Akagami No Shirayuki-hime – Masahiro Andō ~ ☕☕☕☕☕

Hello everyone!

Today review is about an anime I wanted to see since forever and I have finally seen: Akagami No Shirayuki-hime (“Snow white with red hairs”).
This anime consists of two seasons of 12 episodes and one OVA.
The manga is composed by 17 volumes, for now.

We could say that the main reason why I have had stupidly delayed the vision was the unfortunate name of this beautiful anime. If you put “Snow white” in the title, I automatically do not want to know anything about it…
How wrong I was!
But I should probably go with order and start from the plot.

Shirayuki is a herbalist who lives peacefully in the kingdom of Tanbarun. She is a totally normal girl except for the rare colour of her hair: red as apples.
And it is precisely because of her hair that she will find herself in a series of troubles.
Indeed, Tanbarun prince, Raji Shenazard, wants her to become his concubine because of that hair. As answer, she cuts it and runs away, ending up meeting Zen, Mitsuhide and Kiki.
Immediately, Zen and Shirayuki have a strong connection and the boy decides to bring her with him at Clarines, allowing her to start a new life in safety.
From this moment forward, we follow Shirayuki’s path to become royal herbalist and all her adventures and the troubles she has because of her hair, we meet all kind of characters and we see how the relationships between characters evolve and mature.
Basically, this is the story of how a young girl finds her place in life, chases and achieves her goals and of how she meets those who will always be at her side.
Anyway, I think, it is not the plot to make this anime worth watching, but the characters and the setting.

The characters are well-developed and every single one of them – even “the silly prince Raji” – has an evolution and this is something I loved because, usually, in shoujos, the secondary characters’ evolution is left aside.
I really liked also Zen and Shirayuki’s relationship. Yes, it’s true, there are some of the usual shojo clichés, but the way their relationship is shown is particular. They give a lot of space to their knowing each other, becoming friends and so on before their relationship becomes something else.
Moreover, there are amazing secondary characters that you can’t help loving – such as Obi and Ryuu – and characters who will always surprise you.
And do we want to talk about that Shirayuki is not a girl who cries every once i a while? Who has goals? Who is determined and often tries to “save herself” by her own?
I will not say anything else because I do not want to deprive you of the pleasure to discover everything by yourself.

The setting… Why did I mention that?
This is not a “high school shoujo”, it is set in undefined past time with princes, knights and a lot more that make this anime less… Banal, let’s admit it. I usually enjoy scholastic animes but only because they really make me laugh, given the amount of clichés, instead I have loved Akagami no Shirayuki-hime precisely because it was not predictable, banal and, above all, because it does not focus exclusively on the love story between the protagonists.
All of this depends, indeed, by the chosen setting, in my opinion.

To sum up, I strongly recommend this anime and ask you to at least give it a try and see the first episode.
At the bottom, we all know that, after seeing the first episode, you will devour the series.

Enjoy!