Forum - View topicOuran Host Club.
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HaruhiToy
 Posts: 4118 |
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As a result of someone in another thread comparing Revolutionary Girl Utena to Ouran High School Host Club, I pulled the series off the shelf. I remember it being good but this time it seems so good I ended up watching the whole thing all over again.
One thing I want to mention. The English dub is brilliant in every performance, but what really stood out for me was Michael Tatum as Kyoya Ohtori, a supporting role. Without him the whole thing would have been worth half of what it is. For what it is worth I think the equalities are pretty weak. Both series use tall, slender characters. Roses figure prominently. (What would RGU be without roses?) The building architecture is ornate and lavish but definitely not the same strain. RGU's humor (to the extent it appears) is sly and measured and inserted into a drama where Ouran is a comedy full of overdramatic pratfalls that uses drama to fill it in. The only place where RGU is similar is early scenes where Utena is blowing off the sniffy faculty member or when Utena is forced to flail about helplessly while Wakaba jumps on her to declare her love. But they soon drop that. Oh, well. I appreciate opposing thoughts on this. I did come up with one question about the ending. spoiler[Did Tamaki end up having sex with Lady Eclair? In one scene she's mounting him on the sofa, and she's not seen again until she's in the shower while Tamaki is playing piano. It doesn't affect the story at all either way but what would Haruhi say if she found out?] |
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Pleinair
 Posts: 92 Location: Texas, USA |
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I loved Ouran when I watched it, and watch it every few months just to enjoy it..
But...I can't stand the dub. It is...horrifying to me. Moving beyond that. I watched Ouran First, even though Utena in much older, but even so I never made any connection from one series to the other. Even the way the roses were used was different enough for me to not spark a connection. When mentioned I suppose parts of the humor could be...called similar. So I agree with your calling the similarities weak, and I do not have an answer for your question, as I often wondered that myself! I'm still a bit reeling from someone loving this dub so much, but I am glad that someone does, even if I cannot. |
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Zalis116
Moderator
 Posts: 6902 Location: Kazune City |
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ANN Ouran-Utena Comparison.
I'm still reeling from someone hating this dub so much, but to each their own. There's just a lot of passion and love the the show in everyone from director Caitlin Glass on down. Aside from Tatum as Kyoya, I felt Mignogna's Tamaki, Rial's Renge, Christian as Honey, and of course Glass as Haruhi were standout performances. I couldn't ask much more on a technical level either, as there weren't any sloppy/lazy name mispronunciations. However, it has been my experience with people online and IRL that the Ouran dub is "love it or hate it." There's not a lot of "eh, it was okay, pretty standard for a Funimation effort." |
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ninjapet
 Posts: 1517 |
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As far as I know nothing is implied that way, and I have re-watched the ending like 10 times and I never got that vibe from it at all. Still the manga current ending (well it is ending soon) > anime's ending |
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marie-antoinette
 Posts: 4136 Location: Ottawa, Canada |
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I think that's a bit unfair, since the anime ending had to be fairly inconclusive, to leave the opening for a second series perhaps (which I would dearly love them to do). Also, quite honestly the material that both the manga and anime cover is done better in the anime, at least IMO. I haven't really listened to the dub much but overall it seemed fine. But Miyano Mamoru is my favourite Japanese seiyuu and not listening to him play Tamaki didn't work for me. |
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littlegreenwolf
 Posts: 4796 Location: Seattle, WA |
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Eh, I guess this is mainly coming from my comments in the SKU/Utena thread. I'd repost my reasoning in comparing the two, but I'm really too lazy to go dig it up and copy and paste. I will say however that you're missing a major bit of what I was comparing Utena to Ouran with in the Utena thread: The Nanami episodes of Utena equal to me the same sort of comedic style of the Ouran tv series. Anyone who has seen enough Utena understands that the Nanami episodes are usually just random, bizzare comedic relief that give the viewer a break in an otherwise serious drama. You say the Utena humor is sly and say Ouran isn't, and I don't quite understand what you mean by this. Nanami's personality is sly I suppose, but to say something like that and ignore the antics of the twins in Ouran who could easily be called the living form of sly, would make your view of Utena vs Ouran a bit unfair. I said in the last thread that Ouran is like a non-stop Nanami episode, and I stand by that opinion. The humor is similar, especially with it concerning rich spoiled kids with too much time and money on their hands, and then some of the stuff just being so off the wall, out of no where. I saw a bunch of similarities in the production values of Ouran in connection with Utena. I stated Utena and Ouran share similar french/baroque architecture in terms of the school campuses. You say they aren't. How are they not, because I see it clear as day from the roofs to the large windows, hallways, and cloisters where students hang out. It's style of architecture, not native to Japan because it's western, and it has a name called Baroque. If you need a reminder of what the school grounds are like, here's Ouran, and here's Ohtori. Other examples: Ouran - Ohtori Ouran - Ohtori I'd post more but it's hard to find more images of Ouran's campus. Since I already did go into it a bit more in the Utena thread, I'll just mention that Utena was the first to use the blinking pointy arrows to draw a user's attention, something that I've only seen done since outside of Utena with Ouran. By pointing these things out I'm not claiming Ouran is an Utena knock off. They're two complete different beasts. I was just making an observation of the similarities of both, which were justified later on at finding out that both shows share a LOT of key production staff members, something which you can see from the link Zalis116 posted. You get storyboard artists, episode directors, and show writers working on two different shows, and there will be similarities noticeable to the people with eye to pick them up. It's called recognizing someone's style. Watch enough movies by a certain director and you'll start seeing similarities between the films. It works with anime too. |
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bravetailor
Posts: 817 |
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I haven't finished Ouran yet, but through the first 7 episodes I don't notice many similarities beyond the aesthetic (abstract use of flowers, gargantuan and baroque architecture). Keep in mind though, that many, MANY shoujo works contain the same features. But the tone and direction of the two shows are totally different.
But if your point is that they are solely similar aesthetically, I would agree. |
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