Iori Kitahara is in an exciting time of life—he is about to start college and to do so, he’s moving to a sea-side town with relatives he hasn’t seen in years. And this transition won’t be a peaceful one—beautiful women, bitter cousins, very persuasive diving club members, an otaku rival, and drinking—lots of drinking—bid him welcome as he embarks on this new stage of life.

To say that I’m divided about this series is an understatement. The first episode was…well, very engaging! The series embraces college life fully, which makes the (equal-opportunity?) fan service more tolerable to me, but also strips away the naivete that we’re used to seeing in a lot of high-school aged series. There’s so much alcohol in this episode that the series gave warnings about drinking throughout (Don’t drink even though we make it seem fun), which leads to many of the opening episode’s comedic moments but not all—there were a lot of funny sight gags and one liners in episode one, and some really fun characters, especially the two beach bod diver guys and the handsome otaku dude. On the more bleh side, the protagonist is apparently going to establish a relationship with his cousin, who has a sister lusting after her as well—the latter is going to be played for laughs but the former is at the center of the series, and though I’m sure the writing will try to get us to accept that relationship, along with Iori’s character development, still, the incest stuff (directly or inferred) is no bueno for me.

Dive into Grand Blue Dreaming on Amazon Prime.

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Twwk

Husband. Dad. Occasionally Korean. Enjoys Star Wars, ASOIAF, and Meg Ryan movies. Tweets before proofreading. Ghibli. Oregairuuuuu. Jesus is King. Follow me on Twitter (@thetangles).

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