Onegai Twins

An Anime series produced by Hiroaki Goda and directed by Ide Yasunori. This is a spin-off from Onegai Teacher. 'Onegai', means 'Please' in Japanese. Trying to continue the tradition of Anime titles to have mixed Japanese and English words? Not that I have problem with it. The Onegai-type series follows a certain line (see Onegai Teacher): romantic, dramatic, leans toward the seinen type. Unlike the former, this series contains ecchi scenes and partial nudity.

The first episode was released to the Internet by a fan-subber on July 16, 2003. 5 more episodes were released so far, and it's quite popular judging from the thousands of BitTorrent downloaders during each release in animesuki.com. It is currently unlicensed in the US, so you can download it for free without worry.

Plot

This series sets in the Onegai Teacher world, supposely after the UFO landings and all. You'd see some of the characters from Onegai Teacher (like Mizuho Kazami and Kei Kusanagi) for short moments but nothing further. I like to see them around like this, because it is hard to say goodbye to those beloved characters from a previous series.

Kamishiro Maiku (voiced by Daisuke Namikawa), the main character, is a teenage guy who lives alone in a rented house. Maiku attends high school and also works as a programmer from home. Maiku was given away by his mother at a young age. In order to find about his past he left his orphanage and came back to live in the house he saw in an old photo from his lost childhood. This photo shows him and another girl of his age, who could be a lost sister which he has never met.

One day, a cute girl named Miina (voiced by Mai Nakahara) meets Maiku. That girl has the same blue eye color of Maiku, and carries a copy of the old photo. She claims being his lost sister, and asks whether she could live with him, because he is the only true family she has. All fine, but later that day another cute girl named Karen (voiced by Ai Shimizu), knocks on Maiku's door with the exact same photo and story.

Now it starts to get complicated. Which one is the relative, and which one is the stranger? Out of choices, Maiku decides to let them both stay in his house, since one of them might be his lost relative. Maiku decided he must not abandon his relatives.

Note that the characters I have mentioned so far, somehow chose to believe that there's only one relative. The photo doesn't imply that. It is possible that both are his sisters - the other might have not been photographed by coincidence. Both girls appearing on the same day, maybe a result of having the same birthday (they don't seem to compare each other's birthdays, so they might not know).

Characters

Besides the 3 main character, this Anime contains some additional characters from Maiku's school. It makes this Anime much more fun with those secondary characters, so I'll describe them too.

• Kamishiro Maiku

  Maiku gives an impression of a serious, self-controlled guy. He rides a scooter (which is untypical for the main character in this kind of Anime - it indicates self-control and some level of maturity). He likes his two sisters, and would like them to stay. He handles embarrassing situations in the house properly (a guy lives with girls, Anime, of course these situations would happen). Even though he might not realize, the girls in the school like him a lot, especially Oribe Tsubaki. He is a programmer. For a few short scenes, you would see actual C++ code snippets on his computer screen - and this is cool, because it means the creators of the series are actually geeks like the anticipated audience. He is quite protective over his computer and doesn't let the girls touch it.

• Miyafuji Miina

  The first lost twin sister. A cute red-head girl, She has no apparent qualities except that she can cook. Though she could be a bit annoying and obnoxious. She begged Maiku to let her stay because she has no other place to go and she has no other family.

• Onodera Karen

  The second lost twin sister. A cute green-haired girl, She's the quiet, introverted type, and unlike Miina she can't cook, so she helps around with cleaning. She hopes deeply that she is the girl from the photo.

• Oribe Tsubaki

  Maiku's senpai, a girl from school who is a year ahead of Maiku. Student's council vice president. A tall, very attractive dark-green long haired girl, who wears glasses. She looks like the geek girl of choice for Maiku, and she can be described as the perfect girlfriend type. Maiku respects her, naming her senpai. She has a crush on him and he doesn't realize, of course. Lucky bastard...

• Ichigo Morino

  Another girl from Maiku's school. A short, brown haired girl, looks like a 14 years old who is exhibiting late puberty. She is the student's council president. She is also the original Ichigo Morino character from Onegai Teacher. But the thing that's striking me here is that she doesn't really act much like herself from Onegai Teacher. In this series she behaves rather suspiciously and deviously. She makes low-voiced remarks with some sick 'huhuhuu' chuckled evilly with them. She'd like to bring Tsubaki and Maiku together.

• Kousei Shimazaki

  A gay classmate of Maiku who obviously has a crush on Maiku. It looks like the creators of the series gone extreme with the "everybody loves the main character" Anime tradition... Maiku consistently rejects Shimazaki's love expressing moves. The other girls in the school mistake Maiku and Shimazaki as a hot gay couple.

Music

The opening OST, a single named Second Flight by Kotoko and Hiromi Sato, is a very excellent piece of a good modern mix between pop/rock/techno/piano. Surely a must hear. 10 out of 10, for the jpop lovers. The single was released on August 27, 2003.

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