Christmas is right around the corner, and J-List is helping you make it a great one with our EMS shipping sale! From now through Dec. 26, get 50% off EMS shipping when you order $50 or more from Japan. No coupon to enter, so make your order now!
This has certainly been a busy season to be an anime blogger. One fun series I’ve been following is Kishuku Gakkou no Juliet (Boarding School Juliet). It’s the story of two mortal enemies, Persia Juliet and Inuzuka Romio, who belong to opposing factions in their school called the White Cats and the Black Doggies. Inuzuka confesses his love to Persia and the two end up as a couple, though they have to keep their relationship from the other students, who would not allow sworn enemies to be together.
The show is fun, a light romantic comedy in which Persia and Inazuka do everything they can to keep their secret, which naturally leads to lots of comical misunderstandings. The show knows what side it’s bread is buttered, and has quite a lot of fanservice scenes, both the “sexy” kind as well as the emotionally charged situations that will appeal to anyone who’s become invested in the characters. And waifus…there are quite a few quality waifus here, including Inuzuka’s childhood friend Hasuki, Juliet’s closest friend Char and Juliet herself.
There are a lot of ways to judge the “quality” of an anime, or at least the seriousness with which it’s being taken by the animation studio and financial backers, including how early figures start arriving for the show and whether the animation budget falls off a cliff after the third episode or not. (It doesn’t in this show.) You can also pay attention to the voice actors who’ve been tapped to be in the production, based on how famous they are. As shown in this chart, anime seiyuu make very low wages until they’ve been in the industry long enough to attain a decent rank, the highest being “no rank” when they can negotiate their own voice acting fee. Kishuju Gakkou no Juliet sports many top named stars, like Ai Kayano (who plays Menma from AnoHana), Eri Kitamura (Ami from Toradora) and Tomokazu Sugita (the voice of Kyon), which signalled to me from episode one that they were going to be very supportive of the series.
Are you a fan of Kishuku Gakkou no Juliet? Tell us on Twitter!
We all love fun Japanese snacks, but it can be hard knowing what to buy and taste. That’s where J-List Box comes in: every month our staff creates a great selection of the best snacks for that month, and puts them in a box and sends them to you. You get every awesome seasonal snack, lots of fun and famous names like Pringles and Kit Kat and Pocky, and we also include a card explaining what all the snacks are. Browse and order the newest J-List Box snack boxes!
