This Week in Anime

Where Did "My First Girlfriend is a Gal" Go Wrong?

Jacob
So Steve, I actually have a confession to make.

For as much as I can go on about ridiculous fanservice shows and weird sexist garbage that pops up where it doesn't need to in anime...I actually enjoy watching big tiddy anime. They can be extremely fun to plow through (hurr hurr) in the most shameless way possible. After years of watching anime, I did in fact become "that guy."

But the other part of this confession is that I often regret it. And shows like Hajimete no Gal are why. Like, the series is ripping on Hybrid x Heart Ataraxia in that screenshot, but I'd watch that show three times before I tried to sit through another episode of Galfriends.

I was intrigued by the premise! It seemed like the kind of thing that could have its cheesecake and eat it too in terms of sincere romance and just absolutely inscrutable big ole anime tiddy fanservice.

I mean, it's SURPRISINGLY bland. Our hero Junichi has like the most vanilla fantasies in the world, never really gets anywhere with any of them, but unlike many other fanservice anime, the way he (and especially his friends) thinks about those fantasies is like the grossest thing on the planet.

I mean, pure unhinged libido is one thing. But his problems run much deeper. So the premise is that Junichi and his cadre of horrible friends are frustrated that they're still virgins in high school, so they try to set him up with the class's resident Gal, because...

Right. And that's not a bad setup. You think okay, this is the lead-in to him understanding that gals want to be treated with the respect you'd show any girl, and maybe he's gonna fall in love with this lady for who she is on the inside, while still indulging tons of fanservice along the way. But NOPE. Every new storyline is just about piling on more women with progressively more massive chests while Junichi grumbles about how horny he is, how much he doesn't understand women, and gets jealous over Every Little Thing. That's when he even bothers to do anything, because most of the action is actually carried by his trio of friends, who uh

Nope

Noper

and NOPEST

You can't even try to go with the lolicon excuse, like "ha ha, he just likes little 2D anime girls, right?"

No no. Actual Literal Pedophile.

That's the thing. The characters suck all the fun out of engaging with the show sincerely (the girls are extremely flat stereotypes in all ways but one, and the guys are all self-obsessed slaves to their most extreme hormonal responses), but it's not like I expect loving characterization in porn. So maybe this would be forgivable if they could at least get the porn part right. But the eroticism here is just like...stuff you would make fun of people finding attractive in the mid-20th century or something in terms of tameness. It's not "tame" visually, but it's all censored to hell and back so it might as well be. It's like just the top entries on the "very sad old pervert" checklist.

"ooh I've been a bad widdle girl you wanna look at my cleavage and maybe brush my chest accidentally with your elbow" like YAWN

Yeah the choice of censorship imagery (which is at least something approaching fun) isn't the problem, it's that any censorship sucks out the show's only remaining appeal after it's thoroughly scrubbed out everything else.

Nobody's gonna be watching this one for the animation, that's for sure:

And that's one of the "good" cuts!

Yeah, as it is, that's the only slightly interesting fetish beyond whatever in the seven hells is happening with Nene's boobs.

I mean...

I mean...!

When the anime tiddy is so big, ya girl just look pregnant.

So was there anything we liked about the show? Besides using slightly creative images for censorship?

Yeah, definitely. She does absolutely nothing whatsoever after that except kick some anime-original strawman "steal yo girl" bully in the nuts in the last episode. What a waste.

I liked the idea (tho not the execution) of Junichi having different versions of himself in his head deciding how to deal with his first girlfriend. There's an idealized gentleman, pure libido, his child-self, etc. But as it turns out, there's nothing whatsoever surprising or interesting about Junichi, so the inside of his head is just as boring and stupid as the outside of it!

This Week in Anime, we watched Galfriends so you don't have to. And you watched us do it, you perverts.

And Netsuzou Trap is yet another better option than My First Girlfriend is a Gal if you just want trash! I know the anime tiddy can be tempting, especially when it comes in bulk like this, but do yourselves a favor, guys. Save your cherry for the good stuff.

Or whore yourself out to the lowest forms of garbage like we just did, I certainly won't judge.