Plot Summary: The story revolves around high school student Akira Nikaido, a typical slacker living a normal life. That is, until he meets the mysterious Shirogane, a man who suddenly appears and tells him to meet him at the school that night. Though he is skeptical, he goes anyway, and subsequently gets attacked by a shadow monster. Shirogane convinces him that the balance between the human world and the shadow world has been distorted, and that Akira must become a "shin", which is a creature of the shadow world, in order to help restore the balance.
Genres: action, comedy, fantasy
Themes: shounen-ai
Review [contains little to no spoliers]
So I was skimming through anime lists and came across Monochrome Factor. The year it came out was 2008 yet I have never heard of such an anime before. I decided to go to my usual place (animenewsnetwork) and look up what I have been missing. That's when I saw it: shounen-ai.
Me: Huh? How come I've never seen this before?
Being somewhat of a fan of everything and anything that is anime, I was unsure to why I skipped over this one (especially since my friends are fangirls of shounen-ai and yaoi) so I click 'watch'.
The first thing you see is water, and voices, and this guy with brown hair that suspiciously looks like mine and an obnoxious orange shirt. Then, opening theme.
Now let me tell you. This! This is beautiful. You have to see for yourself: (CLICK THE BOX!)
Now I believe that the art is the opening is different compared to the art out of the whole anime. But that is just me. See for yourself.
In this 'kid-show-gone-semi-adult-show', you meet this guy:
Meet number one cool guy Akira Nikaido. His hobbies are doing nothing and not going to class. His dislikes are... well... if you are a guy who thinks everything is boring what don't you dislike?
Now he doesn't have many friends. When you find everything boring and like to be a loner who has time for friends?
Especially with her:
She's not a happy camper. He name is Aya and she is the school disciplinary, otherwise known as a "Perfect". Who wants a friend who always yells and beats up on you?
Or this annoying guy:
I like to call him "foreign friend" since I could never remember his name when talking to my friends about the show and he had to be the odd one out with the obnoxious blonde hair. He is loud, annoying, never shuts up, obnoxious Kengo. Does anyone really want a friend who just wouldn't shut up and shouts "AKIRA~" and tries to hug you all the time?
Or him...
Shirogane. The guy who wears lips gloss. Would you really want a friend that molests you?
Right. I didn't think so.
And the mysterious little kid who wouldn't leave you alone.
Remember? The one who does all that dark magic?
Yeah, I don't want to get on his bad side...
But I guess being with a crowd like that is okay for Akira when he has this up his tail:
These gross looking things are called Kokuchi. And this is what we do to Kokuchi we don't like:
Yeah, that happens to be all of them.
The whole invasion started when Akira bumped into Shirogane one the street one day. Shirogane--out of no where--asks for Akira to go somewhere with him but because Shirogane's direct approach, Akira refuses and basically runs away.
While Kengo and him are at an arcade and saves a little kids from being bullied
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| Creepers. I know, right? Pay close attention to the young boy, he becomes important later. |
Aya soon catches them and tries to beat them up for being out so late on a school night. As the boys try to run away, Aya soon strikes a deal with them: "come with me back to the school and be my bodyguards". Even though she is the most violent one in the school and didn't need bodyguards, Akira and Kengo join her.
You find out that she just left her plushie at school (why she brings her stuff animal to school is beyond me) and as they walk, everything gets creepy as if someone turned up the notch on the "creeper scale".
With strange noises, Aya freaks out and beats up Kengo (she thought he was a ghost).
And out of nowhere Aya gets attacked by these shadows.
Or her plushie. This causes her to faint.
Now Akira is all alone with these monster... I feel slightly bad for him. But don't fret my anime fans, he is saved by none other than creeper number one Shirogane.
Shirogane tells Akira weird things like Shirogane is a shin and that the balance between light and dark is crumbling and these things called Kokuchi are from the shadow world and must be destroyed.
Akira runs away and in doing so he made one big uh-oh. Akira gets soon swept into darkness and in order to save him Shirogane turns him also in the shin... by... kissing him.
Don't ask me how that worked out.
So now you realize that the boy in light brown hair from before is now this guy:
And the fighting is fast, somewhat dizzy, and fuzzy,
Like honestly, how can I get a good still frame when I have THIS to work with
But even this serious sounded anime has it's light hearted moments. Seriously, a lot of light hearted moments. I mean in the middle of a battle you have a chibi sequence
I believe this is what the anime is most famous for
With most of the comedy your receive from this show it couldn't be complete without on fan girl. This is where Kengo's older sister Mayu jumps in.
She is in love with hot boys no matter what age. She even has a "hot guy radar".
You find out for yourself whether you will be able to stand this character or not.
Akira surely doesn't.
Now if you think a fan girl is bad, try dealing with a fan boy.
He is not as annoying and gets drunk every night like Mayu. Kou-nii just flirts... with everything that moves.
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| "You can call me onii-chan" |
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| AYA RAGE! |
As I watched the 24 episode series I noticed something. I kept trying to think of an anime it reminded me of but I couldn't think of it nor could any of my friends think of it. We all just came up with one answer: Sailor Moon. The anime reminded us of Sailor Moon. Don't believe me? Watch for yourself... or I can explain it right now.
In almost every episode you have this:
First step: meeting a character you've never seen before
Second Step: getting to know that character
Third Step: He or she comes along and screws things up
Fourth Step: the character you've come to know and love in less than one episode gets possessed by a Kokuchi
Fifth step: Some ass kicking time with the same transforming sequence every time
Sixth Step: Parasite Kokuchi extracted and killed
End. ... And you never see that random character ever again.
For some time I was getting bored of it and I felt like I could pick out any random episode and watch it and still know what was going on. But boy was I wrong. At one point episodes string together and you get confused about who is who.
And who is she? I want to say that she is bad but...
There is actual plot after a while and it gets very intense, suspenseful, and interesting without loosing much of it's light comedy charm.
There is still a lot of action and A LOT of twists
This is another anime that I strongly advise not to get close to any of them (I make them sound like real people).
There is a lot of implied in this anime, especially since it's a shonen-ai.
You have Akira and Shirogane (unrequited love)
Akira and Kengo (implied -- just a really strong friendship or something more? xD)
Akira and Aya (implied)
In the end, Monochrome Factor is a light hearted comedy with an original plot that will take your breath away. And if you still stomached through this shounen-ai filled review and find it interesting but don't want to see boys flirting with each other than I would totally read the manga. There is no hint of BL what so ever. Why they placed it in the anime is beyond me but I'm not complaining.
It has loads of action
Romance (uh, implied romance xP)
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| Though is this still considered implied? |
And comedy.
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| Just slightly inappropriate xD |
All in all I give this anime a 6 out of 10. The constant repetitiveness of the episodes annoyed me but when they got somewhere with the plot it was fantastic!
That is all I can think of at the moment.
Till next time!
Oh and if you want to see the first episode:
This is part one, go onto my youtube channel to see the rest! :)
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