The first episode of Cute High Earth Defense Club LOVE! kicked off yesterday with the premiere episode “In The Name Of Love.” I missed the episode because I was under the assumption it was going to start streaming on FUNimation. You can catch the first episode on Crunchyroll and FUNimation will start streaming the anime on January 13th.
This series seriously pokes fun at the magical girl genre. I somewhat prepared myself for this anime by watching Is This A Zombie?, which currently streams on FUNimation with Japanese audio or English dub.
Episode one calmly starts out in a bathhouse, where two of the main characters are conversing on “chikuwabu.” I found a pointless conversation let alone one on chikawabu to be stupid, but in the good funny way.
S—t hits the fan, in a comedic way, when a mysterious talking pink wombat appears.
I couldn’t stop laughing when the scene got awkward when it looked like the wombat was trying to molest the two, which was never the case at all. I just wanted to point that out. It got weirder when another person entered, saw the wombat, got excited and jumped into the same bath.
To say that things got awkward in morning class is an understatement. If you were greeted by a talking animal in class, with the exception of parrots, you’d be shocked.
It’s even more shocking to be stalked by the wombat.
Then the energetic Yumoto arrives to “save the day.”
I just love Yumoto’s one track mind about cuddling.
They are interrupted by their first battle, which is against an anthropomorphic chikuwabu.
As if that wasn’t bad enough for the five, they are forced to do silly poses and say ridiculous lines as they transform.
It’s not hard to get the gist of the story and when you do, you will appreciate the humor behind Cute High Earth Defense Club LOVE! You can obviously see that the anime pokes fun at magical girl and sentai superhero series.
I have high expectations of this series after watching the first episode. It is funny to see a group of grown boys being forced to become “magical girls” in order to save the Earth. It’s funnier to see them forced to say cheesy lines and perform ridiculous poses.
This feels similar to Samurai Flamenco, but I can see that this series wants to poke fun at shows like Shugo Chara, Sailor Moon, Power Rangers, Ultraman, Yatterman, Gatchaman, Casshern, and more. I have no problem with that.
In fact, I feel that a show like Cute High Earth Defense Club LOVE! is long overdue.
