Customer Reviews

Okami-san and Her Seven Companions: Complete Collection (Limited Edition Blu-ray/DVD Combo)

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It is one of the best short single season shows released within the last few years.

The show brings in characters from a variety of fables and stories. The most prominent is Red Riding Hood, The Big Bad Wolf, and the hunter who hunts the wolf. Each character is recreated into a modern day anime counterpart. It's story centers around the Big Bad Wolf, Okami-san. The companions and friends make up a sort of school mafia organization. They take jobs and handle student problems to earn favors which they can then call in later at anytime they want. The school itself is then part of a larger group which owns the city. The concept of a feudal society mixed with mafia tones in how things run, is very prominent.

Characters themselves are more akin to generic anime in style and presentation. There is the weak guy, the tough girl, and the schemer...along with all the other common threads like the fan service character/etc. But the interactions of these characters, coming from their fable roots, brings a degree of freshness to the anime that gives it a step above others. Each character has well designed backgrounds and some are very rich. When you recognize who these characters are referencing, you will see new life being breathed into the classic storybook characters.

This is a series that will leave you wanting a second season, but for the most part, it does come to a decent stop point at the end. Art style is good and the voices are excellent. The Amazon page lists it currently as Japanese language, but the actors listed and the fact that it is Funimation means it could have an English dub. Hopefully it is a decent dub if there really is one. It is hard to imagine this show done in English. The personalities are so key to characters like Ringo or Okami. Future edit will note this once it is released.

Great series, one of the best in recent years. It will cause you to rethink your opinion of the Big Bad Wolf and Red Riding Hood. Enjoy it! See if you can name all the fables used! You might have to wiki it to figure them all out!!

Ookami-san and her 7 companions isn't particularly remarkable as series go. J.C. Staff brings top shelf production quality and the character design is fun if a little cliche (a fake loli, perpetual maid, moe mad scientist, super tsundere and a relatively weak-sauce but surprisingly solid male lead).

The story follows the members of the Otogi Bank, a mutual help association that does favors for favors - helping people out with certain requests and asking for their help at a later date. It's here that Morino-kun comes on the scene, confessing his affection for Ookami-san, the titular lead. Through a series of adventures the two try working out a troubled but ultimately sweet relationship.

The series plays off a number of fairy tales. Ookami-san (wolf) is Akai-san's (red, as in little red riding hood) best friend. Akai-san's sister is Shirayuki-hime (Snow White) who has seven siblings. And so it goes. It makes for a fun backdrop.

One has to hope [POSSIBLE SPOILERS!!!] this is a first installment (though i haven't checked, recently, on plans for another season) as a number of central storylines remain unresolved: Ookami still hasn't told Morino about her past, Shirou is still at large with Rikkun's threat hanging over his head, etc. And "I don't dislike him" is hardly sufficient relational development.

Overall, the series is enjoyable but not a must see. It resembles (and even has a brief cameo by the cast of) A Certain Scientific Railgun in many ways. A group of cute characters running around having fun little adventures. I liked it well enough.

***EDIT***
One thing i forgot to mention. It is really annoying that the narrator and characters talk over each other the entire show. While i like the narration, the subtitles become atrociously hard to follow.