Before I go further into detail, let me just say that I enjoy a good romance. Romance frequently happens to overlap with the magical girl genre, which I also happen to enjoy and it was through consuming Cardcaptor Sakura, another CLAMP property, that I was able to find out about Chobits. I won't go into the problems I had with Cardcaptor Sakura here since I already wrote a review on the matter, but Chobits turns all of the issues I already had with Cardcaptor Sakura up to eleven.
Let's start with the fact that Chii is presented as the titular persocom, a Chobit. Because she isn't actually human, it's difficult to make the case for her having a character whatsoever. A computer does what a computer is told to do. End of. And to be honest, the writers may have actually benefited from subscribing to the notion (see: episode 24), but they tried to shoehorn a character into Chii anyway, so let's start with that.
Chii is presented as not being like other persocoms so she is effectively The Chosen One. She has a learning AI, so when Hideki gets her and turns her on (by molesting her), she gets to work learning to navigate the world in such a way that makes Hideki happy similar to how a puppy might. Cute, but also trite and boring.
Here, we're introduced to our Chobit and already, her entire world revolves around this creepy man who doesn't stop fetishizing her.
This would be all well and good, except that it's passed off as... funny and charming?
Without going into too much detail, it's worth pointing out that the writers also rub friendly shoulders with incest both in the relationship between a young human boy and a robot he made to look and behave like his sister and a smarter Chii clone spirit thing who was obsessed with Chii losing her virginity and her papa.
Uh, okay.
If we weren't already getting problematic enough, let's glide back on over to Hideki. When he's not fetishizing Chii, he's fetishizing his coworker, fetishizing his teacher, screaming randomly in public, or playing the "woe is me, I'm so poor, feel bad" card.
And again, all of this is played up to be funny and charming.
As our story carries on, not only do our main characters develop painfully little during the course of the show, but so does their relationship. Like what's the major difference between the first episode where Hideki touches Chii and the last episode? That she's awake? Much character development, wow.
And all the while, we're supposed to be bonding with either Hideki or Chii, which means we're either bonding with a creep with no redeeming qualities or a computer who ultimately behaves like one despite their desperate attempt to give her a personality. (See: Something more than saying "Chii".)
In reality, Chii is just a catalyst to other character stories which pan out to be more engaging than the main plot.
So what does this all mean?
Despite having a lovely art style, this show is much too problematic and mediocre for me to recommend to anyone, so here are my recommendations instead.
Are you coming here from Cardcaptor Sakura, hoping against hope that Chobits will be better? Try Princess Tutu or Puella Magi Madoka Magica.
Do you want a movie with a cute girl robot who learns things but isn't sexualized by creeps? Metropolis.
Do you want a half-decent show with a harem romance? Fushigi Yuugi.
And if you aren't ready to give up on CLAMP just yet, do you want to try another show where the main female lead loses her memory and isn't immediately groomed/molested by a creep afterward? Tsubasa.
