lot of romantic-comedy anime focuses on shy, nerdy boys living in wish-fulfillment fantasy situations, surrounded by girls who are competing for their affections. But Mahoromatic: Automatic Maiden sets a new standard of competition for this particular breed of fantasy. Its star, Suguru Misato, is an orphan living alone in his family's huge home. Naturally, he's not very good at cooking or cleaning up after himself, and the house is a disaster area. So he decides to hire a maid.
Enter Mahoro, a pretty young girl who also happens to be a deadly, super-powered, top-of-the-line combat android. Mahoro was built by a group named Vesper to help fight off an alien invasion, and she's distinguished herself in battle so often and so well that Vesper is offering her a form of retirement. If she continues to fight the aliens, her artificial body will wear out in about a month, but by entering a low-key civilian job, she can extend her lifespan to over a year. At first she seems hesitant to leave the fray, but at last she admits that she does have a wish she'd like to fulfill.
That wish seems to include taking care of Suguru, cleaning up his messes, waiting on him hand and foot and even bathing him. While Suguru is naturally shy the first time Mahoro climbs naked into his tub, he seems to get used to this particular perk pretty quickly, but he does try to hide Mahoro's beauty and her strange quirks from his classmates. They soon find out nonetheless, and while Suguru's male associates try to make time with his new maid, his female classmates are either jealous, mildly curious or just willing to take advantage of Mahoro's cooking skills. Unfortunately, the hugely endowed teacher Ms. Saori lusts after Suguru, and loses no opportunity to climb into his bath herself, or just to mock Mahoro's small breasts. With naked women on every side, his own private home, a bevy of eager new friends and a super-skilled live-in maid, Suguru has a more ideal life than any sensible, down-to-earth boy could ever even dream of.
Brings new meaning to the world "titillating"
Mahoromatic is an acquired taste that some folks won't care to acquire. It's got its action and drama—the opening sequence, which features Mahoro in gritty battle against alien monsters, is particularly breath-catching—but for the most part, it's a typical teen-romance comedy that goes way over the top without even noticing, then heads skyward from there. Ms. Saori in particular is almost too freaky even for low comedy: At the point where she dons a barely-visible bathing suit and aggressively humps Suguru in public, prattling about how his small-breasted maid must leave him sexually unsatisfied, the effect is more creepy than alluring or silly. Some fan-service shows tease viewers with innuendo and vague or implied nudity, but Mahoromatic whips out the naked breasts at every opportunity, then discusses them graphically and obsessively.
Of course, there's more to Mahoromatic than sex, though everything else has to slide in around the edges. There's a fairly typical romantic overplot between Mahoro and Suguru, whose relationship resembles the central dynamic of Oh My Goddess. Lurking in the background is a solidly science-fiction alien-invasion story, which just seems like a convenient setup until episode 3, which explains Mahoro's strange devotion to Suguru in shocking terms having to do directly with her combat-oriented past. And of course there's the drama of Mahoro's ticking biological clock; every episode ends with a reminder of how little time she has left.
In its galloping mixture of overwrought breast gags, splashy visual jokes, sudden sweet moments, romantic tropes and looming, surprisingly serious alien threats, Mahoromatic actually bears its strongest resemblance to the ever-unpredictable Magic User's Club. Ms. Saori and manga queen Mizuha Miyama, whose comically massive breasts loomed over Club's opening credits like a dire portent of doom, are not only clearly cut from the same cloth, they probably shop at the same Victoria's Secret outlet. Granted, Mahoro has more brains and more inherent competence than Club's bubble-brained star Sae Sawanoguchi, and Suguru's marginally more together than Club's easily distracted hero Takeo, but their relationships and their milieu—one equally packed with death-wielding aliens and pheromone-wielding sex queens—parallel neatly. Club fans may finally have found another series that's varied enough for them, but drama fans are likely to roll their eyes and get back to the latest installment of Arjuna.
Mahoromatic's goofy visual sense of humor, in which words and question marks periodically fly out of people's heads to indicate emotions, would also be right at home in Magic User's Club-land.
— Tasha
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