Our Home's Fox Diety

Summary: >

For generations the Takagami family ran a mountain shrine. A generation ago, a girl inherited the task of protectorate, but moved to the big city after she got married. While she passed on years ago, one of her two sons inherited her blood, strong with magic.

Spirits stir and become interested in the youngest brother Toru. A fox spirit sealed in a cave generations ago is called upon to protect the brothers in exchange for its release. For the brothers, the world has more strange spirits and creatures than they would have imagined. For a fox spirit, the world has more strange technology and tasty deserts than it would have imagined.

Thoughts: >

Despite the interesting supernatural concept, Our Home's Fox Deity is strangely bland. Not to say it's bad, it simply fails to fully utilize features which should make it far more vibrant. On the other hand it doesn't become stupid; a trap many anime titles would fall into with such material. If you don't expect much, it's not a bad watch. But then why watch something requiring low expectations? Well, it has a few good features too.

The setup looks suspiciously harem prone, but romantic options are toned down. Two brothers are the male leads, yet not involved with either the shrine maiden or fox deity Kugen. Kugen can take human form in either gender, but strangely little is done with that. It certainly never became the gender bending comedy material I imagined. Foxes are smart and mischievous in Japanese lore, so Kugen using sex appeal to get what it wants seems logical. Noboru notices Kugen always turns into a female when asking him for something (yet he never caves). It's refreshing to have some distance between the sexes, although maybe that says more about the sad state of anime in general.

Romance isn't absent though. Sakura is a classmate with a crush on Noboru, who's over active imagination has plenty of fuel once two beautiful women move into his house (probably the only comedy element that works well). Aside from Sakura and her hilarious imagination, its unfortunate everyone else is so unremarkable. Even the fox deity.

"Unremarkable" is the problem Our Home's Fox Deity has through and through. The comedy is sometimes good, but generally flat. Characters? Mostly flat. Artwork? Characters look fair, except they all look the SAME. There's nothing to say about the rest of the show either. There appears to be depth in a magic "rock-paper-scissors" system between the elements, but it's poorly explained. As far as I could tell the anime made everything up as it went.

Stories go much the same way. Our Home's Fox Deity doesn't have a big plot. Instead it's a mix of short side stories along with a few larger ones. Some stories appear finished, only to pick up again in the next episode. This keeps things interesting since it's not clear how far most stories go, however pacing in the longer ones often feels lethargic - like they're longer just to be longer. I can't say any of the stories were memorable either. I was annoyed when it launched into a SECOND hot springs episode (seriously, no anime needs more than one), but it became my favorite story due to the shift into a fun murder mystery theme.

At first it felt like I was slogging through this one, but over time it became easier to watch. I wouldn't say it grew on me, more like I understood I wouldn't get much from the show and accepted that. Our Home's Fox Deity isn't bad, nor is it good. It sits in a middle ground which is only acceptable. With so many other titles to choose from, it's hard to recommend an anime which is only average spanning so many episodes. It's not a total waste of time if you're into the setup, but don't expect much.

Screen Caps: >