Bakemonogatari (Ghostory) Review

I'm gonna try this starting with a moe pic thing

Bakemonogatari is one of those shows you either love or hate. Watching the pilot episode, I was put off by the striking colour scheme and confusing flashing text introduction. The frequent slow motion and 3-D close up shots of characters didn’t give a pleasant first impression either. Its definitely not for those who are new to anime and even after watching the whole season, I’d agree with anyone that calls the series “weird”. It was hard for me to put sum up everything about this show so please forgive me if I miss out on something important.

Not your typical Opening

The content sounds reasonably normal. Bakemonogatari (Ghostory) is about Araragi Koyomi, an ex-vampire, who helps out 5 unusual girls with their supernatural problems with the assistance of a specialist, Oshino Meme. Araragi is the typical selfless nice guy who is unconditionally kind  and allows himself to get abused or hurt in the place of others, which usually turns out fine because he has a near-immortal body thanks to his ex-vampirism.

It sounds like a pretty generic harem themed show structure, and I’d be lying if I said that the show doesn’t  have any harem elements. But unlike most shows with many girls surrounding one guy, Araragi is actually not an idiot. He’s a little bit perverted and a lolicon, but is absolutely loyal to Senjogahara while still being very kind to the other girls, except maybe Hachikuji.

Another thing that separates the show from a typical harem (*Ahem InfiniteSratos*) are the girls’ personalities. They aren’t just there to provide different types fanservice like loli and moe, they also each have a distinct relationship with Araragi and have vastly different temperaments.

If you say so...