There are many things that a butler must have for his qualifications. Unwavering loyalty to their master, utmost rationality with every decision, mastery of combat skills to protect who they serve, and the looks that can pass for the beauty of a cat maid. Ayasaki Hayate can do almost all of that, with the cat ears and tail to boot. With a more-than-quirky plotline, and a group of more-than-normal character, despite the lackluster animation and music,
Hayate no Gotoku is one series anyone can have a good time watching.
*Japanese names in this review are written surname-first*
The story centers on Ayasaki Hayate, a poor teenage guy unluckily born to an unemployed dad and gamble-happy mom. He ends up shouldering the debt of his parents from the yakuza which he plans to pay by kidnapping a girl for ransom. He fails to carry-on with his plan and instead saves her when she literally gets kidnapped a few moments later. The girl, Sanzenin Nagi, mistakes everything from their first encounter to her rescue as a show of Hayate’s affection for her and falls in love with him immediately. To save him from his debt, he “buys” him from the yakuza and entitles him a life of service as her butler, and Hayate is quite grateful about being given new life and purpose in the Sanzenin mansion.
At first, the story progression looks substantial. The shoujo theme is evident on the very first episode and it is not too heavy or scant on the hearts and flowers. Then, the comedy strikes. Not to say that it is bad to make a joke episode but gag episodes come up too often for the true story to be allowed to progress properly. Despite that due to Hayate’s aloof personality, the romance often collides with the comedy in the actual storyline and is an overall nice experience especially since Nagi can be very expressive with her complete displeasure about it.
Many of the characters in the story are very expressive and this leads to very interesting scenarios, such as Hayate and Nagi misunderstanding what each other say during their conversations and Maria the maid shaking her head in empathy for the both of them. But with so many characters, sometimes the focus of a full episode ends up shifting away from Hayate and towards the daily life of the others to further flesh out the timeline of the story. It is not a bad idea to do so, but this also adds to the slow progression of the main storyline.
The visual quality is actually not that bad since moe eyes, light skin and near-circular faces are standard but when the fanservice escalates to very high levels of skin exposure, the pre-anime reminder to sit not too near from the television comes back to mind. Since the conversations tend to become extremely expressive whenever Hayate is around, the voice-acting is not that bad and can actually be moving at times. But when it comes to the musicality, the opening and the ending song do not come up as memorable. They do have a shoujo theme going on for them, but think about the anime, the scenes predominate most everything else that can be remembered about it.
Hayate no Gotoku may not be something that everyone will consider recommending right off the bat (except for the harem or fanservice, maybe), but it is actually fun to watch for the majority of the series. Hayate is multi-talented when it comes to housework and self-defense techniques and does not look bad in a dress or three. Nagi does get into danger many times wherein Hayate comes in swiftly to save her, just like a combat butler would. And the romance is never lacking, whether it be between Hayate and Nagi or not.
Rating: 7.75/10
Warnings: skin fanservice
Written by Moe