Review of Candy Boy: Nonchalant Talk of the Certain Twin Sisters in Daily Life
TLDR at the bottom. "I like you all the time since I was born. For a long time... and we stay together, forever..." Candy Boy is something of a pleasant surprise. Intoxicated by exterior titles, I came into this series thinking none other than typical yuri. How wrong was I indeed, for Candy Boy doesn't follow such blasphemy, as instead, it is of an innocent bloom in this bizarre bouquet dubbed romance (specifically girls' love/yuri). The premise of Candy Boy is simple, it follows two sisters and life. Really, that is all the anime spares. I suppose I could touch on the lifestyle these characters take as well, there isa lot of referring to family relationships and concreting the ties that behold the two parties. Candy Boy also makes use of "generic" s.o.l moments to hold together a sense of reality, instead of a singularity on solely the main point of the narrative. I've said time and time again how much I love simple anime, I have to say Candy Boy really takes the cake here. Sure, the entire anime is probably nothing new in the medium, but with writing that endeavours in its ecstasy without notice. I find it that Candy Boy is not only lucid but a fully elaborate story on its own euphoria. I'm not one to find the most pleasure out of stories like such, with its themes of sister love, there wasn't really much to submerge myself into with this. However, the execution came in and absolutely hammered everything that an anime as such should have, I don't really have experience with the genre either, but I wouldn't be surprised if this was entirely believable too. It's strange but not surprising, just another impulse of irrationally that, yet again, has proven misleading in analysis. Efficient thinking has its disbenefits, I'd tell all.
As for the characters, I liked each and every one of them. Both lead characters, Kanade and Yukino have really good chemistry and a sense of humanity to them, they felt like normal humans and behaved accordingly, I suppose with lack of episodes, there was no room for major development, however, that is completely fine, as the characters remained intact to their fixed settings. It may sound boring, but it is a perfect fit for such an anime. Sakuya acted as the clown of the show, diverting moments into comedic relief so that the anime wasn't entirely monochromatic. I do believe she did a fine job at such, conveying such a personality throughout the show as one would expect without any hinders. The same goes for Shizuku and her gimmick, which was bringing drama around more often than not. The drama here is a hit or miss, but overall it didn't crash the quality of the show despite it being of "generic" order, which I will stress once more, is totally fine in an anime as such. So overall, they are relatively great characters.
The audiovisuals for its time is incredible, the background was seriously well made, the designs were fresh and polished, all the other words reviewers will use to say something is great. I suppose with this being an OVA, AIC (whoever they are) had the benefits in the market, if I am not wrong, they probably could have gone wild with aesthetics and made it even more beautiful, but seriously, for the late 00s, this is amazing stuff. The same is true with the OST and voicing, more so OST in the form of OPs and EDs, sometimes this stuff sounds like something out of KEY or something. Whilst I would like to praise the in episode OST, I simply could not remember everything that played, however, if I tried, I do believe such quality could also be found throughout. I wouldn't have guessed such amazing production values would be brought into some original OVA no one really speaks of, which goes to show that expecting the unexpected brings pleasant surprises.
When all is said and done, I really did enjoy Candy Boy a lot more than I thought I would have originally. All the lucidity, the bliss, the other big words I need to find via googling synonyms, is nothing short of impeccable. So, as said for about the 111th now, the simple stuff is good stuff, and that happened to be Candy Boy, which I enjoyed a lot. I would imagine if you are looking for a deep and intrinsic story, you won't find one here, if you are looking for something not "s.o.l boring", you won't find it here. Full enjoyment usually comes around to those with low expectations in an anime like this, with satisfaction levels disproportionally magnified whenever said artistic piece achieves the basics of whatever it tries to accomplish.
TLDR: Candy Boy achieves apex status in its elegant writing of a simple tale of two sisters and the life events that arise around them. Great characters that fit together live hand and gloves. Amazing production values for its time, also check out the full OP/EDs
Overall - 8.8 (9)
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I planned to watch this specifically in a time where I'd binge multiple romance anime, for some odd reason, I just didn't with this anime, same with School Days, same with Citrus… anyway, I wholeheartedly recommend this OVA to anyone interested in some niche title or is a hardcore fan of romance, you just don't want to miss this presentation if you are like me who is satisfied by anything wholesome. On that note, I'd also recommend reading "Tamen De Gushi" if you can, it's more of a feeling that vibe recommendation rather than it bonds well on an internal level, both have girls' love though. Otherwise, I have nothing to leave off with, I will say, however, don't look at this anime's cover and jump to vapid conclusions; a treat lies ahead, maybe it will taste like candy. You tell me.