The Spring 2026 Anime Preview Guide

Go For It, Nakamura-kun!!

Nakamura is a shy boy who falls in love at first sight with one of his classmates–his dreamy high school classmate, Hirose. But there's a problem: they haven't met yet. And Nakamura is a total klutz who might bungle things before they even begin.

Go For It, Nakamura-kun!! is based on the manga series by Syundei. The anime series is streaming on Crunchyroll on Wednesdays.

No, Go for It, Nakamura! isn't based on a manga from the '80s or '90s, but it sure does feel that way, doesn't it? The original manga dates to 2017, but everything about it is calculated to give it that rosy glow of nostalgia, and honestly, I think it works without feeling gimmicky. Granted, I think it works better in the manga (the ending theme's retro sound is a bit much), but there's just something reassuring about its old-fashioned look and plotting. It's charming.

It's also quite fun. I know we more typically talk about disaster lesbians, but Nakamura is his own brand of queer catastrophe. Desperately crushing on his classmate Hirose, Nakamura is completely inept when it comes to interacting with the other boy. He makes meticulous plans in his head, writes entire virtual scripts for every encounter, and then when it comes down to it, he crashes and burns spectacularly. The scene where he so desperately wants to be the one to hand Hirose back his dropped handkerchief, only to end up stomping on it like it's a poisonous spider, is amazing – it perfectly captures both his mental state and his ineptitude in a way that feels relatable. Who hasn't gone home and screamed into their pillow after a disastrous interaction at school?

It's not just Nakamura who's entertaining, though. In the second half of the episode, his home economics class discovers a bunch of octopuses in the sink and immediately assumes that they're meant to be ingredients for their cooking lesson. At first, everyone's freaked out by the animals themselves, but Nakamura's adoration for them (he has a pet octopus at home, because of course he does) encourages Hirose to look at them differently. The scene where a teacher comes into the room and the entire class tries to keep him from getting anywhere near their new favorite animal is a blast, because, once again, it's an exaggeration of something that feels incredibly real. (This is where I admit that we ate most of our dissected sea life when I took marine bio in high school. Lobsters are less adorable than octopuses.) It feels like one of those key growing-up moments (the realization that food was once alive), presented in a way that makes it feel fun rather than traumatic. If Go for It, Nakamura! has a great strength, it's that.

With its bright colors and animation shortcuts, this is fun to look at, although not spectacular. Nakamura himself can be a lot (he was loud even on paper), but his earnestness shines through his anxiety. This should be a charmer, especially if it follows the manga, and I'm looking forward to more.

To be frank, as a straight male, there is a lot about this anime that obviously doesn't hit me. None of the romance aimed to make me swoon as Nakamura does. I don't find the characters attractive in any way, so I don't empathise with Nakamura or the others on that level.

However, to be fair, even if Hirose were gender-swapped, this anime wouldn't interest me. It's just a conglomeration of well-worn romantic tropes with nothing new besides the fact that the main relationship is a homosexual one rather than a heterosexual one.

The main joke established in the first half of the episode is that Nakamura is too indecisive to interact with his crush, Hirose, even on a friendship level. Nakamura has all these plans in his head to be suave and sweep Hirose off his feet—yet, that's all they are. He doesn't act and, in the rare event when he does, he makes things doubly awkward.

Then, in the second half of the episode, we get a look into Nakamura's worldview. Anti-social while longing for human interaction, he protects himself by building up his ego internally—believing himself to be better than everyone else. He tells himself they're all fake while he is the only one who sees reality.

While Nakamura's personality and way of thinking are exaggerated for the sake of humor, they do feel real. They accurately reflect the feelings and thoughts of a lonely teen wanting what everyone else has but being frustrated at not being able to obtain it as easily. I wouldn't be surprised if this struck a chord with many viewers—it did with me (albeit in an nostalgically embarrassed kind of way).

However, that said, I don't find an entire series built around being awkward and indecisive entertaining. And even if Nakamura is relatable on a human level, I don't really like him as a person, nor am I rooting for his love story. It's safe to file this one under “not for me.”

Am I merely falling victim to generational pandering when I say that I adore the recent trend of projects adopting the fluffy hair and soft features of late-80s and early-90s anime? Probably, sure. That doesn't mean the pandering isn't working its magic with frightening power, though. Maybe it's because these stylistic flourishes demand a certain degree of attention and craft to pull off that so many other series lack, or maybe it's because anime really just did look better Back in My Day. Hell, I'm just going to go ahead and split the difference either way and say that both explanations are correct. The point is, Go For It, Nakamura-kun!! had me in its clutches from the get-go, thanks to how gosh-darned charming and cozy it makes me feel just to look at it.

I also can't help but root for our titular hero, Okuto Nakamura, to find his courage and get closer to his crush, Aiki. I like messy drama and steamy sex just as much as the next guy, but how often do we see a gay romance between two boys in an anime that is depicted with this much straightforward, earnest zeal? Beat for beat, the premiere of Go For It, Nakamura-kun!! would play almost identically to the typical rom-com if you just made Nakamura into a straight female protagonist, but that's honestly what makes the show feel so refreshing. The specific slices of life that Okuto and Aiki share are where the show's creativity shines the most outside of its visuals. The sequence where the boys' class struggles with octopi in home ec is an entertaining spin on the usual school-life sketches that sets the perfect bar for what every adventure in this show ought to be like. It's exceptionally cute, frequently funny, and it satisfies all of the warm-n'-fuzzy checkboxes that a good romance anime aspires to clear.

Granted, the fact that Okuto is a gay teenage boy does matter, even in the simple subtext that comes from his difficulty getting closer to Aiki, but we're not playing any of our hero's anxieties or social struggles for exploitative dramatic beats (at least, not in this premiere). The exuberantly bright tone of the show makes me think that we don't need to worry about things getting too bleak or tragic, either. Would the world in general benefit from having more incisive and honest representations of what it is like to be queer in an oppressive society? Absolutely. Will it also benefit from the addition of a colorful and joyous romantic fantasy that gives BL fans a taste of the sugary rom-com flavor that us straight folks have been eating off of silver platters for centuries? Also yes. While I have absolutely no doubt that a happy ending is waiting for these boys on the horizon, you can bet that I'll be rooting for Nakamura-kun every week, regardless. The boy needs all of the encouragement he can get.

As far back as when it was first announced over a year ago, I wondered if Go For It, Nakamura-kun!! would have enough story to sustain a full-length anime. Two volumes of light pining and crush-based shenanigans aren't a whole lot of substance. It's here for a good time, not a long time, and as endearing as I find Nakamura and his hopeless crush on Hirose, it doesn't have a complex psychological profile to dig into.

In retrospect, I should have had more faith in director Aoi Umeki, who worked hand-in-hand with writer Yasuki Aoki to create the script for this episode. Umeki's previous work on Pop Team Epic proved that he has the creative chops to deviate from the original manga, building on the existing comedy to open it up into something that flows smoothly out from the concept. Admittedly, it's been a bit since I cracked open my volume of Go for It, Nakamura! It's sitting in a box in my closet due to limited shelf space, and unfortunately, my organizational system is such that digging it out would be a task. Still, I'm reasonably sure that Nakamura's world has expanded, and it's done so seamlessly that if this episode were my entry point into the series, I would have had no idea.

Another point of anxiety for me? The lengthy delay pushed it back from 2025 to 2026. Studio DRIVE didn't have a great track record for good-looking productions, and I could only assume they were struggling to make something even halfway decent. And maybe production will fall apart later, but this first episode looked great, with expressive, dynamic character animation. They seemed to take stylistic cues from the manga cover in particular, decorating the backgrounds with bright colors and rotating flowers. It's adorable and totally appropriate for Hirose's sweetie-pie nature. The cast is wonderful as well – Chiaki Kobayashi may have experience playing gay teens, but the tone here is about as far from The Summer Hikaru Died as one can get.

People talk a lot about how Syundei is influenced by Rumiko Takahashi's '80's work, especially Ranma ½. While that's not necessarily wrong, it's hardly the whole picture. Her characters' big, puffy bangs and sweet faces have a charm all their own, and her sitcom humor bears a sweetness and modern sensibility that sets it apart from her most oft-noticed influence.