Anime: Demi-chan wa Kataritai

The basic premise of this show is extremely simplistic. It takes place in an alternative present where "Ajin" (Demi-humans / "Demis") are known to exist and have been known to exist for a while. The show focuses on a vampire, a dullahan, a yuki onna (snow woman), and a succubus. The first three are all freshmen starting high school. The succubus is a new teacher. As accepted members of society, this show's entire premise is Takahashi-sensei interviewing and interacting with these "demis", helping them acclimate to normal society and come to terms with the things that make them different. Every episode is light-hearted, heart warming, and extremely insightful, exploring the "real world" aspects of these demis' various abilities.

Basic premise included, this show is... just one notch short of absolutely brilliant for its storytelling, insightfulness, heartwarming ambiance, and genuine presence of character for all the demis who are, naturally, all girls and all incredibly cute. Takahashi is a young male biology teacher who has long wished to interview demis. With four demis entering school, his circumstances are a dream come true. But aside from being a fan of demis, Takahashi-sensei isn't a creep. He's a teacher. He treats his students with respect, and speaks to them honestly. Relationships of mutual respect are formed, and within that container, there is plenty of room for amusing antics and frank discussions. As a character-driven show, the personalities of the cast all shine through, each one unique in their own way, but making for an interesting group of friends.

Hikari, the vampire, is a bright and bubbly girl, whose energetic nature makes her a perfect driver of antics. She's a little ditzy, but a far cry from being stupid or dense. She's enthusiastic about telling Takahashi about vampires, and is the perfect catalyst to get things rolling. Youko (Machi), the dullahan, is more quiet with an air of maturity, but she has trouble connecting with other people because of the awkwardness of always carrying her head around with her. Yuki, the Yuki Onna, is probably the least convincing character. She suffers from a certain lack of self esteem stemming from her fear that her 'radiated cold' would be off-putting to other people. Sakie (Satou-sensei), the new math teacher, walks around dressed in a tightly closed tracksuit and maintains a minimum distance from all males because of her body's radiated aphrodisiac effect. She comes across at times as a relatively dorky character, but that's because she's trying to mask her appeal so as not to draw males' attention to herself.

Nothing I say about this show will adequately portray how much of a real delight every episode of this show is. I looked forward to seeing it every week, and that was after keeping current with the manga and already knowing what was coming. And on that note, this show did a good job of keeping true to the content of the manga. A few of the latter-middle episodes included some filler scenes which were pretty much duds, but they were necessary to pace the season's end. At the time I'm writing this review, I don't know whether episodes 11 or 12 are even part of the manga... But they're both extremely well done, providing a neat open-ended end-cap to the show. Although I would absolutely love to see this show continued into a second season, it would likely be 2 years or more before there was enough content in the manga to continue it without bogging it down with fillers.

Level of Taboo/Ecchi/Fanservice: This show is pretty much squeaky-clean when it comes to the high school girls, but it takes advantage of Sakie's age and the fact that she's a succubus to portray some 'ero'-esque scenes. Sakie's breasts jiggle and there's a shower scene or two, though there's nothing worth censoring in the scenes. In discussions, the concepts of 'ecchi' and 'sex' are discussed on some basic level. Otherwise, pretty clean.

Intended Audience: As I just said above, Sakie's particular character traits are taken advantage of on occasion, so I'd say this show is probably best suited for 16+. It's listed here on AniDB as 'seinen', and I suppose I can agree with that, though I don't see any reason why a female audience would be put off by this show. Its core theme is 'abnormal girls' fitting into 'normal society', which is honestly a theme that girls may find of value, perhaps even more-so than guys.

Art & Animation - 8 - Although nothing particularly special, I find that the backgrounds are relatively well detailed and the character design is adorable. Unlike most anime, I don't see this show suffering as much from low-fps or lack of 'in-between framing'. Everything seems pretty smooth, pretty soft, and relatively well directed.
Sound - 7 - Always a difficult subject for me to judge. I rarely notice sound unless there's a problem with it. But I will say that both the OP and ED are nice and fitting to the show. The background music is relatively quiet, but it does help to support the ambiance even if it is a little generic.
Story - 9 - Solidly so. Although the premise is simplistic and the plot is mostly just situational character-driven antics, the bullet-list of events per episode is interesting, as is the scripting. With the exception of some filler scenes in the latter-half, which were glaringly flat to me (and obvious since I knew what scenes weren't in the manga), every episode was a delight, both heart-warming and playful. Not just girls-being-girls, though there is a fair share of that in the show. Situational comedy with warm-fuzzy scenes and even emotional scenes where appropriate. Everything is well-thought-out and very few situations are 'template' because the characters themselves aren't template.
Character(s) - 9 - The only reason I didn't give this section a 10 is because some of the scenes do fall flat and the voice acting can't entirely resurrect it. Yes, I'm referring to the fillers. That said, everything that sticks to the manga's script is delightful and the voice acting is excellent. All of the characters are believable, which is astonishing since four of the five main cast are fantasy with fantasy problems.
Value - 10 - Not only is this show extremely well done, extremely insightful, and a lot of fun to watch, but it's also a well-needed variant of the 'monster girls' theme recently popular in anime. Instead of hyper-sexualizing the 'monster girls' into ecchi like Monster Musume or making them... almost just a novelty... like the dullahan in Durara, Demi-chan wa Kataritai makes the effort of tackling the 'real' aspects of these 'fantasy characters' head on, and it does so brilliantly.
Enjoyment - 10 - I'm not sure what else to say. One can only glow so much while talking about a show before people start to wonder what sorts of drugs are involved. Inevitably, there are people who won't be as impressed with this show as I am. But whatever. I don't mind being impressed by things that are impressive, and I genuinely looked forward to this show airing every week. Although the couple of filler scenes fell flat, the scenes that kept to the manga were excellent. This was a show I could watch and relax, yet it also made me think a lot about the demis and their natures. Anyone that reads the associated Comments thread on the forum with this show will know that there were several aspects that gave me pause and even made me question just how open-minded I am.

Conclusion - 9 - Deservedly so. I could understand other people giving this show an 8 because of various technical aspects, but the nature of the show itself was particularly appealing to me on several different levels. I regard it as a breath of fresh air, and I would wholeheartedly welcome a second season, although not unless there were enough manga content to support it. This show's biggest failing was its occasional fillers at the end.