Home >> Anime >> Ai Yori Aoshi

Genre: Romantic comedy
Author: Kou Fumizuki
Publisher: Hakusensha
Other: publishers:
Grupo Editorial Vid
Daiwon CI
Norma Editorial
Ever Glory
Sakura Press

Demographic Seinen
Magazine Young Animal
Original run 1998 – 2005
Volumes 17 (List of volumes)
TV anime
Director Masami Shimoda
Studio J.C.Staff
Licensor Geneon
Network Fuji TV
Other networks:
Anione

Original run April 11, 2002 – September 26, 2002
Episodes 24 (List of episodes)
TV anime
Ai Yori Aoshi: Enishi
Director Masami Shimoda
Studio J.C.Staff
Licensor: Geneon
Network : Fuji TV
Original: run October 13, 2003 – December 29, 2003
Episodes: 12 (List of episodes)
Original: video animation
Ai Yori Aoshi: Enishi X-mas Special
Director Masami Shimoda
Studio: J.C.Staff
Licensor: Geneon
Episodes: 1 (List of episodes)

Story introduction:
Kaoru Hanabishi appears to be an average university student, but in actually, he's the eldest son of Yuji Hanabishi, the head of the Hanabishi Zaibatsu, and was set to take over the zaibatsu after his father retired. His mother, Kumi Honjō, and his father never married, making life difficult for both him and his mother. Kaoru's father died when he was five years old. Since then, Yūji's grandfather, Gen'ichiro Hanabishi, took Kaoru under his wing and began educating him for the eventual succession. Yet Kaoru never felt at home in the Hanabishi family and left to live alone in self-imposed exile after his mother died. Day by day he felt alone, thinking that he was living life with no reason pushing him on.

There was, however, a person who loved Kaoru so much that she had do whatever was necessary to be with him.

Her name is Aoi Sakuraba. Aoi is the only daughter of the owner of the Sakuraba Kimono (Dry Goods in the manga) Store (later renamed to Sakuraba Department Store). Kaoru's family and Aoi's family had accepted for Kaoru to marry Aoi, but after Kaoru walked out, the marriage was canceled. Both families had a friendly relationship and Aoi had been in love with Kaoru from the start, which Kaoru was unaware of. The Sakuraba family had already been searching for someone suitable, but Aoi was unwilling to marry someone else and walked out, chasing Kaoru.

Both were freed from their families' affairs, but did not know how to make their living. Miyabi Kagurazaki, who had been looking out for Aoi, offered the two a way. Aoi and Miyabi would live together in a grand western style summer house owned by the Sakuraba family and Kaoru would live in a house for servants next to it. This would prevent a scandal, much like the one that had made Kaoru's life difficult, as the two would be living separately. But soon, Kaoru's friends, who just happen to be attractive females, took residence in the house, and it quickly became a dormitory. Very soon, Aoi became a landlady of the dormitory.

The first season of the anime ends when Aoi's father decides to arrange her marriage with another man, but she refuses, and is confined. She manages to escape with the help of Miyabi and Aoi spends a day together with Kaoru. Rather than doing what Miyabi expects and eloping, they confront her father the next day and manage to get her father to accept their relationship. Kaoru's best point in his argument with Aoi's father is the fact that, after having lost his family and enduring the pain of that loss, he does not wish to see the same thing happen to Aoi. Her father grudgingly accepts Aoi's choice in order to maintain his relationship with his daughter. In contrast, the manga does not have Kaoru going to meet Aoi's father until the final storyline. Instead, it goes into the plot of Kaoru coming to terms with his painful past by confronting the Hanabishis. The final storyline of the manga involves Karou's half brother attempting to gain control of the Hanabishi Zaibatsu by marrying Aoi.

A best effort to map the story elements of the anime to the manga shows that the anime covers between one and two years in the lives of the characters, while the manga covers 4 years of their life.