I’ve been learning Japanese slowly like a toddler over the past two years, and one thing I haven’t done throughout all of that time, is learning through exposure. Over the latter half of 2024, I finally started to! This included plenty of things, including watching anime, which is something I haven’t done outside of Love Live! since about 2015. So to start, I wanted to look for a slice of life anime, as it would use simpler words, and words more commonly used in day to day conversation. This is NOT the anime for that… 🤭 Oopsies! It’s definitely useful! Way useful! I think… Tho it does use a lot of more complicated or lesser used “normal” words. Regardless, I did watch both seasons, and really enjoyed it even!
Who is this post for? Ideally you’ve watched the series, but I will be explaining things as if you’re only mildly interested in either the show or just me. :3 So you don’t NEED to know what’s going on in the show, you won’t get lost while reading, but it WOULD help give context to things! The show can be a little inappropriate so don’t feel like you have to go watch it before reading if it’s not something you’d be able to handle. Before I get to much of any spoilers, I talk about this inappropriate part as a critique, so you can make your decision to watch the show first after reading that part if you want. Treat it like a content warning. There are minor spoilers there, but actually meaningful spoilers start after you read the word “cosplay” at the end of a paragraph, so you can keep that word in mind! ^^
I know the show is based on a manga, but I have not read that. In this post I may talk about things in the series I don’t know much about due to it being new to the anime, even tho it’s not new to the manga. Keep this in mind if you HAVE read the manga! And don’t tell me abt any spoilers. :p Speaking of spoilers!
This will include spoilers from here on out!!
What lead me to The Demon Girl Next Door specifically, was this silly video “Brain Shaker” by owatax99 which I found one year earlier in December of 2023. I really admire this persons creativity with their videos. Simply do not think I’d ever find this anime if not for this! (Just don’t think it’d appeal to me on a surface level. Partly for reasons I’ll get into.)
(Warning for flashing lights if you want to watch it)
It even inspired me to make and publish a gif of it to tenor at the time!
So it was already on my radar, and was the easiest choice to go with at the time. And it seemed cute!
Here’s a silly idea I wanna try out for these… This is background music from the show to keep you company for a little moment! :3 The audio player will follow as you scroll, so you can pause any moment! Just be sure to stop it before you play the next one further down. And watch your volume so it’s not too loud! If you don’t mind, let me know what you think of this idea. (Feedback for anything at all is greatly appreciated!) <3 You can let me know anywhere at all, don’t feel pressured to comment directly under this post! Of course if it’s distracting, or if you don’t like reading with anything else going on, no reason to keep it going, it’s optional after all! You could even just listen to it in full before continuing to gauge the vibe of the show! Enjoy this post however you want~
♪ シャミコミカル-Mid- ♪
The gal with red hair is introduced as 15 year old Yuko Yoshida, but she quickly takes the name Shamiko. I will refer to Yuko as Shamiko in this post.
I really enjoy how the most absurd thing is treated by normal people. Never is something supernatural met with much disbelief if any. Not only does it add to the humor of the show, nor is it a new concept by any means, but it really helps with the pacing and feel of the show pretty well! I also love the specific way they do the “good and evil become friends” thing. It’s unique to me! :p
Something funny about human characters with non-human body parts is that it can sometimes give me a weird body dysphoria type feeling. Shamiko’s tail (and her horns to some extent) does this to me… Not really something I’m able to fully explain even tho I’d love to…but I’ve talked to people who share the sentiment, so I know I’m not alone in this! I just think it’d be neat to have a tail like that, I love the way it moves and behaves. :3 Maybe it’s tied to how I struggle to express my emotions in real life, and her tail is very expressive. Isn’t that trait of it cool? I think it’s cool! ANYWAY!!!
There is a dog in the show that becomes a running bit and I just found it funny enough to mention. 🤭 One of my favorite characters. 🥰 I’m also bringing him up this early on because it leads to a critique I have with the series, which might be an obvious critique, but I wanna get that out of the way first! Then we can get to the more fun parts :3
Shamiko encounters this dog again in episode 5. This time she’s guided by her ancestor, Lilith, speaking to her through her mind. And this is when we get to the problem I have, tho either I’m just desensitized, or it’s one of those things that seem a lot worse than it is once you give it a go. Shamiko’s demon outfit, or “Crisis Management Form,” is very revealing. This did make me feel a little weird at the start, and if I’m presented with only that, it still feels a little odd to say the least, but I believe they handled it pretty well in the show. The design itself is sexualized. No doubt. However, everything else isn’t. What do I mean by that…?
So to their credit, the way she’s usually placed in shots is as if they’re trying to minimize the aggressiveness of the design, since she’s rarely too up close, and is at times even facing away or is obscured. USUALLY… And the way she moves and is animated is not sexualized whatsoever, with no unnecessary movements. When she IS up close, she’s at least being modest by keeping her hands up in front of her, or it’s a shot exclusively of her face. That’s not to say it’s NEVER front and center, and those moments where it is, feel weird to me. They got better at not doing that in season 2, so I’m hopeful for season 3. Even still, the outfit doesn’t get a lot of total screen time anyway. Even here in this first moment. After the initial reveal, she’s covered up or turned away. The scene is really short, and it took a whole five episodes to see it even once.
I feel like I’m yapping a lot about this… I really want to emphasize how little focus it has, but also emphasize how weird the focus it DOES get is. Could do without the visuals for the first 21 seconds in episode 9. 😅 Could’ve been done in a much better way while still making its point! Tho that’s probably the worst of it. All in all, I really think they did a great job despite the design they were given. Which I appreciate. This is a great show I’d hate to have completely ruined for me by something like that. If you went to look at those 21 seconds I mentioned, you probably have a very skewed understanding of how big of a deal this is overall. I view it in a similar way I view Nozomi’s gimmick in Love Live! School Idol Project, among some other moments from that show. It’s unnecessary, and I completely understand it if some people can’t get through it, but it’s not common, and everything else is wonderful! Or I just tuned it out pretty quickly…
To me, all of these little things they did to minimize the impact of the outfit, made it so the outfit never appeared distracting under normal circumstances even in the slightest. I’ve always been a believer in how nothing is sexual unless you make it so, and so maybe that has helped me not think about it much. It’s revealing, but it’s never “highlighted” unless directly commented on. The design of the demon outfit is actually really cute if you view just the outfit. Would make for a cute cosplay!
Lilith has a similar outfit to Shamiko in this form. Despite being just as exposed, it does not feel as offensive, nor do I think it is, tho that’s 100% a size thing. They were a little too “generous” with Shamiko’s design, for lack of better words…
♪ せいいき桜ヶ丘の日常 ♪
Speaking of Lilith, I wanna mention how her first physical form (that wasn’t Shamiko’s body) in the show, the Demon God Statue, or “Ancestor Statue” (“Ancestue” for short) shown above, is cute. :3 I want one!! I’ve seen some people own one, so maybe I’ll look into where I can get one, if they still sell it…
Also speaking of Lilith!!
This design is so adorable!! And she is TINY!! Primarily using a bright lilac color even, one of my absolute favorite colors!! Everybody say thank you Momo!!
Sssssspeaking of Momoooooo!!!! Momo Chiyoda is such a fun character to me. She’s voiced by Akari Kito, the same person who voices Kanata Konoe in Love Live!! I only found out about this after finishing the two seasons, I never recognized the voice, but it definitely helped me appreciate the show as a whole a little bit more! 😇 Akari Kito is one of my favorite artists, so it made me very happy to realize this! <3
Her scars look cool on her… Maybe they have given them lore by now, but not in the anime! I think… At least not past vague mention… So I will wait to find out :3 More on her later~
Woah! Hey! In the last episode of season 1!! Animals from the next season spotted!!
I think it’s so cool of them to briefly put them in as background characters in season 1. Made me so happy when I spotted them as I skimmed through the episode after finishing the show!
These two, Shirosawa and Lico, are funny I think. In a sense that they made me a little uneasy, but I loved them very much at the same time. I love what they add to the show, Lico turning into one of my favorites very fast. She has a funny airhead energy I like where she appears stupid, but I noticed she has a good read on people, so she can’t be THAT stupid, right? 🤭 I see the way she’s good at working on her own to benefit herself when needed, but I like that element of surprise to her, even if it’s not used in a massive way to drastically change the plot or anything. She’s just a silly gal doing it casually for the love of the game.
I love when she does this with her hand <3
Season 2 Episode 6 (Writing that just now made me think, and then realize that in my last post on here, “My Life With Love Live!,” I also talked about “Season 2 Episode 6” but of Love Live! Superstar!!. Funny coincidence :p) Momo!
This is when I realized I was in love with this series. I knew I liked it. Very much even. At this point it was a comfort show. But this made me realize just how much I liked it. There’s not much that can make me happy cry (or cry at all for that matter) besides Love Live!, but this moment got me, and it got me really quickly. The first frame of her smile even. Not to mention how this is such a pretty shot!! It so easily got me emotional. <3
The impact of it really is built up throughout the whole show, so if you haven’t seen it, I wouldn’t be able to do it justice by explaining it! But ya :3 it made me very happy <3
Here’s a character that has been there since the start that I haven’t mentioned yet. Let me introduce the freak.
♪ 牛肉を見る権利 ♪
Sion Ogura is a very fun character to me, as per usual for any character at this point, I feel like she keeps one-upping herself every time she appears. Towards the end of the show she turned into my absolute favorite character, I got excited to see her every time she appeared because I knew she was about to momentarily take control of the whole show in her own weird way. It never once felt intrusive or out of place, and it was always fun to watch!
She’s also like the only character I’ve gotten spoiled on, I know what her deal is, but I’m excited to see her more, I hope she stays as fun as she is currently! ^^
There are multiple other characters I haven’t mentioned either, but I don’t have much to say about them. I CAN say that I really enjoyed everybody, there’s not a single character I didn’t like. In fact Mikan, who I haven’t mentioned, is one of the characters I found the most enjoyment in, but I really don’t have much to say overall. Her outfits are really really pretty <3 So I’m sorry if your favorite character is like Seiko or something… She brings me joy but I don’t have much to add besides that!
By the way, what’s with this girl? I’m obsessed with her.
I do briefly wanna mention this pink glowy cat in the outro tho, using it as my own outro for this post! When I first saw it, knowing how they like to put characters in the intro and outro that wont appear until the latter half of the season (since each season I believe covers two volumes of the manga,) it scared me. My thinking led me to assuming it to be Momo. Right next to Shamiko’s dad. Putting the pieces together in my head… As Momo got weaker later on in the season, I was starting to believe that Momo would lose all her power like her sister Sakura and turn…into… Huh… Like her sister Sakura… Right… That’s Sakura… What am I worried about… I’m stupid…
Open for secret
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