Aoi House Vol. #02

By Matthew Alexander     December 20, 2006
Release Date: November 01, 2006



Creative Talent
Writer/Artist:Story by Adam Arnold / Art by Shiei
Translated by:
Adapted by:

What They Say
Having narrowly lost the Dance Dance Revolution showdown for control of Aoi House, Alex finds himself in over his head as he's forced to endure an awkward date with club founder and resident transvestite Carlo. Also contains the side-story "Fruit Cake Fantasy" and a special Christmas story.

The Review
Cute girls, yaoi, cosplay, and two poor fanboys caught in the middle. Well things aren't all bad for our fanboys Sandy and Alex, I mean they do live with five cute college girls after all. Now if Alex can just survive his date with a transvestite . . .

The harem comedic hijinks kick up a notch with this volume when Alex and Sandy discover they have a secret weapon against the yaoi obsessed girls of Aoi House. It turns out that Alex is rather good looking when his long hair is allowed to rustle in the wind, outside of the normal ponytail he wears. For some reason, the girls fall under a bishie spell and treat Alex as their master. So as any self-respecting fanboy would, Alex has the girls cooking and wearing sexy outfits for him. The question is, how long can this harem goodness really last? Well, I say push it for as far and long as you can until it blows up in your face.

The plentiful anime/manga/game related jokes also continue in this volume as the Aoi House decides to make an amateur movie for an upcoming con, grand prize a PS 3. The movie is really funny as it begins spoofing Revolutionary Girl Utena and then rolls into a Final Fantasy storyline after Elle refuses to kiss Nina. There is also a metric ton of other genre related jokes along the way and I have to admit there were even a few I had to strain my brain to figure out. This is all very entertaining, but to prove this story is more than just spooferific, the author begins to show a developing love triangle between Alex, Elle, and Morgan. Elle thinks she might like Alex, but Morgan has no doubts that she's in love with him, but who does Alex like? Nina is low key and good for a booby flash every now and then, Jessica is super hot but some how seems like trouble, Maria is stacked but she's really shy, Elle is a cute but uber crazy rich bitch, and Morgan is cute in a sugar-high hyper little sister kind of way. Well, I say good luck Alex! I don't even know which direction I would look if I were in his shoes, but I look forward to finding out how things progress.