Are you ready?
This is probably the first time I do such a short introduction, but at the same time it is just perfect for this anime. Anyway, Uta no Prince-sama Maji Love 2000% is an anime about a young girl who writes music and the members of the idol group she writes for whose name is Starish. And these guys are obviously all in love with the girl; everyone is in love with Haruka.
In case it was not obvious from my little summary and you never heard about Utapri before today, this is adapted from an otome game, one of the adaptations that chooses no definite answer, the girl is still single at the end and the boys are all still in love. There is no resolution at all and this is something I usually hate. Except in Utapri. There might be other exceptions but Utapri is special. Utapri sparkles you know.
And that is why I have gotten so interested in it, and the reason why I couldn’t wait to watch the new episodes. The plot was mostly boring because it was constructed more or less like the first season: every boy gets an episode to deepen his relationship with Haruka and the remaining ones are devoted to the actual musical plot. In this season, Starish was competing with Heavens, another idol group, to win the Utapri award. Guess who won? Yes, you’re right.
Really, there is nothing ground breaking in terms of story. If it would have been anything else but Utapri I’m pretty sure I would have dropped it mercilessly. Except I didn’t and I’m sure you want to know why.
That is simple: fabulous. Utapri is nothing but fabulous. You can be sure that you’d have some fabulous things appearing in every episode. Every time Saotome appeared it was fabulous. (Then again, Norio Wakamoto makes everything fabulous when it’s not scary.) Every time they started to sing it was fabulous. Even the lack of plot became fabulous. It was sparkling, sparkling everywhere, kinda like Precure but for girls. And it was thus pretty fun to watch despite the obvious flaws.
As far as characters are concerned, it should not be necessary to say it but please note how bland Haruka is. As the heroine of an otome game adaptation, I wouldn’t expect any less from her.
When I think about it, the characters were not really that interesting, and most of their character development happened in season 1 anyway, that leaves mostly Cecil. I had my doubts about Cecil at first because he seemed like an unsuffering, jealous brat, but he kinda grew on me and quickly became my favorite character (behind Saotome, no one can beat Saotome). As for the others, well, they haven’t changed one bit, they’re still very stereotypical: you have the lady killer, the calm traditional boy, the sporty one, the always cheerful, the popular guy and even a guy with a double personality.
I would have been very interested to get more development on the senpai and Heavens, but obviously this didn’t happen, they’re not love interests. Doesn’t mean I cannot hope for another spin-off.
To sum it up, Utapri is surprisingly good, don’t miss it! Everyone needs sparkles!
Additionally and this is a public announcement totally unrelated to Utapri. Starting now and until September, hopefully early September but you can never know, Go for Broke will go bi-weekly. All of this is due to my awful workload (and social life, it’s summer and I just can’t say no to a barbecue party…). Everything should decrease starting September so we’ll get back to our usual schedule!
