Many of us were introduced to “moe” via The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, the first anime in which I heard the word used, though I still didn’t understand what it was. The famous “Moe Moe Kyun” moment in K-On! (only in the original Japanese) cemented the idea of moe in my mind. What Haruhi had (and K-On! subverted) was an imouto who was moe. Imouto = little sister.
Kyon no Imouto (Kyon’s Sister) helped form that idea of a moe little sister. It was complete with the big brother being annoyed by his little sister’s cuteness, her kawaii. Kyon no Imouto even had her own CD with songs sung by her seiyuu. And yes, she even has a version of “Hare Hare Yukai.”
Then came Oreimo. A series that gets blasted for its ending, Oreimo is the closest thing you’ll get to an otaku-focused anime. With Kirino Kousaka as the imouto who was secretly an otaku, Oreimo was an anime’s anime, so to speak. It catered (and maybe pandered) to otaku. Kuroneko was a wonderful character who becomes sort of a second sister to Kyosuke. Oreimo became the defining anime for the imouto trope. And yes, there was some icky stuff on it, but if you can ignore it, you’ll come away with an appreciation for imouto anime.
But you know where this all started? The imouto trope began with one series, Sister Princess. Before I say any more, I need to let you know that Sister Princess did not begin with an anime, or a manga. It began with a light novel series, that became best known for being a video game – in particular, a visual novel. Now, since we here in America don’t get very many visual novels, the concept may seem foreign to you. The best way to describe it is a “dating sim,” a term that gets thrown around a bunch but is more or less accurate in this case.
Dating your sisters? Gross! Of course it would be, except that, if you make the right choices, your “sisters” end up not actually being your sisters, and thus you can fall in love with them without hurting your conscience. Confused yet? It’s okay, learning about Sister Princess is. It’s not the easiest thing to explain. I’ll do my best.
Basically, the Sister Princess video games go like this: you learn that you have 12 sisters, all with very different personalities. You pick a sister and follow her storyline, making decisions as you go along. Some of them are flat-out hilarious, like when you can tell Kaho that she’s fat, or when you can tell Yotsuba that you have no interest in helping her look for the missing flower seeds. But in those cases, it’s like falling into a pit in Super Mario Bros. You lose, game over, no moe ending for you. That might be fine with you, but it defeats the purpose of the games.
If you do very well, though, what happens is that, you find out that your “sister” of choice actually isn’t related to you by blood, so now you get a romantic ending. So, in the words of Mr. Cat from Princess Tutu (a series that, if you haven’t seen, you need to go watch right now!), “I’ll have you marry me!”
Eventually, Sister Princess proved so popular in Japan that they made an anime out of it. And Man McHan, that is one truly awful anime. Don’t get me wrong, I like it, but I could never recommend it to anyone. The problem with it is that it’s trying to do too much. Every scene requires all 12 sisters to get a line. What ends up happening is that the lines are so wooden that you could knock on them for good luck. You’re trying to cram 12 sisters + the main protagonist + sometimes others into every scene, and the result is that you’ve got a really bizarre anime. Some of the sisters may only say a couple words. It’s really bad.
But the voice acting is stellar. Some of the best-known voice actors in all of anime (Tiffany Grant, Luci Christian, Monica Rial, Hilary Haag) play sisters, and all of them do a great job – none better than Serena Varghese, who plays little Hinako. How an adult can produce that super-kawaii voice is beyond me. If there’s anything worth consuming in the Sister Princess anime, it’s the voice acting.
To make a long story short, here’s the premise of the anime: Wataru (the main character you play as) finds himself sent to an island with 12 girls all claiming to be his sisters. For the next 20-some episodes, Wataru goes through different scenarios, and the reactions of all 12 sisters are shown for every last one. Sometimes a certain sister will get special attention, but the other sisters will still be in the storyline. All of them are OBSESSED with their older brother. That is literally all they talk about for the ENTIRE season. And since they have 12 different personalities, all 12 of them have to be crammed into the 25 minutes. One Piece this isn’t. It may seem like padding, but it isn’t. There’s no way to pad anything out; instead, every bit of padding has to be stripped from the show because we need 12 responses for every line Wataru speaks.
At the end of the series (spoiler alert!), Wataru leaves the island for a couple days, and the sisters are utterly distraught because he’s thinking of leaving for good. In fact, one or two of them almost contemplate suicide, something that doesn’t seem right for this show. But then Wataru comes back and everybody has a happy ending. All’s well that ends well, right?
Here are the 12 sisters, ranked in order from worst to best:
12. Aria
Aria speaks in a very… slow… manner… and… says… hardly… any… words. She is French and calls Wataru “Mon Frere.” There is nothing interesting about Aria whatsoever.
11. Haruka
Haruka is German, yet she likes classic Japanese culture. Tell me how that makes sense. She’s always at shrines and wearing kimonos. I fail to see the German part of it. But her voice is tremendous – can you guess who voices her? Here’s a hint, she played a German character in Evangelion. Haruka calls Wataru “Beloved Brother,” or “Be-wov-ed Bwother.”
10. Shirayuki
Shirayuki is a cook… and that’s pretty much about it. She’s almost never shown doing anything but cooking. She calls herself “Princess” in the dub and “Hime” in the original Japanese. She calls Wataru “Elder Brother.”
9. Chikage
Chikage is a medium, a diviner, a psychic of sorts. She uses tarot cards and crystal balls and candles. All this makes her seem like she’s in her mid-50s. Somehow she’s still Wataru’s little sister. Her name for Wataru? “Brother Darling.”
8. Mamoru
Mamoru is the athlete of the bunch. She’s always active. I hate putting her so low, but it’s tough making a list like this. She’s a fun character, and I love that she’s the one who calls Wataru “Big Bro.”
7. Karen
Karen is considered the main character of Sister Princess, yet she really doesn’t offer much. She plays the piano, and… uh, well, uh… yeah, that’s about it. Oh, and she and Sakuya are the two who are most in love with their brother, and when I say “in love,” I mean… She calls Wataru “Big Brother.”
6. Rinrin
Rinrin is a mad scientist. She creates robots and other inventions, and maybe is the most selfish of all the sisters, since she wants money from her “Bro” to fund her creations. She’s always begging Wataru for funding, which makes me wonder if she truly loves him after all.
5. Sakuya
Sakuya is the icky sister. I put her higher on this list because she’s entertaining to watch, but her entire persona is tied up in being romantically in love with Wataru, her “Dear Brother.” Sakuya’s seiyuu is Yui Horie, who also sings the theme song “Love Destiny.” “It’s my only destiny,” Horie sings, and Sakuya firmly believes that.
4. Kaho
Kaho is a cheerleader and a very clumsy one at that. She’s always worried about putting on too much weight. She loves to cheer for “Brother” but usually does a pretty poor job at it. Wataru is always there to cheer her up after she inevitably trips and falls.
3. Marie
Marie is sick. No, not in that way – she’s literally sick. She spends most of her time in the sanatorium with her dog Michael. Her story is that she has a weak constitution and can barely do things most other people can. As a result, it’s up to her “Brother Mine” to be with her while she’s resting to recover. Her story is so sad that it melts my heart. The poor girl’s entire life has to be consumed by illness.
2. Hinako
Hinako embodies the kawaii trait the most, as she is a kindergartner who calls Wataru “Bro-Bro” and talks to inanimate objects, while coming up with hilariously cute names for objects. She at one point tries using a basic calculator to send e-mails to Wataru, and when Wataru leaves, she starts begging “Mr. Sky” for him to come back. Her immaturity makes her cute. Fortunately, she is one of a select few that you (Wataru) cannot fall in love with in the video game. It’s okay to watch her hug “Mr. Teddy Bear” and act all cute, but you don’t have to worry about Wataru getting together with her.
Yotsuba is a detective who is always snooping around with her magnifying glass. She is very curious, and she vows to solve every mystery. She has a pet bird named “Watson,” or at least a fake pet bird which she keeps in a cage. When her “Brother Dearest” doesn’t spend enough time with her, she cosplays as a villain character named “Clover” (get it, “Yotsuba” means Clover?) who tells Wataru that he better cherish his sister Yotsuba or Clover will do something bad to Yotsuba. Wataru, of course, sees right through Yotsuba’s disguise, but Yotsuba is too dense to realize this. She’s my favorite because she, more than any of the other girls, is off in her own world and not really present with the others. She’s out of touch with reality. That makes her all the more moe when she uses her catch phrase of “check it out!”
There is a lot more I have to say on Sister Princess, but for now, this is what I’ve got. I plan on reviewing the anime as well as the video games and the light novels, if I can get my translator to work. Sadly, only the anime was released in America; the video games and light novels were not. And that means they’re all in Japanese. Having read some of the translations of the light novels, it’s clear that they’re ultra moe, but it’s very difficult to translate an entire page at once. Until then, I hope you be like Yotsuba and “check out” anything Sister Princess has to offer, but with the strict warning that, unless you understand the premise of the video games, the anime will make no sense to you (as happened to me the first time I watched it). For now, so long from Promised Island!
Tommy A. Phillips 