Yamato Nadeshiko Shichihenge (The Wallflower)

Rating:	★★★★
Category:	Movies
Genre:	Animation

Eeeek! Maybe it was "The Frighteners" Director's Cut being shown on Cinemax. Or maybe because it is Halloween...but I finally steeled myself to start my marathon of this comedy-horror anime last night. I didn't regret my eye-bags afterwards because aside from the resulting maniacal howls of laughter I let off from 2 a.m. upwards (which probably made my neighbors think that ghouls had occupied my unit), I especially liked the main theme and lessons imparted in this particular series.

Manga-info:
I have not read the manga at all though I think some copies can be found in National Bookstore if one is diligent enough to paw through the bookshelves. Alternative titles include "Perfect Girl Evolution", and "Sunako of Many Forms." The anime series ended in March 2007 while the manga is still ongoing.

From wikipedia - "The series is serialized in Bessatsu Friend in Japan, and released in North America by Del Rey Manga, with English translation by David Ury. It is published in Singapore in English by Chuang Yi as My Fair Lady (given the story's similarity to the play of the same name). The series is also published in Indonesia by Level Comics. On May 15, 2007, ADV licensed the anime for distribution."

I. The Creepy Story (in a nutshell):

Four bishounens (meaning boys who are drop-dead gorgeous, intelligent, sexy, ..well you get my drool..I mean drift...) will get to live rent-free in a spacious, ala-"lives of the rich and famous" mansion...if....if...they can turn their landlady's niece into a "perfect lady"!

Unfortunately, she is a horror-movie-loving, pockmark-faced, face-covered-with-long-bangs, fashion-illiterate recluse (she reminds me of Sadako from "The Ring" sometimes) who tends to break into explosive nosebleeds whenever she sees anyone attractive. How's that for a challenge?

II. The Characters (in a bloody bind):

= Sunako Nakahara - our heroine! She undergoes a life-changing event when the only boy she confessed her love to, told her that she was "buzu" (ugly) and that he hated ugly girls. She completely becomes different after this incident, shunning all forms of beauty and wallowing in the world of darkness.

She has Hiroshi-kun (an anatomical mannequin) as her best friend along with 3 other skeletons as her confidantes in her room and has a love for all things horror (the first time she cooked for the boys, it cracked me up with all those knife-waving, blood-spattered scenes you would expect from Psycho and other suspense/horror classic movies..and...oh yeah..Jason and Freddy get some screen time too).

Our four guys who at first seem to flow into the mold of the usual stereotype bishounen characters in mangas but who later turn out to have different facets to their personalities are:

= Takenaga Oda - the cool, calm, quiet, rich guy

= Yukinojo Toyama (usually referred to as "Yuki" in the series) - the cute, kind guy who gets saddled with dressing as a girl if there is some costume-swapping going on.

= Ranmaru Morii - the rich playboy

= Kyohei Takano - the brash, very handsome, all-girls-love-to-sexually-harass guy who also is a very good fighter and who may be in the long run the love interest of Sunako-chan (since its only in the anime that the hint is given earlier than in the manga). The hint? well he is a glutton and declares that you haven't tasted fried shrimp yet if you have not partaken of Sunako-chan's. In fact, the only reason I think he came back after he ran away from the mansion was that he missed Sunako-chan's cooking.

There is also Noi Kasahara (Takenaga's girlfriend) and the Landlady (referred to as Oba-chan) and some other minor characters popping in and out in the anime.

III. Thoughts to ponder (and drool ghoulishly over):

As can be gleaned from the title, the main theme would be about beauty. Society and people in general has this concept of what a perfect lady or what beauty is all about. These standards make it difficult for people who may not fit into the mold and who are overlooked even if their beauty is not glaringly obvious (one has to search and take time to get to know them the way one would do for rare orchids).

Like all things too, beauty has a flip side of the coin. Kyohei for instance, always gets stalked by fan girls and can't hold down a steady job due to the sexual harassment he gets. His mom broke down under the constant harassment so she basically pushed him out of their house and her life and they been estranged for a long time. Even mom has her limits! You would have thought she'd be crowing for having such a beautiful offspring...

Sunako, for all her morbid hobbies (she delights in skeletons, skulls, blood spatter and banned horror videos), is actually not an ugly girl. She is an intelligent, cool, strong-fighter-if-she- wants-to-be kind of girl. Its a good bet that when she does grow up and develop she will also be a strong, beautiful woman like her mom and her aunt.

But because of Sunako's experience with that one $#@!* guy, it has diminished her self-confidence and she now thinks she wasn't born a "creature of light". She refers to the boys and other pretty things in the anime as "dazzling creatures" and says she will melt if she looks at them. She still constantly resists the boys' attempts for her makeover but when the going gets rough, she can always be depended upon to deliver her help.

Noi-chi, as Takenaga's girlfriend, is a very pretty girl. However, beauty has its price too! Noi-chi did not get to be that way overnight...and her recitation of what one has to do to reach that level makes me remember the saying of: Vanity - thy name is woman...or some such line.

How the friendships developed between the boys, the girls, the boys and the girls...(ehem) over time is also one thing to appreciate. They all didn't start out hunky-dory and buddy-buddy with each other, but in the end you see that they are really kind individuals who look out and care for each other's well-being.

IV. Conclusion: Take a direct stab at it!

After the 25 episodes, I was only sorry that it ended. I wonder if they will have another round of episodes once the manga continues much further on. Granted, I do not like horror-comedy per se, but the comedic instances interspersed with the challenges for Sunako-san and the 4 bishounens in the different storylines makes me think that there is still hope for those of us who were not born as "creatures of light".

By all means, go rent or acquire a copy of this series and get some popcorn and a bloody mary to boot!

If nothing else, it can make you appreciate horror-comedy films more (I am more of a comedy-action genre junkie). This would be more for the 10 years old and up age bracket to appreciate, if only for the hilarious horror-scene parodies.

*btw, the image in this review depicts the cover of the first volume of the manga by Tomoko Hayakawa.

P.S. if you are wondering why these guys would be worrying about the rent at all when at least 2 of them are heirs to rich families - well, it is because with the exception of Kyohei-kun, their respective families sent them to Oba-chan since they wanted the guys to change. They are not given any money at all and are expected to manage their expenses. That is good training for the 15 year old bishounens..eh?