Drama: Ouran High School Host Club ep01

I'm not sure if it's me being biased, but this drama is freaking adorable and I hate having to wait once a week for episodes and I hate the fact that 30 min is not long enough (well tbh, it actually is since it stays true to the anime).

I'm going to do this review a little differently than the other dramas.  Let's go the short version route for describing the first episode.

Plot:
The story revolves around a high school girl named Fujioka Haruhi (Kawaguchi) at the prestigious Ouran Academy, who stumbles upon a group of male students who have formed their own club as hosts. Accidentally breaking an antique vase, Haruhi ends up owing the club a vast amount of money, and she ends up posing as a host in order to repay her debt.

Credit: DramaWiki

Cast:
Kawaguchi Haruna, Yamamoto Yusuke, Nakamura Masaya, Ryusei Ryo, Daito Shunsuke, Chiba Yudai, Takagi Shinpei, Takagi Manpei

Official Site: TBS - Ouran High School Host Club

Comments:

 

Haruhi is on her way to school, dressed in non-uniform clothing.  She's studying in the library, but the library at this school isnt like a typical library with peace&quiet.  She sets off to find a place and comes across Music Room #3.  She notices a very pretty vase, turns and finds 6 ikemen guys off to the side.  Tamaki welcomes Haruhi to the Host Club and asks her which guy type is for her (thinking that she's a guy.... haha).  She freaks out, slowly backing away from Tamaki and ends up knocking into the vase.  The vase breaks and she's in debt to the host club of 8 MILLION YEN.  In order to pay off her debt, she becomes a lackey to the boys.  Tamaki orders the guys to make Haruhi up so that she can become a host the next day.  Haruhi gets cleaned up and is even given a school uniform... a guys uniform.

She becomes a host the next day and is quite the natural.  Her goal in order to get rid of the debt is 100 customers.  One of Tamaki's customers looks extremely jealous that Tamaki's attention is going towards the new host.  Haruhi's personal items are tossed into the fountain in the school quad.  She gathers all her items from the fountain except her wallet.  Tamaki comes and tries to save the day, and all the other members help out as well.  The next day Haruhi gets a request from the jealous girl, the girl tosses water at Haruhi, but Tamaki intervenes.  The hosts stand up for Haruhi, the girl gets angry and leaves, Haruhi sweetly asks the girl to come by again for their next event.  Tamaki gives Haruhi her wallet, but drops it on accident revealing her school ID.  Tamaki finds out Haruhi is a girl and freaks out while the other hosts just watch Tamaki panic and pretty much faint.  And that's the end of the first episode. 

Definitely not the short version, but shorter than my usual recaps HAHA.

Characters:

Haruhi - Haruna does a pretty good job at portraying Haruhi.  She plays the kind and sweet part of Haruhi really well, but when it comes to shooing off Tamaki, it doesn't sound too believable, like she's just yelling at him, instead of putting an emotion to it.  That's just my opinion.  Haruna's response at the part at the end when Tamaki drops her wallet revealing her school ID, she says "hai" in this weird tone.  Usually when you're like "yes?" its in a questionable tone, but she said it in a, dare I say, sensual way, which was really weird and for some reason it bothers me haha.

 

  

 

Tamaki - I think Yusuke is doing a great job with how he's portraying Tamaki.  He's actually got some of the gestures down and what I like about the way this drama is going is that its filmed with special effects that portray an anime, like when he gets crushed to the wall by the "UZAI" word.  I also noticed that Yusuke is wearing a light colored contact lense which I didn't notice the first time I watched it.  I knew his comedic portrayal would seem like his character on Atashinchi no Danshi, which I loved as well.  Facial expressions and some gestures resemble it.  If I can, I'll screencap those and compare, just gotta go through the episodes again haha.  His protective side is really charming and his host persona makes me wanna giggle haha.

Kyouya - yes... YES!  I think everyone is in agreement that Daito as Kyouya is definitely the best pick and he really does do a great job portraying the character.  He really is this "cool" guy, the loveable douchebag lol!  The tone in his voice and the way he expresses his words is what really brings out Kyouya. And you gotta love that they upgraded his notebook to an iPad, so much more convenient.

Honey- Chiba Yudai is cute, but doesn't have that cute factor of Honey.  He's trying, but there's only so much you can do considering how chibi Honey is in the anime/manga.  The effect that they added to Honey when he jumps on Haruhi is kind of disturbing (especially in the 2nd ep which I'll explain then), like really... he becomes chibi in mid-air?  That's hella freaky.

Mori - Of course, Mori has no lines or barely anything to say, but gestures go a long way and I think Nakamura does a pretty decent job and being this statuesque, tough, guy.  Him eating the cake with Honey was kind of funny though, when you look at how he eats it.  He's eating cake with such a stern look on his face.  The part with him picking up the fish in the fountain was so awkward and unneccesary.  You don't need a schtick for the comedy, though him picking up a fish in a 6-in fountain was pretty funny, it was just.. not needed.

Hitachiin Twins - The Takagi twins are portraying the twins pretty well, though seeing a live action of literally "brotherly love" is really disturbing.. REALLY disturbing.  I thought it was pretty comedic at first, but everytime I see them getting close to each other, i feel so uncomfortable that it makes me laugh.  I wish they were a bit more playful and mischievous but we can't really see that yet with just this one episode.

Nekozawa - I understand that they're going to add him in all the episodes, which is one of the big changes from the anime to the drama.  I like the idea of adding him, but so far he really is an unnecessary character, but I think Ryusei Ryo is doing a good job playing him.  I still can't get over the fact that Nekozawa is played by Ryusei, it's such a drastic change from his usual roles, and he even changed his voice to get that creepy Nekozawa feeling which I think is really well done.  Nekozawa.. is a bigger creeper than Kyouya. period.

They actually did very well staying true to the anime, but I really wanna see some exaggerated gestures.  Go crazy! Have fun with it! I wanna see an anime come to life, not just people portraying an anime.

I also gotta mention that I did watch all episodes of the anime, which is really rare, but I couldn't stop myself, I just kept going and before I knew it, I was at the end.