A Good Librarian Like a Good Shepherd Review

AKA: 大図書館の羊飼い ; Daitoshokan no Hitsujikai

Genre: Harem/Fantasy

Length: Television series, 12 episodes, 24 minutes each

Distributor: Currently licensed by FUNimation. Also streaming on Crunchyroll.

Content Rating: PG-14 (Fanservice, nudity, mature themes.)

Related Series: The original game; 3 manga adaptations; 6-episode OVA (2014-2015)

As well Recommended: Kanon (2006)

Notes: Based on adult visual novel (game) adult by August, published by Hazuki.

Rating:

A Skilful Librarian Is Like A Good Shepherd

Synopsis

Kyotaro Kakei is handsome and polite, but not very social, an gorging reader who prefers the visitor of books to people. He dreams of finding a book with all life's answers in it. He likewise has some precognitive power, and his vision of danger to another ultimately leads to a situation where he must choose to either stay with new- mostly FEMALE- friends, or instead abandon human friendships in the service of the Shepherds, who have a library of their own- a library whose books are the histories, past and futurity, of the lives of every individual. The Shepherds dedicate their lives to interventions to save, or improve, the lives of the people whose books they are assigned to (or choose), and they acquire great power in this service of helping others, only they pay a price- the memory, even the noesis, of their OWN being disappears from the world of non-Shepherds. How will Kyotaro cull?

Review

This evidence has a gem of an idea in the concept of the Shepherds, merely the whole thing is laid low past terrible execution- mainly poor character evolution, including weak or not-existent backstories for some of the principal players, likewise as a slavish devotion to the clichés of harem shows. (There'south plenty of fanservice, but I guess quite a bit of actual sexuality got excised in the move from game to anime, since the original was an eroge. See under Audition, below.) As a result, other than in the bones issue of Kyotaro's "selection", the evidence can't conjure much genuine drama AT ALL, pretty inexcusable for a series where nosotros take, in the Shepherds, individuals who can practice such spectacular stuff every bit stop time and teleport huge objects.

To illustrate, let's meet our (generally female of course) cast. The person Kyotaro saves is one Tsugumi Shirasaki. I can't remember u.s. ever getting much of her background story- we exercise become to run into her hospitalized younger sister later, but that's near every bit much as we'll get about her family. She says she's introverted, and wants to get over that by forming something that may accept been chosen the Happy Smile Club, or some such matter- to be honest, I didn't even really feel like taking the trouble to go dorsum and verify the name- but the gist of the affair is the Service Social club idea (a la My Teen Romantic One-act SNAFU et al), i.e., an odd-jobs club. Tsugumi is energetic, sugariness, and easily embarrassed, only otherwise seems to be pretty insubstantial, withal the show seems to choice her every bit the "principal" daughter for our male hero. ( I guess you lot could have picked one of the others in the original game, but the anime has gone with Tsugumi. Sometimes you can tell which ane of the girls in a harem is the "primary" ane by the effort our leading man makes on her behalf; the FIRST girl he meets also seems to get points for, well, being the starting time; BONUS points for "childhood friends" but that, at to the lowest degree, doesn't utilize in Tsugumi's case.)

Kyotaro's initial rescue of Tsugumi involves one of the 2 usual fanservice-friendly "misunderstandings" (no, information technology's not the "seeing panties" 1, information technology's the OTHER one), which will naturally arouse the ire of any tsunderes nearby, and sure enough there's 1 inside striking distance (so to speak), in the form of one Tamamo Sakuraba. I didn't actually recall whatever backstory for HER either. She'south such a stickler for propriety that she eats hamburgers with a pocketknife and fork, which at least gives her the all-time gag in the show. And that's about all of note for her.

Kana Suzuki is a blonde waitress with a class-clown personality (though she says she's easily discouraged) and ambitions to be a playwright. She HAS a backstory, which is presented briefly as a diagram. (Yep, as a diagram.) She'll get her desire to produce (and star in) ane of her original plays, which seems to be a hodgepodge of a fairytale romance, The Emperor'southward New Clothes, and a fanservice obsession with chest size, all in one ungainly package. Kana, I'1000 afraid, shouldn't surrender her solar day task, no matter HOW bad the tips get.

Senri Misono is called the "Song Princess", and I had to admit she did take a terrific voice. (Kudos to her VA.) HER backstory is also brief, but at to the lowest degree it DOES take "pictures and conversations", as Alice (of Wonderland) used to say. Senri's backstory is actually her continuing story; the person she wronged for the right reason- or mayhap righted for a incorrect reason, the ethics are a little dingy here, when you think about it- is yet in her life. Her affiliation with Kyotaro's order (yep, it was originally Tsugumi's idea, but you know how GUYS are, especially with harems) sets upward a conflict with her singing career, but I was a picayune dislocated nearly what boundaries her final decision set about that, or if she really made a final decision at all.

There are some female person nonmembers of the club who bear witness upwardly to complicate things as well. While Kyotaro's still working with Tsugumi to course the gild, we run into Maho Mochizuki, the Student Quango President, who we gather has for some fourth dimension been trying to recruit him for the Council because of his "talent" (yeah, RIIIIIIGHT). I idea her likely to desire to wreak some sort of revenge on him for spurning her in favor of Tsugumi. There'south also Maho'south right-mitt woman, Aoi Takagawa.

And then there's Nagi Kodachi. She's a number of things, amongst them Kyotaro's next-door neighbor, AND his rival throughout the prove. (No, not for 1 (or more than) of the girls; it's the OTHER thing.) The show also burdens her with a completely complimentary connection to Kyotaro through some other classic anime cliche, abetted by nonetheless Another, the old hero'south-memory-lapse-near-his-own-past. Nagi'due south a twin-tailed redhead, which pretty much guarantees that she'll be an ambitious and/or sarcastic character (the anime genre has this matter virtually red pilus.) The bear witness seems to imply that she'll remain in his life even after the terminate of the events depicted, though given all the information nosotros Have received I just don't come across how that's possible in any meaningful way. Yet Nagi is yet the only daughter who gets to demonstrate much personality in the show at all, if a not only bellicose ane simply also a contradictory i. (When all the pieces of the Nagi puzzle are assembled, I Yet didn't understand why she did much of what she did, or for that matter how she notwithstanding stayed qualified for the position she aspired to.)

Oh, I forgot, there IS another male character. His proper noun is Ikkei Takamine, he'southward Kyotaro'southward buddy, he joins the Club, and he's pretty much ignored by the girls; at 1 point, they go on a kind of group date with Kyotaro and conspicuously (and unapologetically) don't invite Ikkei. There's only room for i Blastoff Male person in a harem later all, and then if he doesn't desire to remain effectively a eunuch, I guess Ikkei should resign and bring together a different club- he'south not quite equally perverted as male person heroes' sidekicks usually are, so he might really exist appreciated elsewhere. His treatment by the girls is not quite equally rude as the one Takeya received in White Anthology 2, but anybody (or at least everyone even halfway decent) deserves a little attention and respect, after all.

Yes, Kyotaro does finally make i decision, in case you were wondering. Unfortunately, the decisions of the rest of the cast (OK, with ONE exception) remain murky, even when they had a decision to brand at all. I NEVER really understood how one character was sufficiently motivated to effort murder- much less why they got a "mulligan" for that endeavor. Nosotros don't even see THAT much of the Shepherd's magic, and at least one of Kyotaro's assignments was completely dizzy. I couldn't figure Nagi out, but at least with her there was something TO figure out. The Recommendation is a show that also has supernatural events and multiple girls, just at least has decent backstories and drama surrounding some of them. — Allen Moody

Recommended Audience: Fanservice, including some nudity (bathhouse due west/chest comparison, etc.) The elimination of actual sex here probably removed the major depict of the original game. The Blu-Ray/DVD is rated for 14+. I'd actually go with 16 to be on the safe side.

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Version(s) Viewed: Streaming on Crunchyroll.
Review Status: Full (12/12)
A Adept Librarian Is Like A Good Shepherd © 2014 Hoods Entertainment

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Source: https://www.themanime.org/viewreview.php?id=1977

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