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Saekano: How to Raise a Boring Girlfriend
Episode 3

by Theron Martin,

Throughout the first two regular episodes Tomoya has been portrayed as a young man with great ambition but a much more limited ability to realize it. In this episode that shortcoming rises to bite him in the ass.

Due to his lackluster performance in earlier attempts, Utaha has given Tomoya until the end of Golden Week (which is just beginning as the episode starts) to work out a proper proposal for what, exactly, he wants to do with his dating sim. Because he cannot pin down a good idea, however, he procrastinates in between phone conversations with Megumi (who is on a family vacation) and soon whiles away most of the week. Visits from Eriri (who is ostensibly seeking a place to concentrate on illustrations for her own upcoming deadline) and Utaha (who has ostensibly come to share cake) both firm up his resolve despite their efforts to convince him that he's really not cut out for this, but he is still stuck for ideas. Coming to his rescue is Megumi, who returns early from her vacation out of concern over Tomoya and, with coaching from both Eriri and Utaha, tailors herself as much as possible to Tomoya's tastes to serve as his inspiration. Though it works, that doesn't necessarily mean that he has gotten any better.

As someone who has written reviews for a decade now and been peripherally involved in game design (i.e., writing adventures for tabletop RPGs) for a decade before that, I can very much sympathize with Tomoya's plight. When the creative bug just isn't in you at a given time, buckling down to work on a project is really, really hard, and I have wasted many a day just like Tomoya has during that process. That the series is going to such pains to carefully and realistically portray things like that – even if played for comedy – suggests that the story is going to actually take the game creation aspect of its story seriously rather than just using it as a framing device for its harem antics.

As another pleasant surprise, this episode also makes clear one point suggested by the previous episode: that the focus on character development is going to remain throughout. While hardly deeply nuanced, Eriri and Utaha are not just (purely) standard harem archetypes. They may be clearly in love with Tomoya, but they are not about to sacrifice their professional dignity just to pander to him and are doing everything possible to keep him honest in his creative process. They also are not so moony-eyed that they cannot acknowledge that helping another girl appeal to Tomoya is the best thing for him under the circumstances; Megumi is, after all, his muse as well as his heroine. Tomoya, meanwhile, continues to show more character than your typical male harem lead and Megumi continues to be a delight with her dry, off-the-cuff commentary over Tomoya's words and actions. (“You have to let me go by 6 instead of 7 because girls take longer to get ready in the morning.” Situationally, this line is golden because of the multilayered implications it offers about where Megumi's priorities lie.)

As with episode 2, this one offers virtually no fan service beyond an occasional camera angle which seems to emphasize Megumi's chest. It does, however, offer numerous sightings of anime-related paraphernalia (Tomoya is apparently a big collected of Nendroids), with Date A Live clearly showing up amongst others previously sighted. Most impressive artistically is the three-dimensional feel of Tomoya's “otaku paradise” of a room; it is easily to overlook the fact that we actually see his figure display shelves from both the front and back during the episode, for instance. The practice of rendering certain scenes with different-colored outlining continues and seems to be done for subtle emphasis, as does an occasional metafictional comment and the odd fascination the art has with stocking-clad legs. Sadly, the artistry does seem to drop off a bit at times for the foreground art.

If you can ignore episode 0, Saekano is looking more and more like a harem series made with those who don't normally like harem series in mind. And that's not at all a bad thing.

Rating: B+

Saekano: How to Raise a Boring Girlfriend is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.


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