Sister Princess

Wataru fails his high school entrance exam because he misaligned all of his answers on his computer-scored test. Since he only applied for one school, Wataru is now behind one year from the rest of his classmates. Two weird men appear at his house and tell him that he has been accepted to another high school and were there to pick him up. They drop him off at an island were he is going to be living. There he finds twelve sisters he never knew he had.

Sister Princess is a very straightforward, episodic show with a lackluster story. The whole series is about Wataru spending time with his sisters and doing stuff for them. Of course, all of his sisters are lovey-dovey for him and constantly want to be with him. All the sisters get an episode that mostly focuses on them. There are other episodes where all the sisters take part, like when they get stranded on an unknown island or spend Christmas together.

With twelve sisters comes many different ages and personalities. Each of them call Wataru by a different name, including "big brother," "bro-bro" and "brother mine." In the beginning it felt like there were too many sisters, but I quickly became acquainted with them. I found most of the sisters to be likeable. Wataru is bland main character; He's not very likeable but he's not a complete idiot either.

Sister Princess' episodes range from so-so to quite good. I'd say that a big factor in how much you enjoy an episode depends a lot on how much you like the sister it is focusing on. I thought a few of the episodes were downright boring and that some of the sister's stories could have been better. It has a decent ending, however, I thought some parts near the end could have been handled better and that the outcome is predictable. I actually thought the opening and ending episodes were some of the weakest ones in the series. There is also a really pointless recap episode.

The animation is low budget and a lot of the show comes across looking cheap. The character designs look a bit off at times, but for the most part the artwork stays pretty consistent. I like the opening and ending themes by Yui Horie. The background music isn't anything special.

Overall, Sister Princess is below average series. It has some enjoyable stories, touching scenes and memorable moments, but it also suffers from some tedious episodes, lame plot devices and poor animation. Those that like shows filled with lots of cute girls will probably like this, but everyone else should pass.

Score:

Written by Marc Frost on Apr 05, 2014