Anime based on visual novels aren’t new. Many popular series were based off of visual novels, like Fate/Stay Night and Clannad. Love, Election and Chocolate is one such Anime that is adapted from a visual novel. With this visual novel being a dating-sim, you can view this Anime as a harem of sorts. Although, I wouldn’t classify this as your traditional harem since the hero inevitably ends up with someone in the end. So I would label this more romantic comedy.

Love, Election, and Chocolate

Publisher: Sentai Filmworks

Genre: Comedy/Romance

Media: Blu-ray (Also available on DVD)

Language: Japanese w/ English subtitles

The setting for Love, Election and Chocolate takes place in a high school that’s currently undergoing the process of choosing a new Student Council President. One of the candidates (and overall favorite) in the running is Satsuki Shinonome and once she reveals her intent on cutting certain school clubs in order to save money, that’s where our main character comes into play. Yuki Ojima is a member of the Food Research Club, a club that mainly just spends their club budget on buying snacks and enjoying them. When news that their club could possibly be disbanded once a new council president is chosen, Yuki finds himself joining the race to become president in order to prevent the club’s end. What transpires is a romantic comedy with a side of politics.

The Good: Surprisingly, the political portions of the story is what mainly kept me interested, since the student council elections bring up interesting issues like the campaigning process and some of the dark and scandalous dealings that come about. The romantic portions still take center stage and the varied female cast makes for some enjoyable scenarios that were also a joy to watch. I found the pacing for the series to be done well too for each of the female leads. I never felt like one female got too much spotlight time, although it is a bit easy to tell which female is the central focus when you start reaching into the later episodes. It’s not only just the interactions between the main character and the females either, as the various supporting characters that are featured along the way help bring more life and entertainment to things.

The Bad: Speaking more on the pacing, I also had one dislike with it. With this being a 12-episode series (with one OVA), certain story arcs felt rushed and kind of ignored. For example, certain moments with characters would happen, and then the story would just move on without exactly expanding on it. This may be due to the fact that this is based on a dating-sim, so a certain character route is being followed. So the need to expand and provide closure on character arcs probably isn’t the goal for every female. I also felt this with the last couple episodes and ending. You can feel that things are quickly wrapping up and getting resolved, and then when the ending occurs, I couldn’t help but feel like it all happened a bit too fast causing some parts to be skipped a bit. Luckily, the extra OVA episode shows a brief glimpse into some post-ending stuff. Perhaps if the series were a few more episodes longer, then some plotlines could afford to be expanded upon.

My last dislike is more of a personal preference with physical anime releases than an actual knock on the series. Love, Election and Chocolate is currently available for streaming on Hulu and TheAnimeNetwork, though only 12 episodes are available and not the OVA (13th episode). A physical edition is also available for purchase at several sites that sell Anime, like Amazon or Rightstuf. While the OVA is included in the physical version, the rest of the package is a bit lackluster. No inserts inside the box, just the cover art and two discs. In terms of extra content, you’ll find the usual textless openings and endings with a few trailers. I found this kind of disappointing, and even more so since it’s just Blu-ray or DVD, instead of a package with both versions. Also, this is a Japanese language only release, so no English dub is available.

Final Thoughts: I found Love, Election and Chocolate to be a pleasant surprise. While some portions can be a bit cliche, I found the series to be quite interesting mainly due to the political setting of the story. The male lead was likable and his interactions with each of the females were very enjoyable. Only real dislike I had with the series was that the last few portions of the show felt a bit rushed and I would have liked to have seen some story plots be expanded further. In the end, I found Love, Election and Chocolate to be entertaining and would recommend it for those who enjoy romantic comedies. For those interested, I would recommend just streaming the show and watching it that way since the physical version is a bit lacking. However, the OVA was a nice treat so if you’re fine with the lack of extra contents, then go ahead and pick up a physical copy. Otaku Dome gives Love, Election and Chocolate a 75 out of 100.

*Screens are from the first episode of the series.