Futarigurashi

Is it a boy? Is it a girl? No, not that question of asking a mother who just recently gave birth. A boy who looks and sounds like a girl but is actually a girl. Confused? So it’s basically a girl, right? Nope. A boy. At least that’s what this character thinks. If Futarigurashi had been made in recent times, this might have gotten some PC brickbats or support from the trans and LGBTQ+ whatever whoever. Fortunately this retro anime came out way back in 1998 and more than 20 years ago so I suppose the internet and nobody is going to bother. Yup, thank the internet for making me stumble upon this ultra rare series.

Episode 1
Kenji Aoyama narrates he is a college dropout and is doing erotic manga as part time. Can’t concentrate because the next door couple is f*cking loudly in broad daylight! Hey, at least they’re not like a loser like Kenji who has no girlfriend! Worse, his manga editor claims his manga has no sex appeal! Today he will be receiving Hikaru Saitou who is his friend’s brother who will start living with him to help pay the rent. But wait. Hikaru looks like a girl and sounds like a girl. So is she a girl? Hikaru claims she is a boy! No gay stuff! Yeah, so pretty that Kenji tries to assault her?! So if Hikaru is a girl, why the makeup? Because many say she looks prettier that way. Because Kenji still doubts, Hikaru lets him touch her crotch. Shock! I don’t know what he touched but he seems to really believe now that Hikaru is a guy! Wait. REALLY?! Such a cute guy that the couple next door, at least the guy felt he lost! Yeah, his girl looks damn ugly! Then there’s this incident Hikaru just came out in a towel after the bath. Kenji knows she’s a guy, right? But his libido is so strong he tries to assault her! Can’t take it anymore!!! RAPE!!! Fortunately Hikaru slaps him and thinks he is drunk. Yeah, drunk on his libido alright. With Hikaru living with him, Kenji is able to draw decent erotic manga so much so the editor loves it and will hire him.

Episode 2
Hikaru sees Kenji’s works and thinks the protagonist of his manga is a female version of her. Hence she tries to do sexy poses for him which of course turns his libido on. So Kenji gonna assault this ‘dude’?! Yeah, definitely a cock teaser. He tries to resist and by that he rubs Hikaru’s crotch just to check?! Kenji feels weird out seeing Hikaru’s orgasmic face. Or is she just kidding and trolling him? Anyway it ends with her accusing him of being a virgin. Hence Kenji tries to psycho himself that his goal is a harem of beautiful babes. Not a group of macho men. But since Hikaru is in the latter group, he leans towards that group?! WTF?! Then Hikaru thinks that to avoid people having misconception of them, they should be brothers and sisters. Like, WTF?! If she thinks she’s a guy, shouldn’t she be playing his younger brother instead?! Wouldn’t being his sister raise more suspicions?! Like in this store where they try to get her some girly clothes and mini skirt, yeah the storekeeper is even having fantasies of marrying Hikaru!!! Uh huh. He is jealous of Kenji is her brother and even asks him what will he do if Hikaru isn’t his sister. Oh. That psycho fantasy again. Bevy of beauties or macho men. MACHO MEN he picked just because Hikaru is the ‘king’?! I suppose this guy is going to turn gay because that night as Hikaru sleeps, the beast in Kenji awakens as he is going to assault her!

Episode 3
Oh yeah. Kenji is coming in! When he strips her, WTF, boobs???!!! It is then Hikaru admits she is a girl and that there is no need to hide anymore. You bet they can do those stuffs now. Here’s her licking an ice cream for your imagination to go wild. And then Kenji going to ride his train into her but then it gets derailed. Yup. Just a stupid dream. Too good to be true. But still, sleeping Hikaru is sexy enough to turn him on. Kenji still has doubts if she is a guy since the last time she let him touch her crotch, he wasn’t exactly sure. Now it’s time to make real sure. Can he do it or not? If his dirty thoughts didn’t interrupt him all the time. Because Hikaru wakes up and slaps him. As he explains himself, this of course leads them to a big argument with Hikaru calling him a pervert and that he is nothing without her! Because without her, he only has his stash of porn magazines! Angry Kenji kicks her out. But his mind starts to think that it is 2am in the morning and it would be dangerous for her, right? Why does he care? Hikaru is a guy, right?! Yeah, go watch more porn… An hour later, I guess he is really worried so he goes look for her. Just sitting outside. Care to come in? Just then, the bathtub somewhat malfunctions. And explodes?! This is so that Hikaru believes he can’t do anything without her and that’s why she’s staying. Yeah, she’s going to make things more fun. Oh sh*t?

Episode 4
Beach episode! You bet Kenji is going to try hit on the girls. Too bad he has no muscles so he tries to fake it by holding his breath. Yeah, nobody’s buying it. Especially those hot chicks have their muscular men by their side. Then he sees a few guys trying to hit on Hikaru. I guess they only go away because the creepo is flexing his stupid non-existent muscles. Creepy. So why is Hikaru dressed in a bikini? So that nobody could suspect them? WHO THE F*CK KNOWS OR CARES IF THEY ARE SIBLINGS???!!! Anyway, a hot guy, Katsuya Shinjo mistakes Hikaru for a previous girlfriend. Though Hikaru clears up the misunderstanding, Kenji gets jealous and tries to throw a punch but misses. Shinjo then advises him to do more exercise. After Kenji returns from the toilet, he is shock to see Shinjo kissing Hikaru?! WTF?! Another failed punch. Turns out Shinjo was giving Hikaru CPR and saved her from almost drowning when she got leg cramps. Where was Kenji at her time of need, huh? So who’s the loser who jumped to conclusions now? I guess Kenji has to seriously think about doing exercises so as to protect her. Even more so when he hears those beach babes badmouthing a certain loser who failed to protect his girl. Let’s hope he maintains that fiery motivation to become a stronger man.

Episode 5
So for Kenji to be stronger, he decides to take up boxing. However this gym is where Shinjo is the instructor. Shinjo doesn’t have high hopes for Kenji to improve here and of course that bad loser is going to take that challenge. So they start with some basic training and you could say that Kenji is so out of shape and breath and ironically Hikaru is keeping up with Shinjo at a better pace. So the fastest way to train up is to spar with another member. Kenji acts tough until a huge muscular boxing guy volunteers to spar with him. Trying to run away, huh? Shinjo dismisses that guy since he is too big for amateur Kenji to spar. Kenji then spots this scrawny guy, Yoka. Yeah, he convinces that kid to spar with him. This will look easy, right? So you think he can bully this kid, huh? Wait till he hears too late that he is the junior champion and he has taken off his 10kg glove weights! Damn, Kenji so screwed. He goes down in just 10 seconds! Because of that, Kenji now is seriously training because in a week he is going to have a rematch with that guy. Not going to lose again. Can a week do any difference? Not sure but a man has got to do what he’s got to do. Wow. Kenji sound so cool that Hikaru’s heart skip a beat? However a group of hot babes heard Kenji’s struggles and offer to help him.

Episode 6
They are the Unga sisters, Yona, Akeru, Kanae and Meguru. As they are boxing trainers, they claim they can help Kenji. So who made Hikaru the trainer of Kenji anyway? You think Hikaru can effectively train Kenji? Don’t think so. So leave Kenji in the capable hands of those sexy sisters. Yeah. You bet Kenji is going to go with them. In their rich estate, Yona has him strip. Oh yeah! Too bad it is just to make him wear some special clothes. Then she strips! No kidding! You see, they believe Kenji possess this ecchi power that is his true hidden power. So each time he gets an erection, a bell will ring and this means he must continue his training until the bell stops. WTF… You can’t make this sh*t up! At the end of the day, he thought Kanae wants to sleep with him and she’s very inviting. Too bad another erection so back to training. However for Kenji, screw training! He wants to screw with her! Yeah. Sexy Kanae > Yoka fight. Before he gives into his power of darkness and can rape her, Meguru stops him. Looks like it’s her turn to train him.

Episode 7
Meanwhile Hikaru feels jealous home alone. Damn Kenji went with those sexy sisters. You feeling jealous even though you’re a guy? Meguru’s training is some forbidden teacher-student relationship? Then she has a voodoo doll of Kenji as she tickles his crotch area. I don’t know how this is supposed to be part of the training but whatever. Kenji then spots a voodoo doll of Meguru and does the same to her. Yeah, both getting turned on molesting each other, huh? This sick molesting game ends with Akeru turning up to train him. Oh dear, can Kenji handle this dominatrix queen? As Meguru can’t stand her whipping Kenji, she throws him a voodoo doll of Akeru to Kenji. Kenji lets his fingers do the magic but it has no effect on Akeru. Something about Akeru has higher magic power so she deflects her doll to Meguru, hence Akeru is the one feeling Kenji’s doing. Because Kenji sounds so cool in trying to defend Meguru, Akeru doesn’t like this so she has both their dolls do explicit things to each other. Can Kenji hold it in?! I mean, she’s literally giving him a blowjob!!! Luckily training time is over. So this is going to be his training for the next whole week? You bet when his fight with Yoka is here, Kenji looks all drained out…

Playing It Straight: My Roommate’s Not Gay…
Ugh… As you can see, this retro series would never probably be picked up or subbed at all. Heck, I can’t even find raws online to watch the rest. Yes, I was even prepared to just watch the rest of the series without subs. I was even lucky to watch the first 7 episodes that had subs and even so the subs were provided by Russian subbers! The irony. Gotta be thankful anyway. Last I check, this group has gone inactive so it is most likely they will not complete the series. And to think there were 36 episodes in total! Woah. Such a tall order. Oh well. It was good while it lasted. But no matter how good the internet is, I suppose when there are no videos of it online, it means no videos of it online at all. Not sure if this exists in the dark web…

The only reason why I watched this was because of Yukari Tamura as Hikaru. Otherwise, going by the synopsis itself wasn’t enough to make me even want to take a look at this. I would have just skipped this altogether and not even bother with it without batting an eyelid or take a second glance. Good thing my eye caught her name in the credits listing first, huh? So yeah, she is the sole reason why I wanted to check this out and playing her character, she doesn’t disappoint since her trademark squeaky voice is there and all over the place. After all, she is one of the few of my favourite seiyuus of yesteryears still going strong in the voice acting industry although she isn’t taking on roles as frequent as before. On a side note, Taiki Matsuno is the voice of Kenji whom fans may recognize as the titular character of the Kindaichi series and Inu Yasha’s Kouga.

On a side note, the opening theme, Nageki No Melody by The Netanders despite sound like retro rock, I feel the overall song sounds amateurish. Like as though the amateurish band is trying to hammer it all out. Heck, I’m not sure if it is my hardware (I doubt it) or the studio recording of the song was just low quality. Because the thunderous hammering of the beat sounds like they’re trying to thump a dead elephant or something! Serious! Keep the volume low if you don’t want to be partially deaf by the end of this minute long song. Yeah, ironically like the name of the song itself, it is truly a melody tragedy! Oh hell, the band is even featured for a short while in the opening credits. Why the f*ck they want to showcase this scrawny guitarist lead singer performing???!!! Did they not have enough artist to cover the entire opening credits animation?

The animation quality is horrendous and of low quality. If you think I’m going to vouch for this series just because it is retro, well, too bad this isn’t it. Despite it reeks 90’s style anime art, the quality is bad enough that perhaps the producers thought they could pass it off with the dirty jokes and fanservice. 1998 sounds like a long time and even more so in anime years but then you realize this series came out in the same season with hits like Trigun, Cowboy Bebop, Initial D, Yugioh, Cardcaptor Sakura, Lost Universe, Weiss Kreuz and Neo Ranga, it makes you wonder if this is one of those garbage animes of the season. No wonder they keep each episode to 8 minutes and spread it out to 36 episodes rather than having a normal anime runtime with just a dozen episodes for 1 season.

But yeah, I do have to admit that for the episodes that I have watched, I had a short fun and dumb time watching them so I guess it wasn’t all that bad. Although the relatively general plot is nothing (basically just Kenji getting into weird misadventures with girls as well as him trying hard to keep his erection at bay) the most mind boggling matter that one will often fall back to question is Hikaru’s gender. I bet my ass that Hikaru is 99.99999999% a girl. I didn’t read the manga so I’m not sure if they would really pull the shocking revelation that she is actually a guy. More than often (at least as far as the episodes I have seen), they have never actually made it clear to viewers of her actual gender. They trolled us with ‘confirmations’ like Hikaru letting Kenji touch her crotch. So we assume his flabbergasted face means Hikaru is a boy, right? Yeah, looks can be deceiving. I’m not ready to give them the benefit of the doubt. This whole gender conundrum could actually be swiftly solved if Hikaru just stripped naked and show her crotch. Does she have a penis or vagina? Case solved. End of series.

Alas, they pour further doubt into the mystery of her gender since she refuses to show her anatomy, citing that weak excuse of that no gay thingy. Uh huh. If they are both guys and even if guys are shy to show or see each other’s dick, it is so weird that Hikaru keeps acknowledging herself as a guy but does not hesitate to act like a girl. See the problem and irony here? Already 16 years old, you would think that the natural hormones would have kicked in but instead Hikaru continues to really believe she is a guy. I mean, does she even know what a penis and a vagina is?! How the heck did she pass basic biology in school?! Sure, she has small boobs but how come I don’t see her go topless? Guys don’t care about being topless, right?! So unless she is actually trolling us all but I doubt it. Because there are a couple of occasions where her heart starts to skip in seeing Kenji’s ‘manliness’. So are you telling me that Hikaru is not a girl or is she slowly turning gay? Either way, one of those options has to give.

Hence this is all just mind blowing dumb and silly, the basic foundation and setting of the series. It makes Kenji doubt himself and his sexuality because most of the time he has to think hard if he would actually want to turn into hard gay and screw Hikaru, which he often gives in to but thankfully plot convenience says he can’t bang Hikaru not because of risking him turning into gay but to prolong the mystery of Hikaru as a guy. Now can we move on to the next antic? Until the next horniness takes over. Rinse and repeat. I can’t blame Kenji if he ever turns a psycho or have his sexuality twisted by the end of the series. He’s got all the pretty babes around him and yet he can’t shag them somehow. Virgin for life. Too bad I can’t say for the rest of the other characters considering the ‘misfortune’ of me not having more episodes to watch but I think I can safely say they’ll be as quirky and add to all the hilarious hijinks in future episodes. Sighs.

The fanservice itself is pretty mild. But considering this is 1998 anime, I guess it can be considered as borderline raunchy taking into account the mind set of that era. There are a few scenes that show bare tits and some pseudo porn scenes that would’ve caused some stir back in those days (maybe that’s why this series was quite obscure). Of course the fanservice is used as an accompaniment to the series’ brand of comedy of Kenji getting in sexy misadventures and all. Mostly played for laughs more than anything else especially who could forget the way they portray his dick’s erection. Yeah, this guy’s penis is f*cking huge! And how the f*ck do you use sexy fanservice to train a guy in boxing?! If that doesn’t scream comedy fanservice’s sake, I don’t know what is? Imagine if such hidden ecchi power actually worked in real life, man, we’re actually going to see some real power knockouts in real life! I kid you not!

Overall, it is with mixed feelings that I have for this anime. It is definitely one of the worst animes of that particular season but remember, that is only because you compared it with all the aforementioned cool animes that came out in the same period. Yes, definitely this is a bad anime with its low quality production and using fanservice as the core of its jokes. But since I’m such a simpleton, I found myself laughing at all the silliness so I can’t call it a total failure. Libido frustration even more so when I can’t watch the entire series to make a full evaluation and is just limited to the 7 episodes I saw. After all, there’s this saying that you can’t blame the clown for acting like a clown. Ask yourself why you keep going to the circus! So don’t blame a bad anime filled with fanservice clichés and poor quality. Ask yourself why you keep watching such crap! It’s because we love this simple stuff, silly! And if Hikaru’s gender is causing us to debate if she is a boy or girl, wait till we start discussing if traps are straight, gays or lesbians! Futanari-gurashi maybe?!