One reason we love anime is that it doesn’t pretend to be something it’s not. If a given series is a cute-girls-doing-cute-things anime, an idol show, or a reincarnated-into-an-isekai genre work, fans can get into the groove quickly and start enjoying how the story and characters unfold right away. And when the anime is a harem story about a young boy who ends up living with a harem of buxom university students and having lots of ecchi adventures, that’s fine too. And that’s what the new Mother of Goddess Dormitory (Megami-ryo no Ryobo-kun) definitely delivers!
The Appeal of Goddess Dormitory
Poor junior-high schooler Koshi’s house is burned down, and the next thing he knows, he’s homeless and starving on the street. He’s so hungry, he’d eat just about anything, even…
Happily a university student named Mineru finds him and takes him home to her dorm, where he meets the other goddesses residents: mysterious Serene, tomboy-with-a-shoujo-heart Kiriya, cosplayer and otokonoko enthusiast Fley, and Atena, a girl who hates men and isn’t down with having a boy as their “dorm mother.” If Koshi wants a place to live, he’ll need to win over Atena… as well as prepare to be put in some ridiculous fanservice scenes time and time again.
Why Ecchi is Better than Hentai
I love Twitter and Facebook because I get to post sexy anime images and engage with our followers about them. Sometimes I’ll see someone complaining that a certain show stopped at merely being an ecchi show (featuring fanservice situations and light nudity), rather than going full hentai (depicting actual sex). But these fans don’t realize that, in most cases, ecchi is better than hentai.
Great moments from #GoddessDormitory #MegamiRyou. Are you watching? pic.twitter.com/H3fby87tqB
— Peter Payne (@JListPeter) July 28, 2021
First, shows that stop at visual ecchi scenes can be shown on late-night TV, while anything portraying actual sex would be blocked from broadcast. While this can be gotten around by creating edited versions for broadcast alongside too-sexy-for-normal-TV flavors, which are broadcast on certain streaming services and sold to fans later on Blu-ray, sometimes this feels like cheating to me. And anime that have hentai versions always seem to get lower budgets, resulting in poorer quality animation.
Another reason why I feel that ecchi anime are better than hentai is that the limitations cause for better and more clever storytelling. Imagine the many sexy situations from Kiss x Sis, or Haganai, or Eromanga Sensei, which are smartly implemented to provide both visual stimulation and humor for fans. These series wouldn’t be improved by on-camera hentai sex between characters.
I know I’ve been running J-List too long when I’m unable to read “One-Touch” as anything other than “Onee-Touch.” pic.twitter.com/uX2QV9x6RZ
— J-LIST (@jlist) September 3, 2020
The Rise of the ‘Oneshota’ Genre
One genre that’s risen to prominence over the past couple of decades has been oneshota, alternately written onee x shota or sometimes as “straight shota.” This is any sexual encounter between an older, more mature female and a younger, inexperienced male. The word oneesan, of course, can refer to one’s actual older sister, but also to any female who’s older and more sexually experienced than you. (The term should really be written oneeshota but fandom seems to have settled on the shorter version.)
Oneshota is great because it offers the ultimate fantasy for males, including
- a sexy female partner who will take our hand and allow us to “climb the stairs of adulthood” with her
- because she’s the more experienced party, all responsibility falls to her, removing any anxiety guys may feel internally
- because the boy is usually young, there’s no “performance anxiety” if he can’t make her climax repeatedly.
It also leads itself equally well to either ecchi genre stories like Miss Caretaker of Sunohara-sou as well sexier stories like Kanakon. If you like the Oneshota genre, J-List’s sister company J18 Publishing has been pumping out some great books for you, like The Girl in the Used Book Store, Life With my Dorm Mother, Lusty Ayaka-chan and Quick Shot Keita-kun, and Mommy Milky Meadows. Check them out!
Hilariously, the name Shouta (翔太) was the most popular name for boys during the Heisei Period. While Shouta is phonetically different from shota (ショタ), with a long first vowel instead of a short one, the fact that English speakers don’t perceive Japanese long and short vowels makes me think there’ll be some giggling when these young Japanese men go out into the world, maybe having some interesting experiences along the way.
Thanks for reading this review of the new Goddess Dormitory anime! Will you be watching the show along with us? Tell us in the comments below, or reply to us on Twitter!
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