Yuuto goes to a secret boy's school called the St. Alphonse Gakuin. There, he makes five (bishounen) friends, each of which seem to be the princes or royalty of rather unknown or marginal areas. Each episode, a character sings a rather interesting song, however, the plot is rather weak. There's a lot of eyecandy, and despite it's weak delivery, it's a bit amusing to watch.
~AnimeNewsNetwork.com
Since there were no real reviews to this, I decided to go ahead and do one since I've just finished the series. First of all, I will say that there really isn't any yaoi in this, nor really any shonen ai. At most, the boys joke about being in love with Yuuta's sister.. Anyhow. You must also know that this series features random singing in EVERY episode. Now, I'm not saying the songs are bad..but if you don't like anime where characters bust out into musical/music-video style song during the wierdest moments..then you won't like this anime.
I will say that the characters themselves are cute, and the story is..a bit hard to put together and slow to develop. The main character would be Yuuta, an ordinary boy who is accepted into a school for other boys that come from enviable positions in society. The story shows that even those with good status can struggle just as much as the next Joe.
While romance is lacking, there is a light dose of fanservice and plenty of comedy. I myself liked the songs, and the fact that the seiyuu for Bleach's Ichigo Kurosaki plays the role of Alfred/Red and SINGS is a big bonus for me.
Alright. If you are one who fell in love with the cutting edge animation and serious emotional tension of other shounen-esque dramas like Meine Liebe [Weider] and Mirage of Blaze, this may not be your cup of tea. However, if you are looking for a cute anime with decent animation, a steady and amusing plot, and hilarious songs (yes there are songs!) then welcome to Marginal Prince!
This anime is relatively new and as of yet hasn't gotten very much attention. It is, like ML, based on a boys-love sim game and is no more than slashable. The plot is the typical "new kid comes to peculiar school causes mahem and adventure' that can be seen again and again in things like Ouran High School Host Club, Gakuen Heaven, etc, etc. You see the story through the eyes of the older sister of the main character [Yuuta] whom he communicates with via video phone. Yuuta, an average boy has been sent off to study abroad on a small island in the Atlantic that can not be found on any map. The mysterious school he enters is called St. Alphonse Gakuin (St. Alphonse Academy). The boys who study here are all "marginal princes."
Now about the singing. When I watched this anime, the last thing i ever expected was a musical but low and behold, this one has that too! In every episode, at least one of the main characters spontaneously bursts into song, musical style. The songs are pretty and once you get passed the initial shock, it becomes expectable and extremely amusing. Yuuta's songs are usually bubbly and about things going well, where as all the songs of Joshua Grant, the green haired "prince" of the academy and a descendent of its patron, are aways angsty.The songs are never unbearable even for those who hate interruptions in plot... and if you, on the contrary, love j-pop, you should see this.
The issue of Marginal Prince: bad subs. Probably because its relatively new. But seriously! In the first couple of episodes, it was misspellings (tolerable) then in the middle of the episiodes, the names spontaneously changed spelling (irksome) and then in the last couple of episodes we had a whole medley of the two and even tossed in getting the names wrong for added subbing madness! Even the songs! Some times there were subs during the songs which was fun since I knew what this person was singing about, then subs turned off and then they were just picking off and on at random till the end.
Bearing with the madhatter subs was the only true headache of the show and a good subbing would probably knock this a whole grade higher on my scale.
All in all, Marginal Prince is a good time anime, the type to relax and not have to think too much about and then laugh just because you know that at any second, someone is ging to start singing. It's comedic, it has an addictive opening song in FLAME, and the style of Toshiko Sasaki makes them all look pretty while they're having their boyband singer spiels. With lots of bishies just floating around, Marginal Prince is nice G rated eye candy. And a stress reliever if ever there was one. Definetely one to catch if you can.