Ouran High School Host Club, known also as Ouran, is a very amusing take on the shojo genre. Haruhi Fujioka is a student at Ouran Academy, a very elite private school. One day, Haruhi stumbles into an "abandoned" music room and finds the Host Club. While trying to leave, Haruhi destroys a very expensive vase and is eight hundred million yen in the club's debt. The boys of the club force Haruhi to work for them to pay of the debt.
What the host club does is cater to the women of the school--basically, they're male geishas without physical contact. They have tea, they throw parties, they give flowers, flatter, woo, and otherwise entertain the ladies with their different male charms. Tamaki Suoh, the leader, is the "prince". Kyoya Ootori is the cool mastermind, the one actually in charge. Hikaru and Kaoru Hitachiin are twins, andthe "little devil" type. Mitsukuni Haninozuka is the "lolita-shota" type, appears to be an elementary schooler, loves sweets, and is the national judo champion. O_o; Takashi Morinozuka is his cousin, the "wild" type according to wikipedia, but more like the strong silent type. He's at Huni-senpai's side at all times, and talks very little.
Tamaki discovers that Haruhi is a natural at entertaining ladies, and promotes Haruhi to host. At the end of the day, Tamaki discovers that Haruhi, who he just employed as a male host, is in fact a girl. Haruhi cares little for appearances, and had no money for a girls' uniform, and didn't mind being mistaken for a boy, so she went along with it. The club decides that she's so good at being a host, the "natural" type, they'll hide her gender from the school and continue the masquerade.
This is normally the exact opposite of the type of series I would like. It's shojo to the extreme, actually parodying many common themes in shojo series. But while being extreme, each of the boys are actually very honorable and chivalrous, none more so than Tamaki. So I love it. It's hilarious, and makes fun of all the things I dislike about shojo series. It's got a likable strong heroine, and a chivalrous love interest. What more could I ask for? Well, and I can't believe no one thought of this, there's no "comedian" type. But other than that, it's great!
The dub is very well done, also. Vic Mignogna steals the show as Tamaki. He entertains me to no end, especially when I watch Ouran immediately after watching episodes 47 and 48 of Fullmetal Alchemist. (which, as any FMA fan knows, are late in the series and therefore very sad) Caitlin's no slouch, either, yelling at the twins, and dealing with all-around craziness. Travis Willingham plays Mori-senpai, and Aaron Dismuke rounds out the old FMA cast with a small role as Huni-senapi's younger brother. I love Greg Ayres in general, but the twins are to die for, and Huni is Huni. I haven't heard a character I don't like yet, and I think Caitlin is going an excellent job directing. The only thing I dislike are the theme songs. The English singers just don't sound as good as the original Japanese. The lyrics are awkward at times, and the singing itself isn't as good. However, I DO like FUNi's apparent new policy of translating the theme songs into English. If you don't like it, switch to the Japanese audio track. But if you do like it, you've got it made. It shows that FUNi is actually trying, and as a fan, I appreciate that.
Granted, Ouran IS a shojo. It's silly. There's a wide range of people who don't particularly like it. I've read about 4 volumes of the manga, and I enjoy the anime much more because of the hilarious voices. It's not a great work of literature or anything, but it's entertaining, and it doesn't take itself seriously when it does its gags. On the whole, a very fun series, that I would recommend to anyone looking for something peppy. Also very good when you've got a group of friends over.
Overall: A- for entertainment value.
