DearS: Is It a Golden Ball?
金の玉ですの？ (DearS: Kin no Tama desu no?)
- Comedy
- Ecchi
- Romance
- Sci-Fi
- Harem
- Episodes
- 1
- Duration
- 23 min
- Aired
- Mar 16, 2005
- Status
- Finished Airing
Synopsis
Miu hits the jackpot at a local shopping district raffle, landing the top prize: a complimentary trip for up to four people to Yuniataru Studio, a spa resort.
With her grandparents unable to make it, she invites Takeya, Ren, and Neneko to join her for the getaway.
Otaku Consensus
DearS: Is It a Golden Ball? works best as a concentrated 2005 ecchi OVA: Daume keeps the pacing brisk, the resort-special structure gives the cast immediate gag setups, and the Ren/Takeya dynamic remains the recognizable hook. The verdict is limited enthusiasm: critics and fan commentators consistently flag it as “ecchi for ecchi’s sake,” with excessive sexual content overwhelming the subtler sci-fi and servitude themes that the main DearS concept occasionally raises.
Why You Should Watch
Watch this if you want the DearS formula reduced to a single, low-commitment fanservice capsule rather than another full harem arc. It is best for viewers who enjoy early-2000s ecchi OVAs as artifacts: fast setup, bathhouse-adjacent comedy, exaggerated embarrassment, and a sci-fi excuse for relationship chaos. It scratches a nearby itch to alien-harem comedies like To Love-Ru, but with a more compact, older TV-DVD-special texture. The appeal is not narrative expansion; it is seeing Daume lean into the franchise’s most shameless impulses while the familiar Takeya/Ren contrast carries the jokes. Skip it if you need the slavery and alien-assimilation ideas treated with weight, because this special prioritizes lewd farce over thematic follow-through.
Key Characters
- TTakeya Ikuhara(VA: Kishou Taniyama)
Takeya remains the male-protagonist pressure point of DearS, with his exasperated resistance giving the harem and alien-servitude comedy its main friction.
- RRen Ren Ren Nagusaran Rensia Ruroonren Nakora(VA: Ai Shimizu)
Ren is the franchise’s signature alien presence, remembered by fans for her formal devotion, deadpan innocence, and unwieldy full name as much as for the ecchi scenarios around her.
What Makes It Stand Out
- 1
This is a one-episode special released on March 16, 2005, so it plays less like a continuation arc and more like a self-contained ecchi side dish for existing DearS viewers.
- 2
Daume’s handling emphasizes quick harem-farce staging over sci-fi worldbuilding, using the special format to foreground reactions, embarrassment, and fanservice escalation.
- 3
The staff credits give the OVA more pedigree than its throwaway reputation suggests: Tomoki Hasegawa is credited for music, Hiromi Kikuta for sound direction, and Aki Hata for theme song lyrics.
- 4
AniList’s tag profile is unusually revealing: Female Harem, Aliens, and Slavery each sit at 79%, capturing the exact tension between light comedy packaging and the franchise’s more uncomfortable premise.
- 5
Its reception sits in the cult-curiosity zone rather than broad acclaim, with a 6.77 MAL score from 14,923 votes and a 62/100 AniList score, while online reviewers most often criticize the sexual content as excessive.
Fun Facts & Trivia
- Fun fact 1
- The original creator credit goes to PEACH-PIT, the manga-creator duo behind the DearS source material, making this special part of the same authorial franchise rather than a disconnected parody short.
- Fun fact 2
- Aki Hata is credited for the theme song lyrics, a notable name for anime music fans because her lyric work became closely associated with major anime idol and character-song culture.
- Fun fact 3
- A 2012 YouTube commentary by ShadowACS drew over 48,000 views and framed the anime in sharply negative terms, calling it “awful,” which reflects how DearS became a frequent target for ecchi-era criticism.
- Fun fact 4
- RishRaff Anime Reviews summarized the broader critical complaint neatly: the series is “primarily an ecchi for ecchi sake,” while still acknowledging that attentive viewers can catch a few subtler themes underneath.
- Fun fact 5
- Despite being only a single episode, the special has far more MAL voter data than many OVAs of its type, with 14,923 recorded votes, showing that DearS retained a visible niche audience after its TV run.
Studios
- Daume
