Tonari no Kyuuketsuki-san | Worth Watching?

Is it worth? Who knows! I’ll let you decide, but first, you’ll need to give it a watch 🙂

From the first few episodes, it became obvious that schoolgirl Akari Amano takes a liking to a 360-year old vampire named Sophie Twilight. While this strikes as an oddball formula to set up for the series, it works with the fact that the creators wanted to establish an important relationship from the start. Not only does Akari and Sophie develop a close bond, they also begin to share similar interests. The most evident involves with otaku culture. But what evokes hilarity is a lack of common sense from Sophie considering her nature. She still has the mind of a child despite being over 300 years old. The creators made Sophie into an antithesis of a vampire. She’s not violent and has no desire for human blood. While she shares common traits of a generic vampire (like being weak to sunlight), Sophie also enjoys interests of an otaku. These include going to comic conventions and collecting otaku goods. It’s something you’d never expect a vampire would behave but the bottom line is that Sophie is nothing like the vampires you’d see in traditional horror flicks.

Oh and she’s not the only vampire. Later in the series, we meet Ellie, a vampire girl who has known Sophie for a long time. One thing noticeable about Ellie is her characteristics that relates more closely to how vampires would behave. The show also pokes fun of Ellie’s personality by making her behave like a brat on many occasions. Still, she’s not malevolent and often acts more like a child similiar to Sophie. Thanks to her new friends, Ellie does learn more about the human society. Beyond that, we also get to meet Akari’s best friend Hinata as she also gets involved with our lovely vampires.

There’s probably not many reasons to watch this show altogether but if you’re looking for a humorous slice of life anime, this is one to aim for. As I mentioned before, character chemistry is important that shows how close characters grow together. Akari and Sophie is the most prominent pair as the two become what seems to be more just friends. While this show isn’t truly a yuri, there are definitely moments that suggests a bit more than subtle romance. Akari’s attraction towards Sophie is obvious that even gets played for laughs when she gets nosebleeds. There are also many moments when Akari makes excuses to see her. For the more distinctive humor, the show plays around a lot with otaku context in particular with Sophie’s hobbies. She’s pretty much an indoor girl who spends her time watching anime, reading comic books, and buying otaku merchandise. As she is a vampire, the show also injects humor about her nature such as drinking blood (non-human), being weak to garlic, or sunlight. But as the title suggests, Sophie is pretty much a neighborhood vampire who really is harmless.

As the art style also suggests, this anime is decorated with fluffiness and charm. The main female character are made as cute as possible with Sophie being the primary example. At someone her age, she looks like a doll that even other characters comments on. Similarly, Ellie retains a youthful appearance that will be deceptive to the naked eye. However, do take notice that the show has some fan service. While it’s nothing explicit, it exists and some scenes can raise some eyebrows considering the appearances of these girls. As someone who has read portions of the manga, the anime does manage to capture the overall look of the show.