The Dangers in My Heart – 04 – Big With Me Right Now

Surprise! Upon further deliberation, I’ve decided to get back into Dangers in My Heart, as it fell by the wayside in a very crowded Spring 2023 season. I didn’t dislike it, I just felt I didn’t have enough time to enjoy it. But as it’s maintained a rating well above 8 on MAL with a second season on the way next year, I wanted to finish what I’d started in April, lest I become consumed by FOMO.

I pick up as the gears turn in Ichikawa Kyoutarou’s head, wondering what “liking” Yamada Anna even means. He tells himself that at the very least, he has no interest in going out with her, but he sounds awfully tsundere in his thoughts. During lunch he notices a short-haired girl staring intently at Yamada and Yamada not noticing.

Back in the library, he finds Yamada preparing another messy snack: Puruche, with the milk she smuggled out of class. He can’t help himself from emerging from the stacks to tell her she’ll make a mess, and suggests a bowl from home ec. When she asks him to fetch him one, he does so without hesitation, but she chases after him, saying she was only joking, and wanted to together.

The home ec room is locked so they go to the science lab, where Ichikawa uses a balance to perfect the Puruche-to-milk ratio, much to Yamada’s amusement. When she dips his finger in the finished product, I half-expected her to then suck it, but she has him taste it instead, before chugging the beaker.

When a teacher barges in suddenly she chokes on the Puruche and spills the pale, thick concoction all over her lap. Thus Ichikawa and Yamada end up caught in what looks and sounds like it could have been the middle of a sexual act, but is actually far more innocent, thank goodness.

While on cleaning duty, Ichikawa again notices the short-haired girl attempting and failing to approach Yamada about something. Serina then asks her if she’s apologized yet, adding that she didn’t use to “be like this.” In response to that, Kanaoya (we see her name tag) snipes back that Serina simply clings to Yamada nowadays.

Ichikawa has no interest in getting into the middle of a cat fight, even though he knows Kanaoya is mistaken about Serina worshipping the feat Yamada walks on. Like the rest of her friends, they’re all looking out for her because she’s such a space cadet!

The fact that Yamada and Ichikawa are now interacting more in the library  works against him when he tries to make himself scarce so Kanaoya can apologize. He manages to get out and sees that Serina is just outside the library observing.

Yamada ends up being the one beckoning to Kanaoya to come and see the old face-swapping app she’s behind the times on (but hey, if it’s big with her now that’s all that matters really). This gives Kanaoya the opening she needs to apologize for hitting Yamada in the face with the basketball. Yamada tells her it’s fine, and all is well. Later, Serina apologizes to Kanaoya for being too pushy, and they make up.

Ichikawa is biking along when he passes a konbini from which Yamada emerges and compliments his bike (in a way he thinks sounds like she’s about to mug him, which is hilarious). Yamada then asks for a ride, offering the tippy top of a Papiko bottle in exchange. Honestly, the ride itself is its own reward.

Ichikawa notes how Yamada doesn’t sit to one side like other girls, and is lighter than he thought. You can tell Yamada herself was looking for an opportunity to talk with him, opens up about quitting the basketball club, and considers joining Ichikawa’s data processing club, clearly fishing for a bashful reaction.

To Ichikawa’s shock, Yamada actually gives him the full second bottle of Papiko, now that she knows he prefers the classic coffee flavor. He gives her the tippy top of his just as she did with him, and her reaction is adorable as she heads to the trains.

The next time Ichikawa sees Yamada, he’s having lunch at McDonalds with his big sister Kana. He tries to overhear how she deals with guys hitting on her, but she’s so loudly shaking her Shaka-Shaka Chicken (a menu item sadly not available in the U.S.) he can’t hear.

Yamada spots him too, and eventually overhears how they’re related. Then, when Kana teases him for only having a salad, Yamada goes downstairs to order some Shaka-Shaka for himself. She surprises him by shoving herself into him enthusiastically, while wearing a super-cute outfit that makes her look even more like the model she is.

Yamada thinks she’ll get some soft serve, but forgot her wallet upstairs, essentially betraying that she went down just to talk with him. When she heads back up, Ichikawa has the uncontrollable urge to buy her some soft serve, but when they meet again on the steps, she assumes he’s copying her order again. It’s a fun instance of their mutual inability to discern each others’ intentions in the moment.

Back at school it’s time for Yamada to face the music for her alleged illicit snacking, but Ichikawa is by the door to the teacher’s office before her. She admits she’s scared and asks him to join her, and since he has nothing else to do, he does, explaining to the teacher he’s there to “observe.”

Ichikawa ends up serving as her defense lawyer, establishing reasonable doubt to the accusations levied against her. While at first he thinks he’s going to get yelled at, the teacher praises him for speaking up for a change. He leaves the office with Yamada fully exonerated. He didn’t have to save her, but he did, and she appreciates it.

In fact, she uses this as an opportunity to suggest they start talking more like friends, because as far as she’s concerned, that’s what they are. These two have already come a long way since episode one, and I’m earnestly looking forward to their continued progress.

The Dangers in My Heart – 03 – A New Feeling

Kyou ends up in the nurse’s office with a headache the same time Anna is there with a stomachache (likely due to too many sweets). When she notices he’s staring then realizes it’s Kyou, she doesn’t seem to mind, since she knows him. She also offers him a Tylenol, but the only cup by the sink was the same one she used, which means the risk of an indirect kiss.

As dark and brooding as some of Kyou’s thoughts are, he at least knows better than to blurt out his … less savory thoughts. His male classmates, not so much. They’re a bunch of creeps, and when one of them gives him a note to pass to Anna, he assumes it’s something dirty and swaps it out with a drawing of Anna he made. The drawing absolutely makes Anna’s day.

More of the boys’ talk about how girl takes your hand and what that says about their preferred sex position actually gets to Kyou, when Anna counts her candy, notices one is missing, and takes Kyou’s hand from the top, which according to the dumb article means they like to take control. Turns out the missing candy was in her pocket.

When Kyou is hit by a basketball in P.E., he’s ready to aggressively throw it back … until he sees it’s Anna’s ball. She tosses it back and she smiles and thanks him. But later, while she’s looking at him, she gets hit right in the nose with a pass, and her nose starts bleeding profusely.

Continuing a trend of his actions not matching his thoughts, Kyou’s body moves on its own to the nurse’s office. He wonders what he’s doing there, but after hearing Anna talk on the phone with her mom through stifling tears, saying tomorrow’s photoshoot will have to be postponed, it finally hits him: he doesn’t want to murder this girl … he likes her.

I’m glad after three episodes he’s finally both aware of and seemingly accepting of this fact. Hopefully he can make more progress getting closer to Anna, since the fact she framed his drawing and keeps it in her purse, among other gestures, indicates she likes him too.

But for now, Kyou keeps stealthily doing little things to support her, like when she runs out of tissues from crying so much and he leaves packets of tissues at her spot in the library (as well as at all the other seats, so as not to seem suspicious).

I imagine Anna knows who left the tissues, and since she’s done crying, she instead uses them to wipe potato chip grease from her fingers. This smiling, happily snacking Yamada Anna is what Kyou likes to see most, which is good because he’s proven quite capable of making her smile.

The Dangers in My Heart – 02 – Battle Formation

Despite his silent objections, Yamada Anna continues to intrude upon Kyoutarou’s “holy space”, i.e. the library of loneliness. But he can’t deny it’s never a dull moment with Anna in there stuffing her face. When she has a complicated color-changing marshmallow candy set that requires water, she ends up spilling a bunch on the floor. He gets a cup for her, but by then she’s already mixing the candy by the sink.

When it gets hot, Kyou (along with the other boys) observe the girls sweating in their whites shirts, which is mitigated by fanning. The next time she’s snacking in the library, she asks to borrow his fan, which she says smells nice, then invites him to come in close and smell it too. Basically any excuse to get the little guy closer to Anna will do.

When Anna gets a text saying her “boyfriend” Chihiro (who is actually her closest female friend) is en route, she hides under the table where Kyou is sitting. Chihiro realizes pretty quickly the statuesque lass is under there, and lures her out by complimenting her. The reason Anna snacks alone is that Chihiro is allergic. She may be a space cadet, but she tries to be considerate to those she cares about.

More and more, Anna is making it clear that Kyoutarou is one of those people. When he gets guff from the boy trying to date Anna (who was also the first to fish his bike out of the river) for writing “Yamada” on tombstones on the class’ haunted house mural, he owns up to it so the real culprit (Hana, a girl) doesn’t get guff from the girls. But then Hana says she was just using common names like Yamada and Kobayashi. Anna realizes that Kyou was covering for Hana, and apologize for putting him in a spot.

Speaking of spots, Anna will be the class ghost for the cultural festival. She sidles up to Kyou at the sinks, and wonders if she’d look creepier with blood on her face. As with the mural, Kyou can’t help but suggest the right way to make something look spookier, and Anna leans in so he can apply the blood-colored paint to her face. All he can manage is a single spot before bailing from embarrassment.

On the day of the festival, Anna and her friends get picked up by three lads, but as Kyou observes, the girls are in a tight “battle formation” to protect each other from handsy dudes.

Kyou tries to swing around to keep tailing them, and ends up encountering Anna, who had strayed from her group. She and Kyou go in the classroom where there’s a map of the town from 80 years ago. Anna points out her house, asks Kyou where his is, then draws the distance with her fingers, touching his in the process.

When he asks if it’s ok to take a picture (of the map) she grabs his phone and takes a selfie of the two of them. Even if he maintains Anna will be his top “victim” in some rhetorical spree of violence he envisions committing, the bottom line is that Kyou is elated beyond measure to have such a photo, just as Anna is more than happy to provide it.

The Dangers in My Heart – 01 (First Impressions) – It Does Matter

Kyoutarou Ichikawa (I’ll be shortening to Kyou) is, by his own admission, “messed up in the head”, reading horror stories and dreaming of murdering his classmates, chief among them the statuesque class idol Yamada Anna. Which is to say, he’s a fairly typical teenage boy in middle school.

But despite his best efforts to be aloof and scornful, the more he learns about Anna by watching her, the more he learns she’s an endearing space cadet, and he finds himself wanting to help or support her in little ways, starting by lending her a box cutter.

Kyou also seems oddly attuned to Anna in ways others aren’t, like when Anna’s poster has been replaced by her friend’s and she seems upset and even breaks down into tears. Kyou tears his own group’s poster to get everyone’s attention.

But at least this time, Kyou’s actions aren’t necessary. Whatever Anna was upset about, she isn’t anymore once she correctly spots an Osprey helicopter in the sky. Kyou just comes off like a poster-slashing weirdo to everyone else.

When one of his male classmates (who prefers bigger girls) asks to meet the girl he likes to meet him in the library, Anna is a clear third wheel, while Kyou is invisible behind the bookshelves. When Kyou drops his book, Anna actually covers for him by saying there’s a cat in the room.

Kyou meows, Anna goes to investigate, and gets him to meow along with her like two cats fighting. The couple-to-be end up alone and hit it off, leaving the library side-by-side in spirited conversation about cats. This skit shows that Anna and Kyou can make a good team.

Kyou learns that his #1 Murder Victim modeled in the latest issue of Ciel, he heads to the bookstore, but not in his school uniform. There he finds Anna there, also in disguise, desperately trying to get random customers to notice her in the magazine. She even prepares for autographs!

Kyou does by the magazine, but when he sees the photos of Anna, she looks like a stranger, and thus the little bit of distance they had closed gets wider (though he does fish it out of the trash later). It’s understandable that an outcast teenager with few friends would feel like he and someone like Anna were completely different species.

That discouragement builds when he spots Anna with a similarly tall lad. He assumes it’s her boyfriend and declares that “that’s how it is”—those of the same species tend to pair up. But far from her BF, he’s actually a guy she’s not interested in, pretending not to know what LINE or social media are.

When the lad, who turns out to be a cad, grabs Anna’s damn arm when she tries to leave and freakin’ insists she give him her contact info (always great start to a relationship!) Kyou considers walking on by. It doesn’t matter, he doesn’t care, he thinks. But it does matter, and he does care…about Anna!

So once again Kyou does something dumb and impulsive and very much not in his best interest: tossing his bike into the river! It makes such a commotion, the exchange of information seems to have been interrupted. Anna didn’t see it, but one of her friends did and reports what Kyou did.

When he explains he “hit the gas when he should have hit the brake” Anna has the biggest laugh and smile of the whole episode, and tells Kyou he’s funny. It seemed to me in the moment that she knew why he did what he did, and is grateful for it.

But the fact that Kyou can tell that Anna had no interest in the cad hitting on her means he’s not the demented psychopath he builds himself up to be in his dark thoughts. His heart is a lot lighter and warmer he thought, and continuing to interact with the tall, adorable Anna will only reinforce that truth.

Tomo-chan Is a Girl! – 02 – Enemies Becoming Friends

When Tomo boards a bus with Jirou and sits right beside him, the closeness makes her heart race too much, so she stands, bitter that he doesn’t conside her a girl enough to be equally flusterd. However, he shows he’s very much aware she’s a girl when he spots a pervert groping her and puts a stop to it.

Unfortunately for Tomo, his solution is for her to stop wearing skirts, because they “look wrong” on her. What Jirou isn’t sharing with Tomo is that the reason it looks “wrong” is because Jirou is still uncomfortable with his “best bud” being a woman—especially one with legs to the damn moon!

After slugging Jirou, Tomo reports this injustice to Misuzu the next day. She determines that the problem isn’t the skirt, but the bike shorts underneath. She tells Tomo that the key to a skirt is basically the reality that there’s nothing but underwear underneath. In other words, no half-measures allowed.

Misuzu arranges for Tomo to walk home with Jirou (who is eager to make up), but without the bike shorts. Misuzu’s original observation that the skirt is simply too short to wear on its own without errant winds rendering her unmentionables visible. It’s doubly a shame this happens during an otherwise romantic sakura-strewn sunset stroll.

They later make up again, with Jirou rightfully apologizing for presuming he can tell Tomo what to wear. That said, he doesn’t think she should wear anything she doesn’t feel comfortable in. But as we see from his version of a blush, the main reason he’d rather Tomo wear slacks is because he’s just not ready for those endless gams.

The second part of the episode introduces Carol Olston, a blonde student from Britain. Half of the boys in class are in her thrall, while the other half prefer Misuzu’s cool beauty—we know Jirou is interested in neither. She’s also voiced by Sally Amaki, who is bilingual, so I was a little disappointed she didn’t have any English lines.

Carol is introduced to Tomo via Misaki, and Carol is quick to declare that she and Misaki are engaged and have in face already been married three times. Misaki clarifies that they’re childhood friends, hence all the weddings, but it’s clear Carol considers their engagement legally binding—and views Tomo as an enemy who might steal her Misaki away.

This is only half-true and half-nonsense; the latter because Tomo doesn’t like Misaki that way and has eyes only for Jirou, and the former because Misaki does seem to have a little thing for Tomo. In any case, Carol is sharper than her cotton candy looks and ditzy affectation suggest.

When Tomo reports her encounter with Misuzu, it’s plain as day to Misuzu why Carol keeps calling her a baaaka. Then Carol gathers intel on Tomo by speaking to both Misuzu and Jirou, demonstrating her genral oddness by sitting on Misuzu’s desk and hiding in Jirou’s locker.

Carol ends up hiring Jirou to help get her into shape “to defeat an enemy”, but on the surface, and unbeknownst to him, it totally looks like the two are going steady. Tomo is genuinely freaked out by this, and Misuzu, shit-stirrer that she is, sucks up all that sweet sweet energy.

Watching Carol utterly fail to run more than ten feet or do even one push-up or sit-up is amusing, but not as hilarious as a distracted Tomo unknowingly and lazily turning Misaki—who is likely no slouch, karate-wise—into a pretzel.

Misuzu egged Tomo on to confront Jirou and Carol partly for her own amusement, but also because she wants Tomo to display more urgency in trying to win Jirou over, which means defending her claim to him.

But when she does confront the two, it only takes a moment for Carol to read Tomo’s reactions and conclude that she is absolutely no threat to her vis-a-vis Misaki, as she’s only interested in Jirou.

That afternoon, Carol invites Misuzu out for coffee and cake in what Misuzu calls an “unnecessarily long car” as thanks for her advice. Carol confides that she doesn’t have a single friend, so Misuzu suggests she reach out to Tomo, who will surely be glad to have her as one.

The next day Carol thinks about all the times her open hand of friendship was rejected by those who thought she was too pretty, or too rich, or too weird. But just as Misuzu said, Tomo welcomes Carol’s friendship, and thus appears to her like an angel. Misuzu also agrees to be Carol’s friend, because Carol is loaded, and can likely also help her in even more complex and entertaining schemes to make Tomo and Jirou squirm!

Speaking of, the episode ends with Tomo learning for the first time that Jirou and Misuzu briefly dated years ago, which not only explains their cool-yet-close attitude towards one another, but also draws another parallel between Hidaka Rina’s Misuzu and her character Yume from My Stepmom’s Daughter Is My Ex!

Isekai Ojisan – 02 – Neon Genesis Osananajimi

Ojisan’s Youtube views are dropping, so he institutes austerity measures in the home budget—though only after he orders a copy of a video game magazine listing the final results of Sega Saturn reader’s choice. He learns that one of his favorite games, Guardian Heroes, was only ranked 197th. I never played that, but I did play the heck out of a Genesis game by Treasure called Gunstar Heroes, which was immensely fun.

After summoning lighting to sufficiently punctuate his moment of shock despair, Takafumi gets him to stop talking about video games and show him another recorded memory from his time in the isekai. When the village elder shows him to the Frost Clan member Mabel, who goes ahead and tells Ojisan what’s needed to unfreeze her heart, only for Ojisan to ignore all that and defeat the dragon without her Frost Sword.

First Takafumi’s uncle misinterpreted elf’s tsundere behavior as shit-talking, then he totally circumvents the other world’s “quest”. Those blunders aside, Takafumi still thinks enough of his uncle to give him a Sega Saturn for his birthday, which they play to ring in the year 2018.

Ojisan also shows Takafumi how the other world celebrated the new year, only for him to simply eat some chicken by himself and retire to his room. When he mentions Mabel visited in his room later that night, Takafumi switches off the Saturn and demands to hear more.

Turns out Ojisan convinced Mabel that her ennui and reclusive behavior were simply living her truth, and that there was nothing wrong with that, and she should go on doing it if that’s what she wanted. It is, and she does, which even Takafumi can tell is both teaching and learning the wrong lesson!

When Fujimiya Sumika first encounters Ojisan, she assumes he’s a rambling old weirdo and commits to walking a different route. However, it’s thanks to this route that she’s unexpectedly reunited with her childhood friend Takafumi, who has since grown taller than her. Sumika, who we see was once very attached to Takafumi when they were kids, is clearly jazzed to see him again.

She accepts his invitation to stop by his house, which she does after dropping off her groceries, only for the same weird old man she saw in the park to come in through the balcony sliding door. Ojisan initially treats Sumika as an enemy and tries to wipe her memory, but Takafumi intervenes, resulting in quite a bit of physical contact.

Sumika shakes off the attempted assault, but immediately takes the stand that Takafumi shouldn’t be letting his old uncle mooch off of him. When Takafumi confirms that his Ojisan actually does have magic powers he gained in another world, Sumika says what we’d all say: “So show me.”

It doesn’t take long even for someone like Ojisan to pick up on Sumika’s attraction to Takafumi, though she may deny it, leading him to bring up Evangelion, in which Asuka was a famous early example of the tsundere archetype (something Oji has yet to catch on to when it comes to Elf).

Sumika is actually moved by Ojisan’s sad tale that is actually ripped directly from the Saturn game Alien Soldier, at which point Sumika is fed up with having her emotions toyed with. Then Ojisan reads her mind, revealing she showered and changed before coming to Takafumi’s, and was disappointed to learn he had a roommate.

But while she’s disappointed, she also seems to still like Takafumi enough that she’s not going to stand by and do nothing while Takafumi is leeched on by a layabout charlatan. As with Elf and Mabel, I love Sumika’s dynamic character design. She’s cute, but still the tough kid she was when she first fell for Takafumi. It’s a shame Takafumi is 100% oblivious to her long-standing crush, but she and Mabel are fine additions to this colorful cast.

Tsurezure Children – 05

Ahh, conversations through texting. So fraught with danger. You’d think communication would be a cinch in these heady days of high technology! NOPE. Take Takase and Saki. They both like each other and want to confess, but Saki is too scared to do it in person, so after a string of texts goes very well, she sends that text.

Unfortunately, Takase was about to do the same thing at the same time, but bailed at the last second, instead asking if she’d meet up with him later. But he just had to include a comment about how confessing via text is shitty. And so both Saki and Takase end the evening not as a happy couple…but wishing they were dead.

MOVING ON! Kaga Yuki’s childhood friend Nanase Kaoru joins the astronomy club, and she laments how Yuki’s clearly only there because he has a crush on Sasahara. But when Sasahara steps out for a bit, Kaoru pounces.

She tries in vain to lead an entirely Yuki along to the realization that she likes him, but ultimately has to resort to kissing him, lest their be any doubt. A kiss that Sasahara walks in on, no less! Still, by episode’s end, Yuki is willing to knock on Kaoru’s door for a family errand. They’ll be fine.

LASTLY, we have Kamine Ayaka and Gouda Takeru. Ayaka is worried that since they started going out, things aren’t going so swell with Takeru, making her wonder if he’s not into it. As if to confirm her fears, Takeru is very standoffish after school and even starts talking as if he’s trying to gently but firmly dump her.

But it’s all good; it’s fine…he’s not trying to dump her, he’s saying their awkward tension is what can’t go on…not their relationship. To that end, he wonders if it’s okay if they hold hands. And Ayaka’s instincts were right on at least one front: he avoided her because he was sweaty…which makes her so happy she gloms onto him with glee. Daawww…

Tsurezure Children – 04

For three of the four couples, “futility” is the name of the game this week. Kana and Chiaki are now officially together, but forces conspire to keep them from taking their relationship to a more physical place.

After some initial awkwardness and another one of their little comedy bits, they’re well and truly ready to do the deed (Kana even brought protection), only to be stymied by not one but two rude interruptions by Chiaki’s curious mom. Chiaki, brah, lock your damn door.

I’m finding the more complex relationship rooted in a long-standing friendship the more interesting pairing in TC so far, as demonstrated by my lack of enthusiasm for the two skits in the middle.

Neither the painfully blunt Akagi asserting dominance on the tentative Ryouko, nor Ruruya’s inability to answer Yuki’s confession because he fears she’s just teasing him really resonated for me. Hopefully both stories will go to more interesting places at a later date.

Sugawara and Takano’s latest appearance splits the difference between the first skit I liked and the later two I didn’t. But yet again, the situation is the same for Sugawara: the onus is on him to communicate in no uncertain terms that he likes Takano, that he’s not joking around, and that he wants to be her boyfriend.

He’s worried about being friend-zoned, but at least there’ll be closure. And we know that Takano wishes she was…exactly what she is: someone Sugawara would want to date. These two simply need to get on the same page for once. I think they at least inched a little closer.

Tsurezure Children – 03

First couple: Kana is frustrated that even after a year of dating, her boyfriend Chiaki hasn’t kiss her or even held her hand. Turns out he has no idea they’re dating, and thought her confession a year ago was one of the many comedy bits they do. Now that he knows Kana’s true feelings, Chiaki is willing to step out of the friendzone with her.

Second Couple: Matsuura just got turned down by her crush, and is on her way home to wallow in self-pity, but her senpai, Katori, tracks her down and proceeds to act in a very annoying fashion, but with good reason: by punching and kicking him for being so annoying, he’s letting her forget her troubles and helping her feel a little better.

Third Couple: Yamane, who looks vaguely related to Rock Lee, is asked out by Kurihara, a girl he has a crush on. She wants to take him out to lunch as thanks for saving her from a groper, and she also knows he’s a good guy by watching him give up his seat to the elderly on the bus.

Yamane simply can’t believe someone as cute as Kurihara is bothering with him, a self-professed weirdo, so when she formally asks him out, he chokes and hits the button that brings the waitress rather than give her an answer.

Fouth Couple: Finally, we check back in with the unlikely pair of Takano and Sugawara. He helps her sweep up, but she takes it as a sign she’s doing crappy job of cleaning. Just when he thinks he’s making progress talking with her and asking her out, it eventually dawns on him they’re not talking about the same thing, and “cleaning up” isn’t “looking good”…but just “cleaning up.”

He retreats for the time being, but will hopefully try again soon…with amusing results. With so many different couples at so many different stages and paces of romantic relationships providing comedy, there’s scarcely a dull moment in Tsurezure Children.

Nazo no Kanojo X – 01

One day, a girl named Urabe Mikoto transfers to Tsubaki Akira’s class. She’s a strange girl who’s branded a weirdo her first day for laughing out loud in the middle of a lesson and sleeping through breaks. One day after waking her up to leave, Akira tastes the drool she left on the desk. The next day he gets sick. Mikoto visits him at home and gives him more of her saliva, which cures him. It turns out, he’s lovesick. She continues ‘supplying’ him until he confesses to her and asks her out; she agrees.

Ah, now this is more like it: a romance series we don’t have to make any excuses for. It’s the best of its genre we’ve yet seen this Spring season. There always seems to be a series we hadn’t originally planned to watch, but give a shot anyway – that’s how we came upon Penguindrum, and it’s how we ran into this. Just an innocent taste of the proverbial drool on the desk. And we found it sweet. So what makes it good? Well, beyond all the glistening saliva, it’s a beautifully presented, sincere, unpretentious story. Efficient too: not a line of dialogue is wasted. The retro character design is also pretty sweet.

The chemistry between Akira and Mikoto is effortless and watching them interact is sheer joy. They’re the only two characters in this episode; everyone else is in the background (which makes sense, since they only have eyes for one another). The quirky but warm Mikoto (very well-voiced by rookie Yoshitani Ayako) is so lovably weird, you have to root for Akira to try to win her, and he does – in the first episode, without any silly games. Hell, we were half-expecting him to offer her his own finger drenched in spit, but a torn-up photo of an old crush suffices. If this all sounds very odd…it is. But it’s good odd. Like Akira, it will have to continue to prove itself, but it’s off to a fine start.

Rating: 9 (Superior)