Chobits

Of all the anime my friend has lent me, this might be my favorite thus far or at least on par with Gunslinger Girl. Chobits is the story of Hideki Motosuwa, who moves to the big city to attend cram school in the hopes of getting into the college of his choice. While there, he notices that everyone has a personal computer assistant, or Persocom. Persocoms look, act, and are treated almost as people in their own right. As chance would have it, Hideki finds a "broken" Persocom just lying in the trash. When he starts her up, all she is able to do is mimic Hideki's movements and say, "Chii." So that's what he calls her. Hideki asks around trying to find out everything he can can about Chii and in the process discovers that she may or may not be one of the greatest Persocoms ever made - a truly artificial intelligence known as a Chobit.

Chobits is a charming series which portrays, weirdly enough, a touching relationship between man and his computer. The show is ranges from incredibly hilarious to constantly amusing. This mostly comes from the extremely likable cast of characters. Hideki is a fish out of water character. He is shy around girls, kind and considerate, and lacks common sense...oh and he's a virgin, which everybody won't let him forget. Chii's role in the story is mostly to be adorable as all hell. At first she just does a lot of endearing things like mimic Hideki's actions and act innocent at the most inappropriate times, but eventually, her own will and personality start to come across as she becomes a more of stronger character in her own right. The rest of the cast are all highly memorable and have fantastic backgrounds. They also provide subplots which are not only emotional in their own right, but feed meaningfully into the central plot as well.

Not only is the show funny, but Chobits delivers an interesting social commentary on the relationship between humans and machines. Watching Chii stumble adorably through certain situations with hilarious consequences left me feeling warm and cheerful. However, later, as the series introduced the more serious subplots, I found myself somewhat intrigued as to how the main plot would pan out. I am unsure whether I agree with the possibilities opened up by the story, although I appreciate how important these issues are for the characters. At the least I can take this as a sign of the series complexity. The one weak point is that the show is based adapted from a manga series and while almost everything from the manga is included, some important information is either too simplified or not answered. Overall, Chobits is enjoyable, has characters that are interesting, and it's pretty damn funny.