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This Week in Anime
The Least Cute Meet-Cute and Other Summer Love Stories
by Christopher Farris & Steve Jones,
Chris and Steve wander through the summer season's tales of love looking for romantic treasures and finding...stuff.
Disclaimer:The views and opinions expressed by the participants in this chatlog are not the views of Anime News Network. Spoiler Warning for discussion of the series ahead.
Steve
Chris, the summer anime season is well underway, and while we might have been able to wriggle our way out of isekai duty last week thanks to a horse of a different color, we all have to pay the piper eventually. It is time, yet again, for the romcom sampler.
The nihilism angle would have worked better if we had to do the isekai column, but that's just too good a screenshot not to lead with.
Chris
Even as this is somehow the first time I've had to pay the RomCom tax for this column, I'm aware enough that the genre can trend just a bit more varied to avoid the unilateral doldrums I'm so familiar with in isekai.
Not that there aren't some stinkers, of course, but that is the actual point, isn't it? Helping audiences sort through the trash to find that sweet, sweet romantic treasure. Since I had to watch three-quarters of these shows for my Preview Guide shift, I might as well juice some more billable hours out of them.
Lucky you! There's always a silver lining, and I think we've got a couple of those to get to, but I like to start at the bottom of the barrel. You have to save the dessert for last, right? And one meal I'm not particularly eager to taste again is Solo Camping for Two.
Though I will grant that beer can chicken, while delicious, isn't exactly the most photogenic of delicacies.
Appeal is one of the biggest problems out of the gate with Solo Camping, in that as a romantic comedy, it really isn't selling the "romance" angle at all. The "chemistry" between the leads consists of Shizuku being as ineptly aggravating as possible at Gen, who, per the title, just wants to be left alone.
Belligerent and even toxic tension between characters in a romance can be a thing, but this ain't it.
They have about as much chemistry together as a pair of inert gases. Just a lot of powerfully bad dialogue that doesn't endear the audience to either of their personalities. If you want a camping anime to be cozy. Laid-Back Camp is the gold standard. This is pyrite.
It's wild given that one of the widely praised elements of Laid-Back Camp was how the other girls never pressured ShimaRin out of her love of enjoying the great outdoors by herself. So here comes Solo Camping for Two with Shizuku doing exactly that to Gen, ostensibly in the name of the world's least cute meet-cute.
It is funny how this anime isn't playing in the same genre as Laid-Back Camp (being a romcom versus an iyashikei) but still manages to feel like a worse version of it at every turn.
Also speaking of artistry, getting to the second episode of Solo Camping revealed that the most distinguishing element was the way its production values dropped off a cliff after only one week.
I saw some interesting clips on Bluesky.
I am completely obsessed with how Shizuku's breasts grow and shrink here
You hate to see production collapse in any situation, because it's a sign of dire systemic issues plaguing the industry, but it's also not like much of value was lost here.
And I suppose while we're on the subject of shows with baffling premises and off-putting casts, I'd like to add Watari-kun's ***** is About to Collapse to the bottom of the pile.
I hadn't checked out this one for Preview Guide, so after throwing on the first episode for this column, I can confidently say that of all the romcoms I sampled this week, this sure was one of them!
I'm not one of those killjoys who need every question about a story to be spelled out immediately, but also, my biggest issue with Watari-kun is that I'm not even 100% sure what its premise is.
I'm with you there! A childhood friend returning to the scene and instigating a love triangle is, of course, a tried and true trope. But I don't know if I'm supposed to be afraid of Satsuki or cringing at her. The premiere is a bizarre jumble of tones, none of which generate anything palpable.
I will say that Watari-kun is in the same place as Solo Camping in that the "Romance" and "Comedy" earn those quote marks I have to type around them in the context of this show. I can see the driving ideas, like Watari-kun and the sister he's taking care of, needing an outside influence to move on from their parents' deaths and subsequent codependency on each other. And it certainly wants us to be invested in the mystery of why Satsuki...smashed up all their vegetables years ago? But the time-killing gesturing at those thin elements does not make a compelling premiere. You can't engage audiences based on one weak-ass mystery box around a character who's just not likable or interesting.
It's very bizarrely constructed, and not in an interesting way. I usually don't say this, but I think this would have benefitted from being more straightforward. Forget the mystery, forget the asterisks in the title, and hone the basics. And maybe ease off on Satsuki assaulting everyone.
My opinions may be colored by my watching The Summer Hikaru Died the night before, so Watari-kun's attempts at evoking summertime pastoral unease were probably doomed to fall flat.
Or maybe Watari-kun actually will reveal itself as a horror series partway through, complete with uncovering whatever the hell those asterisks are supposed to obscure. Still, I'm not interested enough to find out.
On that note, if you want a good romantic comedy, you should check out The Summer Hikaru Died. It's a hoot! Trust me! Don't look at the other genre tags!
If Solo Camping and Watari-kun count as "comedies," then Hikaru absolutely should. We're no strangers to relitigating genre definitions here on TWIA, and we'll probably do it again before we're done here tonight!
It's not like this season is hurting for blondes in romance setups with odd vibes, anyway.
Cultural Exchange With a Game Centre Girl is at least better constructed as an adaptation. It has a clear, distinct aesthetic it's aiming for, and I like the cutesy palette and cartoony character designs.
I love Sally, but I do not love whoever decided she needs to put on a British accent for this role.
Despite her efforts, it comes off awkward. Though probably not as awkward as the elephant in the room who isn't quite up-to-date on age-of-consent laws.
Thankfully, the show so far seems more interested in the comedy side than the romantic one, but either way, that is super not a great thing to have running through the backbone of your premise.
I feel like Lily just having a precocious crush on Renji could be cute enough to fuel their interactions, but her looking and acting pretty young even for a 13-year-old just gives it that pervasive sense of iffiness, especially as the show continues to play up the possibility of them dating for real.
On the other hand, the second episode teases Renji accidentally rizzing up his sister while in the world's least-convincing disguise. And here I was worried we hadn't hit any incest yet in this romance anime column.
It's impressive how thoroughly icky they made Game Centre Girl when all this setup needs is a bunch of jokes about playing The House of the Dead. This could even fix the British accent problem. Just make Lily American, and then do the bit about her being preternaturally good with the light gun. Now that's cultural exchange!
As I indicated, it's not that Game Centre Girl has technically committed any crimes yet so much as the vibes are just off. And when that's all you have propping up what's otherwise an admittedly nice-looking hangout series, it leaves it with not much else going on. At least it let me see Jashin-chan and pals again.
Also, if you're jonesing for arcade-based romantic comedies, Hi Score Girl is right there. The leads are all the same age, and it makes jokes about Tokimeki Memorial. That's a win-win.
Thus far this season's romcom offerings generally seem to be defined by having better alternatives elsewhere, which is the best segue I can make into the series all about a guy dealing with girls who are better than him!
Dealing with Mikadono Sisters Is a Breeze may have a dubious title, but it managed to charm me more than I thought it would. I think that's in part due to the combination of the femme lead and the femdom harem. If nothing else, that stands out from the crowd.
This is also the first example we've talked about where I left the premiere with a pretty good grasp of who these people are. It spends time establishing their personalities and motivations and makes them distinct from each other, so that they clash in relatively fun ways. You know, the fundamentals of character writing? Crazy, right?
Right, I feel like Mikadono Sisters has just as much, if not more, going on as far as layered, offbeat premises go as Watari-kun's ***** is About to Collapse, but I fully "got" what this show was doing before the premiere was up.
Also, not for nothing, but it's another show that looks pretty good. I love how distinctive, even atypical, the characters look by shonen harem romance standards.
While I respect the character types of the sisters, along with leading little guy Yuu's range of reactions to dealing with them, being this early in the season does make me question where this might be going.
Kazuki, being the princely drama major archetype, is cool. But then the ED deploys a dream sequence where she imagines Yuu sweeping her off after she gets feminized?
I can see some shrew-taming going on here, and I'm not certain how much I like it.
I will defend Yuu's right to hit the sisters with a "damn, y'all live like this?" Because they need some help in their domicile. There's a fine line there before it becomes weaselly male wish fulfillment dreck.
Right now I'd call Mikadono Sisters competent more than compelling. I'd sooner wait to hear how it turns out than follow along with it myself. Still, as far as this season's new heterosexual options go, I'd say it's probably your best bet.
There's a qualifying segue into the fact that this season's almost as rich with yuri options as it is with off-putting blondes!
We have three very distinct examples of girl-on-girl romcom action this summer, which is a lot as far as this space is concerned. Who can say whether this marks a cultural shift or is merely a confluence of sapphism? I can't, but we can certainly talk about the individual shows. And There's No Freaking Way I'll Be Your Lover! Unless... is as good and relatable a place as any to start.
Basically "What if Bocchi the Rock! but Bocchi was accidentally winding up dating her new friends instead of playing in a band with them?" which is both a pretty solid premise for an anime on its own and also, I presume, the source of about a billion doujins.
Granted, in the first couple episodes so far, Rena has only managed to catch the eye of Mai, but that's okay. She's got enough love to go around to mentally destroy an infinite amount of pink-haired nervous wrecks.
Ironically, considering Renako's crippling introversion, my biggest gripe with the show is that it's too loud. It flits eagerly from scene to scene without giving any of these characters space to breathe. Don't get me wrong, a slightly obnoxious yuri comedy would usually be my jam, but the pieces don't quite fit together here.
When it's racing quickly through the first half of the premiere, it's pretty good (that opening POV scene is kinda amazing). But it settles into a push-pull routine between Rena and Mai a little too quickly when I don't know that they have enough to carry full episodes.
It also feels like it's half-assing the "friendship" vs "dating" premise. Even if the point is that the characters themselves aren't emotionally intelligent enough to parse that, it just means the presentation comes off wishy-washy.
The big problem for me is that Mai is way underwritten. Renako is a ball of anxieties, and the show does a great job communicating and lampooning her foibles, but Mai becomes considerably more one-note as soon as she confesses her crush to Renako.
While I don't doubt we'll see her and their relationship become more three-dimensional as the story progresses, I need more of a foothold to start with.
And therein lies another overarching issue with There's No Freaking Way..., in that prospective viewers have to rush into this series episode-by-episode hoping it'll strengthen that foundation, instead of waiting to see/hear if it works and then checking it out. Thanks for nothing, REMOW's bizarre strategy of only uploading the episodes to their YouTube channel for a week at a time.
An utterly baffling move for the 2025 streaming landscape, so it's perfectly on-brand for REMOW.
And despite my quibbles, one undeniable aspect of the culture that Unless... gets right is the puppygirl agenda, which allows me to segue seamlessly into our next series.
This Yuu is the opposite of the boy Yuu from Mikadono Sisters in that she's actively trying to look as cool as possible, but is instead an absolute doofus who nonetheless makes herself utterly desirable to all the coolest women in her life.
It's funny how There's No Freaking Way... paid lip-service to the horniness of a character like Mai, but Bad Girl reads like it's truly taking Yuu's status as a horny little weirdo and...well, "respecting" doesn't feel like the right word, but it does just come off a lot more earnest and genuine about her type of desires.
She's a stupid little freak and a billion times more endearing for it. Bad Girl's earnestness charmed me. Its premise is no less ridiculous than the silliest we've covered so far, but the vibes are good-natured and in tune with the breadth of lesbian pining I frequently see expressed online.
Same. This was another series I hadn't preloaded with the Preview Guide, and I dug it so much I jumped straight through two episodes in the time I had. Not for nothing either, it's probably the funniest anime we've looked at thus far. Yuu alone is going to be a goldmine of reaction images.
Suzu is also really good as the (not) straight woman who puts up with Yuu's antics because she's another gay disaster. There's a good balance of personalities here that helps the show riff better.
For real though, it's probably the most compelling love triangle of the season so far, and Bad Girl hasn't even introduced its fourth girl of dubious bad-ness yet. It shows how even the lightest touch of concepts (the show doesn't even consistently do a ton with Yuu's doomed delinquency attempts) can make for a strong romantic comedy so long as the characters and their chemistry are amusing enough.
Those are all good points, but have you considered that maybe there's just something to the shorter gremlin + taller gyaru combo. I think this merits further study.
At the end of all this season's new romcoms, we come to the one that's probably the simplest, and also the one that'll probably get people yelling in the comments about whether it's a romcom or not. To which I say:
Come on, the first sketch of See You Tomorrow at the Food Court concludes with Yamamoto remembering that she set her password to WADA1234. We've left "just good friends" in the dust.
It's also a perfect romcom for anybody whose love language is yapping. That's the whole show, in classic quotidian Seinfeldian fashion. Just two girls griping about random shit to each other.
Also, by one girl watching her love interest play the IRL gacha for her mobile-game husbando, but believe me when I tell you that this, too, is a love language.
As is talking with a mouthful of food because you need to see your bosom buddy to react to your freshly concocted bit as soon as possible.
This is a show that could probably get by entirely on Wada and Yamamoto trading jokes, but I like how Food Court is properly leaning into the constructive relationship elements. Like how Yamamoto calls Wada out on her more judgy behaviors, and Wada, in turn, actually listens.
To be loved is to be changed, and sometimes that's change you get back after you buy your KFC combo.
Food Court's premise being so stripped down gives it freedom to do more with its characters and their development. It maintains breathing room and doesn't squander it. That confidence in both its writing and its adaptation is a big part of why it's my favorite of this new batch of romcoms.
It's cozy! I'm a little sad it's going to be only a half-season show, especially now that I know a second volume of the manga came out after I looked at the first one for the Manga Guide a while back. But if Wada and Yamamoto's little get-togethers can teach me anything, it's to treasure any time with our loved ones while we can.
While we normally don't cover sequels in these sampler columns, I wouldn't feel right if I didn't at least throw in a mention of how good a start My Dress-Up Darling's second season has had. It wipes the floor with the rest of the summer's non-yuri competition.
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