"Ouran High School Host Club" is an anime based on a manga series by the same name. The series follows Haruhi Fujioka, a scholarship student at a prestigious school (Ouran Academy). While looking for a quiet place to study Haruhi stumbles into the Ouran High School Host Club’s meeting area. The Host Club is where several young men, with too much time on their hands, entertain clients (ladies of the school). Completely bewildered by the members of the Host Club, Haruhi knocks over an expensive vase and is forced to work as a host until the debt is paid. It is soon discovered by the members of the Host Club that unlike the rest of them Haruhi is a female. The group struggles to hide Haruhi’s identity from the clients while maintaining the delicate friendships between the members while feelings develop between each of them and Haruhi.
Let’s get into the review, shall we? While this would fall into the category of reverse harem, it doesn’t give that feeling at all. This is more of a tale of how relationships change over time. Each character is exposed to a new strange element (Haruhi) and none of their lives will be the same because of it. The series ends with a lot of unfinished plot points and it’s tragic that this series wasn’t continued beyond the 25-episode span. This anime is definitely on my top ten list because it tackles serious topics like income inequality, lesbianism, and the teenage angst, that many experiences, in a light and comical way.
Haruhi is the only female in a group of six males and yet it never gives off the harem feeling. At most, they all feel like a group of friends just hanging out after school. The harem aspects of this can be completely ignored because it doesn’t come into play at all in this amazing story’s plot.
The characters are completely developed in personality and behavior; even secondary characters show depth and dimension in a way that is hard to create and execute correctly. The animation is on par with that available today even though the series came out in 2006. I binge watched this whole series in a weekend and have no regrets about it. The series is available dubbed and can easily be found and watched on a variety of sites. The series ends after 25 episodes but it continues on in the manga, which is worth looking into if you need to know what happens after the anime series ends. I haven’t read the manga so I can’t comment on them, however, if the manga is half a good as the series it is worth, at least, a glance. This is an unexpected gem and if you have several hours to devote to it, I definitely recommend it.
