled with the misadventures of Misha with Tsubame, who the girls have a great appreciation due to her modals and great efficiency in doing the job done.
In latter episodes, another former JSDF member who goes by the name of Midori Ukai is trying to find her former comrade and crush Tsubame, Misha then finds Midorin in the dumps after doing some weird things in the neighborhood, and sensing an opportunity to finally get rid of her maid, attempts to hire Midorin, much to the chagrin of Tsubame. Despite the consistent efficiency of Midorin in all things concerning to house cleaning, she has terrifying cooking skills due to her consistent masochist tendencies.
Misha, feeling now missing Tsubame’s cooking talent, attempts to rehire her by sacking Midorin, but the latter informs her that firing someone has to be done with 1 month of anticipation according to Japan’s labor laws. And in typical Uchi no Maid fashion, Misha confesses that she prefers Tsubame’s food, and the recently rehired maid records the scene for posterity.
Entering the final quarter of the show, we start getting more insight on Misha and why she constantly protects the room where her late mother used to draw, and also why she acts like that with Yasuhiro, her dad. She feels alone, and when she was in her mother’s death bed, she receives a ferret who called Kumagoro as a parting gift from her mother. She also wants to have her dad constantly around her as she feels alone and explaining why she went full hikikomori after the disappearance of her mother, considering that Yasuhiro is actually self-conscious about it.
Tsubame in fact, despite her hardcore lolicon tendencies towards Misha, she appreciates her a lot, sometimes taking a symbolic position as Misha’s mother by giving some advices and helping her in the most dire situations when she saver her from a bear in Hokkaido.
In the final two episodes, we start to see the high chemistry between the 3 lolis, Misha, Washiwashi and Morikawa, in which the first invites the other two to a pajama party with the help of Tsubame and Midorin. However, in typical Uchi no Maid fashion, it has several chaotic moments like when they were in the bathroom, or eating, or basically every moment the three girls and the two maids are in the house. In contrast to other episodes, Washiwashi and Morikawa entered the holy grail of Misha by accident, her late mother’s studio, and Misha discovers that and gets extremely angry, so in order to provide cover to the two girls, Tsubame assumes the guilt.
By “assuming” the guilt, Tsubame is trying to maintain the equilibrium that Misha has made since she came and by taking a step too far like finally explaining that her late mother is not there and won’t come back; she immediately becomes like Misha’s de facto mother. And while the maid has her owns doubts because of the semblance of her infancy, Midorin opens again Tsubame’s eyes to have that final dialogue with Her Lady. By explaining the situation, Misha confesses that she had the fear of forgetting her mother, but started to move on from that when she asks her maid to clean the former holy grail of the house.
Art (9/10):
What I expected from Doga Kobo, very fine details and making very cute and accurate characters. For example, Misha is drawn with the typical phenotypes of a Russian girl, very pale skin, very blond hair and with turquoise eyes; Tsubame has a more bulky type best shown with her amazing set of abs, which is unique in modern anime, but also with a rose on her right eye which doesn’t explain what happened there; Washiwashi and Morikawa keep the cute designs seen in other classic Doga Kobo animes.
The animation is extremely consistent, due to the high standards of quality of the studio, it has the occasional weird frame here and there, but it’s minimal; the bright color pallet enhance the characters and the backgrounds with seemingly no effort. The animation is fluid and never stalls, with some nice detailed backgrounds, specially the house of Misha.
Sound (9/10):
The sound is typical Doga Kobo, very cute with the occasional variant of more dark scores, nothing too impressive, but serviceable for Uchi no Maid, loved especially the Russian tunes in several moments which they complement very smoothly the calmness of the anime. Some background sounds magnifies the comedic and stalker ambiance nature of this show.
The opening and ending are sung by Misha’s and Tsubame’s seiyuus, Haruka Shiraishi and Manami Nukamura and exemplify the comedy aspects of the anime; the ending in particular is the better. Nukamura is clearly the highlight of the voice actress with acting roles in Overlord, Shirobako, Aikatsu and fellow Fall 2018 anime Release the Spyce, she proves her talent by changing smoothly between the funny and stalkish voice of the maid and the more ceremonial and serious tone that personify Tsubame easily. There’s also the talent of MAO while voice acting Midorin and getting the best of the masochist tendencies of her.
Characters (10/10):
There are just 6 characters overall and all of them is important in the plot of Uchi no Maid, this is in my opinion the strength of the anime:
Misha Takanashi is an 8 years old girl who is a shut in since the death of her mother, she doesn’t express correctly her emotions, but in the inside, she feels lonely and wants her father Yasuhiro to be with him most of the time. Misha is also a tsundere with Tsubame, somehow justified by the questionable actions of the maid, but she also prefers to have Tsubame around, especially when it’s about cooking.
Tsubame Kamoi is a 28 years old former member of the JSDF who explicitly said even when younger that she prefers “girls who haven’t menstruated”, which clearly indicates that she is a lolicon and has an obsessive crush on Misha, to the point of telling she’ll keep loving her even after having her first period. In surprising fashion, she’s very efficient in doing house chores like cleaning, washing, cooking and maintains an aura of formality and respect to hierarchy when addressing to other people. Tsubame, with her obsessiveness with little Misha, she begins to close on her to help her with problems like loneliness, extreme introversion, like her late mother did a few years ago.
Midori Ukai is also a former member of the JSDF who is in love with her former comrade, Tsubame, and because the latter rejects Midorin, she enjoys being treated badly by her. In spite of this, she is also very skilled in survival due to her more than intense training in the forces, giving some interesting and funny moments on how she hates comfort and prefers the hard way.
Yasuhiro is Misha’s dad and was married to her mom; he is a hard worker and doesn’t have time to be with her daughter, so he hires maids to take care of her until Misha drives the maid out of their house. He also has problems in being considered Misha’s father and he wants to have the honor.
The other 2 characters are Washiwashi, Misha’s best friend and a compliment towards Misha’s cool and direct attitude, and Yui Morikawa, who is the self-proclaimed best girl in the class and Misha’s rival, but in a one-sided way. While not very well written as the other four, they clearly play a huge role in the final 2 episodes.
Enjoyment (8/10):
I have to take out a point from here because of the obvious reason that there’s lolicon inserted in the anime, and it’s clearly explicit in the way that is presented. However, it’s clear that I have enjoyed this anime a lot, the wacky and chaotic comedy moments were extremely well made, even in the moments of higher tension, the comedy is still on point to dilute the mood a bit, even by considering the constant repetition of the lolicon “joke”, and the characters are very consistent and realistic inside this somehow unrealistic crazy comedy.
If you pay attention closely to the intricate and tsundere interaction of Misha and Tsubame, you’ll start seeing it more as a mother and daughter-lite interactions which for me makes the show earn its coins despite the big problem mentioned constantly above. As a final parting word, a second season could do justice if they can manage to touch things not mentioned at all in the anime like why Morikawa acts like that, how Yasuhiro came to meet Misha and her mother, etc.
Final Score: 9/10.
