The Summer 2026 Anime Preview Guide

Rich Girl Caretaker

A high school boy, Itsuki Tomonari, becomes involved in a kidnapping and ends up caring for Hinako Konohana, a young lady from one of Japan's largest conglomerates. On the surface, Hinako seems to be a brilliant and charming girl, but in reality, she is a lazy girl with no life skills. However, due to family reasons, Hinako has to play the role of the "perfect young lady" at school. Wanting to protect her, Itsuki takes care of her very well. Eventually, Hinako begins to fawn on Itsuki with all her might… "Now…if Itsuki isn't around, I would hate it."

Rich Girl Caretaker: I’m Secretly the Caregiver of the Most Popular Girl in This Rich Kid School is based on the light novel series by author Yusaku Sakaishi and illustrator Sakura Miwabe. The anime series is streaming on Crunchyroll on Thursdays.

Rich Girl Caretaker doesn't make the best first impression. It's art is rather bland, it's hero is one of those aggressively bland “ordinary guys” who has to be noted as such in the description of the show, and nothing about the production screams of inspiration or exceptional execution. Then we get to the joke where Itsuki's parents rob him blind and ditch town with nothing but a note that says, “See ya,” which is just the kind of absurdity that a halfway-decent comedy might trade in. After that, when Itsuki gets kidnapped alongside Hinako, the cute rich-girl from the preppy school down the street, the show continues to display what a weird little freak that Hinako is. She talks like a sleepy robot about having to pee so bad she might wet her self, she drinks from a water bottle like a terrier with a motor control dysfunction disorder, and she makes the goofiest blank-eyed faces when she takes such a deep nap on Itsuki's lap that she starts to drool all over herself. This is all while the pair of them are being kidnapped by masked thugs, mind you.

So, despite its meager opening scenes, Rich Girl Caretaker has something going for it as a bizarre romantic comedy. Some of its jokes are a little too obvious, like how Hinako's maid is also a hypercompetent bodyguard with paramilitary training, but the show is never boring, which is a feat that many would-be anime comedies cannot claim. This isn't really the kind of comedy that goes for out-and-out belly laughs, though. It's more that you settle into a cozy state of vague amusement that gets you through the half-hour episode with as little friction as possible. That's not the most glowing recommendation for a comedy ever, I know, but we work with what we can.

What works more in the show's favor is the easygoing chemistry that Itsuki and Hinako share. Itsuki is just goofy enough to slide as a generic rom-com protagonist and the show gets a lot of mileage out of Hinako acting like a sleepy doofus. It's low hanging fruit, admittedly. There's nothing new about exploiting the “She's a pretty and respectable rich girl on the streets, but an embarrassingly sloppy gremlin in the sheets (that she wraps herself up in while she lazes around)” formula. Still, it's a formula that works well enough. Hinako is cute, and I wouldn't mind seeing more of her wacky misadventures.

Does this just-barely-above-the-boderline score of “Good Enough” mean that Rich Girl Caretaker has enough juice to run for an entire season? That's always the question of the hour when it comes to these breezy comedies. What makes for a decent single sitting of television often can't keep up the momentum for a dozen straight weeks. We will just have to see if the next episode of the show can deliver enough entertainment to bring the audience back for good.

The first episode of Rich Girl Caretaker was a pleasant surprise, as it managed to overcome a fairly bland aesthetic and rote introduction with a slew of decently funny gags surrounding our main characters' misadventures. This isn't the first anime to reveal that an adorable specimen of feminine grace and beauty is actually a gremlin freak that lives in a kind of Looney Tunes symbiosis with insane scenarios that reality engineers around her, but darn it, that's a bit that doesn't get old. Our hero Itsuki was only just the other day wondering how he was going to scrape together enough cash to afford enough bread to survive. Now he has to worry about, like, having to push his new car out of the way of a comically large anvil being dropped by a scheming coyote. Such is life for an anime protagonist, I suppose.

With this second episode focusing on Itsuki and Hinako's first day together at the city's fancy school for pampered rich kids, the stakes aren't quite as life-or-death as they were when the duo got kidnapped by a bunch of armed goons. On the other hand, now it is Itsuko's job is to protect Hinako's reputation as a proper young lady of high-class stock, and he already has to figure out how to survive the circling sharks of the upper-crust in his own right. As every kid who ever went through it can tell you, high school is as life-or-death as it gets.

If you liked the first episode and are concerned about my slightly lower score for this one, don't worry too much. Because of how much time we have to spend establishing the school setting and introducing some of the new side characters, this episode just isn't quite as funny and entertaining as the first. It's still a perfectly cozy sitcom fluff, so I doubt anyone will feel ripped off by spending a half-hour in the company of Itsuki and Hinako. I was just hoping for more absurdity and escalation, which we really don't get this week.

The episode does pick up a bit near the end, thanks to Itsuki and Hinako getting some alone time together in the bath while Shizune gazes on with murderous intent. It's a typical but charming joke to have Hinako be so oblivious (or at least pretend to be so oblivious) about how hard she's flirting with Itsuki, but it's still cute. Shizune gets the best joke of the whole episode when she threatens to spike Itsuki with some medicine that will shrivel up any hope he has of rising to the occasion and responding to Hinako's advances, if you catch my drift. All in all, while this episode was a comedown from the premiere, it's still a good time, and I reckon Rich Girl Caretaker is a solid choice for anyone that needs to round out their summer watchlist with a goofy romantic comedy.

*Record scratch* *freeze frame of Itsuki Tomonari handcuffed in the van* Yeah, that's me. I bet you're wondering how I got into this situation.

The premise of Rich Girl Caretaker is not unlike Himouto! Umaruchan, albeit with some variations; after some shenanigans, Itsuki gets drafted to watch over the highest-status girl at his rich school. But – get this – she's actually really lazy when no one else is watching! Oh, the incongruity! My sides ache!

Sarcasm aside, it's not a bad show. It actually did get a couple laughs out of me, especially in the first few minutes. There's a fun kind of absurdity to Itsuki and Hinako's meet-cute being the two of them getting kidnapped together, and to his initial reaction to his parents' blunt farewell note. The chuckles thinned out as the episode wore on and the primary gag of Hinako's lassitude settled in, but it was a perfectly acceptable sitcom until the last minute. Itsuki is a good kid, in an anime sitcom straight man kind of way: earnest, hardworking, and kind. Hinako is more of a cartoon character, especially considering her father see her as his struggling company's greatest asset – as he can marry her off to the highest bidder. But, with a silly comedy like this, that's just fine.

The animation, similarly, doesn't require much in the way of tricky cuts, but is fluid and attractive in what it does. The director Shūsei Morishita has only a four-item resume, and School Babysitters is his only other directorial credit. But hey, you know what was actually a really well-made anime? School Babysitters. The source material for Rich Girl Caretaker isn't as strong, but he does right by it nonetheless. The timing was what made it possible to nail the gags that did make me laugh, even if the episode as a whole didn't have a ton of snap.

Rich Girl Caretaker is the epitome of a three-star anime. It made me laugh occasionally, but the humor wasn't clever or edgy enough to set it apart. The animation is good but not showy. The premise has been done before, but they execute it well enough. I'm fine watching another episode, but I have a feeling that after that, I'll never think about the show again.

Hey, remember when comedies had jokes? That might be before some of the younguns' time, but back in my day, if you wanted to call something a comedy, you had to have some gags and punchlines in there. Alas, times have changed, and now for something to qualify as a comedy series, you just have to be a little silly with it—maybe be a bit “heartfelt” or “wholesome” or some word that doesn't actually mean anything other than “inoffensive.” Despite the first episode generating a couple laughs, it seems that Rich Girl Caretaker is a comedy for the modern era, with a dull male lead reacting to situations rather than any actual attempt at wit.

Except when the subtitles accidentally said that Itsuki was working for 20,000 yen per month instead of per day, which would put his monthly income at around $150. Whoopsie!

There's also the fact that this is almost certainly going to turn into a romantic comedy—if not a full-on harem—and Hinako's on her own isn't just clueless but troublingly juvenile. She sees nothing wrong with sniffing Itsuki and asking him for a hug, making him get in the bath with her, and refusing to eat her vegetables. How is she able to be like that while also maintaining her false persona of respectability? I understand that this is meant to be a parody of "honne" versus "tatemae," but her childishness makes it feel weirdly unsavory.

And there is the seed of something interesting here that halfway-decent writing would have been able to bring out. Hinako is desperately lonely—her closest relationship is her maid Shizune, and she has no friends because she can't be herself around her peers. The longest tenure any of her helpers had before Itsuki was a month because she's a difficult person to care for. I'm not asking to turn this “comedy” into a drama, nor am I trying to sadstuck it; just thinking about different threads Rich Girl Caretaker could pull on to make it into something.

But instead, it's nothing. The highlight is by far the angela opening, but isn't that always the case when angela does an opening?

OK, make no mistake, this is really dumb. This is some of the most contrived high school wishful fulfillment likely to air this season. But darn it, I'd be lying if I said, I didn't get some genuine laughs and some solid overall enjoyment out of it. I think a lot of that came down to the fact that, despite the fact that I have seen this premise a lot before, it still felt weirdly endearing—and the extent at which the premiere was willing to expand upon Hinako's sheer incompetency to highlight how desperately she needs a caretaker was actually very funny. I thought it was cute how she keeps clinging onto Itsuki and seems to just like his overall vibe. I think we can all relate to that idea of how there are certain friends or people that we can really let our guard down around. This is just taking that idea and elevating it to an incredibly ludicrous degree. But considering how little this show seems to be taking itself seriously, I think I can actually get behind that.

It also helps that the writing and directing is a little bit snappy. There's no long drawn out explanation or really any sign of over self-indulgence. Everyone is very direct about what's going on and I respect the episode for not wasting my time. Now, of course, with a show like this, it runs the risk of running the joke very thin, very quickly. I assume the make or break point for me personally is going to be how well can it maintain this formula, especially when the show transitions to the school setting which I imagine is going to be the main setting for the season. That has yet to be seen but if the show can keep up that level of endearing while also playing up the comedy with Hinako, then I think at the very least this could be some pretty solid junk food for the summer.

This episode is all about establishing Itsuki's new life as he assimilates into this caretaker role while also slowly introducing me to the extended cast from the opening. While I didn't think this episode was as funny as the premiere, that mostly comes down to the fact that I do think the show is at its funniest when it is just Itsuki and Hinako on screen. The two function as this nice comedic duo where Hinako is very much the needy princess who doesn't understand things while Itsuki is the straight man who reacts to all of the outlandish stuff. That scene of them in the bath towards the end of the episode was probably the best scene in the whole episode because it effectively balances that comedy with some decent character setup regarding Hinako not really having any friends. I'm also really liking what Shizune the maid adds to the dynamic because sometimes I'm not always sure how she is going to react to these two flirting with each other. She keeps slipping back-and-forth between taking her job too seriously and maybe a little bit of trolling but I like how I can't immediately tell.

Outside of that, a lot of the episode was pretty standard and is falling into a few of the bland tropes that I was sort of expecting the show to fall into. This episode gives me more of an idea of what the school life is gonna be like and it's pretty standard with Hinako being this ideal object of affection that everybody just sort of hangs around. The source of drama and a source of comedy is probably gonna be in Itsuki trying to hide his role from everybody, which will most likely get progressively harder the closer they get to other people. I have no idea what these two new rich girls like Mirei are supposed to add though and I'm honestly a little bit worried that their inclusion is just going to take away from the core dynamic of the show. Maybe they're going to just be a source of jealousy or maybe Itsuki is going to be a caretaker for more than one girl moving forward? It's hard to say but this episode didn't really elevate the show beyond the trashy junk food I knew it was going to be after the premiere. It just happens that this is a type of trashy junk food I kind of enjoy, but I'm not gonna lose sleep over other people not giving this one a shot.