Anime: Horimiya

• Being adapted from the 11th most popular manga on myanimelist.net, you would expect Horimiya to be a good show, or at least have something that makes it stand out. Sadly, this anime adaptation is average and is pretty much your typical high school romance anime, with some exceptions.
  In terms of animation and sound, this series performs fairly well. The art-style looks good, the character designs are pretty decent, and the backgrounds are well drawn. The face expressions and distortions (moe and chibi faces) are well done. The background music is forgettable but fits the various situations. There is nothing wrong with the voice acting. The opening is also alright, both in terms of music and in terms of visuals, though it’s nothing incredible.
  Just like a lot of high school romance anime, Horimiya is about an asocial protagonist who somehow manages to make the top girl of his school his girlfriend. There are however a couple of differences that makes it somewhat less unoriginal. Firstly, the protagonist has a pretty interesting character design. Instead of looking like your average self-insert protagonist, Miyamura is an effeminate boy with long hair. Secondly, he confesses his love to the top girl in his school, Hori, as early as episode 4, and she becomes his girlfriend soon after. Thirdly, the secondary characters are not mere background decoration, they get a lot of character development and play a more important role than in the average high school romance, with many episodes (at least 5) focused on them.
  There is also some decent comedy, coming mostly from misunderstandings and the like, which helps making the show a bit better. Even so, that isn’t enough to make the show good, as there are three major flaws in the story and characters.
  The first flaw is that Miyamura and Hori become a couple too early, that is to say, after the fourth episode. After they become a couple, their relation does not evolve a single bit, and when they appear on the screen it’s only to show boring couple stuff about holding hands, saying “I love you”, using first names instead of family names, and so on. Thankfully, the series does not focus only on the relationship between Miyamura and Hori, which prevents it from being completely boring, but this also means that in the second half of the series, the secondary characters – the relationship between Yoshikawa Yuki and Ishikawa Tooru in particular – were more interesting to watch than the main characters.
  The second flaw is that nothing actually happens in this series. The show tries to be wholesome and cute, but that alone can’t make it good. There are no conflicts, as pretty much all the characters are altruistic and kind and have no particular objective, and as a result there is little evolution in the characters and in the relationships between them, and absolutely no plot progression. While watching the show, you will wait for something to happen, for an antagonism to rise between the characters, but nothing happens. The biggest “conflict” between the characters happens when a pink-haired girl who is member of the student council drops an important paper in the hallway but doesn’t want to admit her mistake, and so her boyfriend who is also member of the student council puts the blame on Hori. Miyamura intervenes to clarify the situation, everything is forgiven, end of conflict. There’s some stuff about social anxiety and bullying but the approach is too naive, with some idealistic bullcrap like “you can be friends with everyone”, and the protagonist befriending one of his former bullies.
  The third flaw is that nothing stands out in this anime. Though they aren’t extremely stereotypical, the characters aren’t particularly likable, original, or relatable, and so it is hard to care about them. Miyamura’s background is pretty unoriginal: being seen as gloomy and creepy by his classmates, he has suffered from bullying and loneliness for most of his school life. He then meets Hori by chance outside of school, they grow closer and form a couple, and he manages to befriend Hori’s friends and some other classmates.
  To conclude, Horimiya is what I would a “neither good nor bad” show. There’s nothing particularly annoying in it, so it can be watched easily, and there’s some comedy that can be enjoyed, but it doesn’t have anything new or groundbreaking either.

Sub-score explanation:

It’s crazy to see hoy many peculiar circumstances have revolved around a title such as this. First, it came out in the most overloaded season in years with so many popular ips getting an adaptation or popular series getting a continuation at the same time and somehow staying relevant and somewhat controversial to its end, which is not what happened with lots of the remaining titles.

Second, its studio made three of the most talked about series of the season at the same time and as expected all got issues in terms of production and schedule and received criticism in the end because of it. Cloverworks did whatever the hell they wanted with Neverland’s second season, making it one of the worst rated second seasons of all time, rushed this title leaving its huge original fanbase disappointed and overworked its team responsible for Wonder Egg Priority to the point of being unable to finish the product in time. That alone makes them one of the worst studios among the newer ones, if not the worst.

Third, it is simultaneously an overhyped and overhated title, by being labeled as one of the greatest romcom/slice of life manga of all time and yet being panned by some for stuff that doesn’t really feel like a big deal, to anime onlys such as me at least.

And fourth, it has two different versions with two completely different styles, casts, pacings and studios coming out at the same time, one of them with the most random airing dates ever seen.

And it’s crazy to think that when you leave all that fuss aside, the title itself is not really special, it stands out more for all the shit happening around it than on its own. There were a few romcoms with unorthodox beginnings or elements coming out for some years (off the top of my head, Gekkan Shoujo, Ore Monogatari!, Science Fell in Love so I Tried to Prove it, Recovery of an MMO Junkie, Tonikawa, heck this season has I Shaved. Then I Brought a High School Girl Home, which sounds like a porno) while Horimiya is far more common, even beginning with a rather typical set up of two people meeting casually, one of them being a gloomy looking, depressive, black long haired with glasses otaku that was either bullied or ignored in the past, which is something all otakus has gone through in such stories and arguably in real life as well, immediately making every Twitter anime fan out there to feel identified with, that makes the top girl in his class and school fall in love with him almost right away.

Aside from the last one, those other titles share an uncommon beginning but later on they lose steam because they develop in typical ways, drag more than they need, betray in some level their premises and are left incomplete. Horimiya is the exact opposite by having a far more common beginning, playing around a bit with the stereotypes and expectations of its genre, going a lot faster than the norm and getting a complete adaptation in just one cour.

First, it goes against the initial impression by revealing right away that the protagonist is not a gloomy otaku as everyone thinks he is and he doesn’t look like what he forces himself to look, and reveals the top girl in his class to be a lot different than how everyone thinks she is as well. That’s its main hook, to make you think that you are gonna watch typical characters and then change a bit your perspective about them, while at the same time tapping into themes such as not showing yourself for who you really are because of the others’ perspectives and expectations and because of high school norms, a rather rare theme to see in anime romcoms I think, right now the only other examples like this one that I can think of are KareKano and Ouran High School.

Still, Miyamura feels like a self insert character for otakus at the beginning, because he embodies what the 2000s and early 2010s idea of cool was, with his piercings, chains, tattoos and his very typical “I take my glasses off and brush my hair back and I’m suddenly handsome and awesome” trope, which helped a lot in making the top girl in his class and school fall in love with him. Later on he’s flavored a bit more by revealing that he’s capable of beating the crap out of everyone and has some not exaggerated nor crowd pleasing homo comical bits.

As the episodes go more stuff is revealed about him and he interacts differently with more characters to make him feel like his own being instead of just a flavored combination of different stereotypes, he gets a little development and chatarsis in facing his past and his former self while appreciating how he changed and thanks to who but without disregarding who he used to be.

As for Hori the main girl, I don’t like her honestly and don’t quite grasp why is so cherished by the fandom. She has lots of typical tsundere things such as jumping to conclusions and misunderstanding things rather quickly and getting violent with Miyamura rather easily. Plus I don’t think that her conflict is as big as his, how is having a little brother to take care of and not looking as pretty as everyone made her to be can even compare? I’m not as dumb to notice that she has a tomboyish side that wants to hide from the rest but this series doesn’t do a very good job in exploring that, the previous version is better in that regard, despite still being incomplete. Honestly, the only thing that surprised me about her, and not exactly in a good way, is her unexpected kink.

That’s my initial complain with Horimiya, despite the struggles of the main characters, it doesn’t really feel that important, so yeah the characters later on learned to cope with themselves and reveal who they really are to the rest and that’s it, nothing much changes. Even Miyamura didn’t have that hard of a background story, you were ignored on middle school because of your looks, big deal. It’s a highschool drama after all, so of course I wasn’t expecting much depth or conflict, plus nobody watches a slice of life series for the plot, it’s the characters what grasps the attention of the audience, so I can let it slide.

Still, there were at least two aspects that I would have liked to see more explored, one is the hostility towards Hori’s father in his house which is just treated as a joke and the other is the hint that Miyamura felt so bad for being so lonely, it’s hinted in the series that his parents are usually away and that made him that way, but there’s literally no mention nor exploring of that in the least to make the story and characters even better. At least it was a different take on the usual trope of the protagonist being all alone in his home, in anime it’s usually portrayed as a blessing, here is the reason for a mental scar, even if it’s not a big deal and is resolved rather easily, this feels more real and better in my opinion.

Perhaps the reason for these problems have to do with the so criticized fast pacing, many moments and things were deliberately left out of the adaptation in order to stick to the most important scenes and the finale, and although the series comes off as more focused, tolerable and even enjoyable than the usual dragged on and melodramatic romcoms, at least for an anime only such as me, it does feel like the series moves from one thing to another rather fast and without giving each event that much importance nor having that much build up, it’s not done to the point of feeling like characters are being rewritten just because, but it can, and certainly did bother some people.

Still, I rather have the more believable development of the main couple that is portrayed here, than waiting for no less than thirty episodes for them to hold hands, say each other’s first name out loud, confess, and at best kiss. I mean, we do get all that (and more, although it was only hinted and not as obvious as in the source), and the characters still feel embarrassed and flustered over the pettiest things, but it all happens in half a season.

Still, I want to point out that there are moments when their relationship can come off as a bit toxic and possessive, especially from Hori. I mean, I wouldn’t have issues if the characters said stuff like this is MY girlfriend/boyfriend, but when instead you see characters that say THIS IS MINE or BELONGS TO ME, even at a point when they are still not a couple, it comes off as a bit off putting and cringy, and there are other awkward dialogues as well but that’s to be expected from a title such as this. I guess it was originally written a whole decade ago after all.

The rest of the episodes are dedicated to show more of the secondary characters, who also begin as stereotypes and are eventually shown to be more than just that and have their own stuff to cope with, as well as backgrounds stories to justify their behaviour. Not a big deal, it’s a highschool drama after all, and they don’t have super complicated characters, but it’s enough to make the cast a bit more memorable and better established as a whole than what you usually get in other similar series.

The best thing about the cast, including Hori who until now I more or less made her sound as a monster, is that is far more sensible and mature than their equals in other shows and talk about what bothers them rather quickly instead of making a big fuss over everything and dragging the series unnecessarily. That is something it has over the previous version, which is more dramatic over minor things. The few romances which I didn’t really dislike a lot have that as well (Hikari no Densetsu, Ajimu Beach Story) but I’d say Horimiya is a bit better in that regard for fleshing its cast more, in both quantity and quality, and for managing its narrative a bit better with less flaws aka fleshing them out enough before getting axed and skipping to the end with an out of nowhere time skip. Granted, not every side character is done very well (that lesbian junior and that green haired dude that speaks very loudly), but as a whole they are fine.

The finale felt satisfactory regarding characters arcs and seeing a graduation as just a step towards another phase in life that doesn’t necessarily means no longer being able to see the rest of your friends ever again, istead of the melodramatic end of the world you get on other series, and that’s fine for once.

In terms of presentation, the show has very good visuals, not suffering of obvious quality drops, and in this regard it’s way better than the other version. There are instances when some characters don’t have faces, but it’s done on purpose from the perspective of the characters that feel isolated, so it has a reason in the narrative. The designs are not that unique nor interesting but stand out a little thanks to the rather large and thin figures (not to the point of looking like XXX Holic thankfully) and the characters having their hairs and eyes of the same color, whether that is a good or bad thing is up to you, I didn’t even notice that until someone else pointed that out. The backgrounds are done well and there are effects shown as the characters’ figures presented as some sort of auras slowly coming from their bodies and getting back together during their internal dialogues and monologues, which are quite interesting to see.

As for the sound, I didn’t really feel the opening and ending songs, they are fine for the show, some will find them cute, for me they were nothing special. The voices fit the characters well but I prefer the cast from Hori-san to Miyamura-kun, still this department is serviceable as a whole.

For some final thoughts regarding the hate during the end, perhaps it’s because I’m an anime only but I don’t get it, it’s quite sad to see newer anime fans being spoiled by digital drawn animation and the possibility to acces the source material with ease to the point of complaining about not getting a panel to frame adaptation with 10/10 visuals or saying that an adaptation is shit because it has not that bad CGI for like 5 out of 24 minutes per episode. In this case, I’ve seen people saying that the manga overstays its welcome and drags with pointless stuff after a certain point, and then the adaptation skips all that to the end, and they still say the adaptation is shit for skipping the boring stuff, to me it’s just stupid, but what you gonna do.