Boku no Kokoro no Yabai Yatsu

Kyoutarou Ichikawa may look like a shy and reserved middle school student, but deep within his heart is a bloodthirsty killer. His ultimate desire is to see his classmate Anna Yamada's beautiful face writhing in pain before he ends her life. But this fantasy may never come to fruition, as Ichikawa starts to see an entirely different side to Yamada.

Often seeking refuge in the library, Ichikawa frequently runs into Yamada. It is during these encounters that Ichikawa realizes his model classmate is actually an airhead who can never read the room. As they spend more time together, the boy cannot help but feel not only a sense of endearment toward the very girl he wishes to murder but also a desire to protect her at all costs. Is it possible that this sudden change in Ichikawa's perspective could lead to something more?

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Yamada, Anna Main

Youmiya, Hina Japanese

Ichikawa, Kyoutarou Main

Horie, Shun Japanese

Ichikawa, Kana Supporting

Tamura, Yukari Japanese

Sekine, Moeko Supporting

Han, Megumi Japanese

Yamada, Sanae Supporting

Minaguchi, Yuko Japanese

Imaginary Kyoutarou Supporting

Fukuyama, Jun Japanese

Hara, Honoka Supporting

Toyosaki, Aki Japanese

Kobayashi, Chihiro Supporting

Asai, Ayaka Japanese

Adachi, Shou Supporting

Okamoto, Nobuhiko Japanese

Yoshida, Serina Supporting

Tanezaki, Atsumi Japanese

Sotokawa, Akihiro Producer

Matsui, Yuuko Producer

Endou, Kazuki Producer

Lee, Sang-jun Producer

Reviews

Dec 10, 2023

KoraxCatalyst

Recommended

Well-written

Anime romantic comedies are a dime a dozen and they have been for over forty years now. The moment some savvy producer looked at the seminal Urusei Yatsura in the late 70’s and was like “We could totally milk the shit out of this,” it was basically all over from there. This reached critical mass in the 2000’s when some iteration of “random douchebag attracts a bunch of socially unstable weirdos and they run around for 13-25 episodes" or "random airheaded bimbo finds some hot piece of bishounen ass to abuse her for 13-25 episodes” became a disproportionate amount of the anime industry’s output. while ... there’s still the occasional harem manga adaptation, these types of stories have largely been subsumed into the now derided Isekai light novel power fantasy whose continued prevalence in the industry still baffles me, I’m pretty sure these things don’t make that much money. And Traditional Shoujo manga adaptations are ostensibly nonexistent these days. It’s a genre that’s morphed into either adaptations of web manga that aren’t explicitly marketed for teenage girls, but still largely cater to female audiences. And, wouldn’t you know it? Isekai light novel adaptations. They’re just in a dating sim this time, you see? ;)

In the maelstrom of all these industry changes, you get a new type of rom-com, the Reiwa Era Comedy. These types of romance stories, usually aimed at adult men though they feature mostly teenagers, have a meta-textual understanding of its own genre trappings, and thus seek to find ways to retool its own formula and keep this gravy train going. Because, despite the fact that Japanese people are far too overworked, and far too fed up with their own gender roles to actually manifest their own fulfilling relationships in real life, they'll gladly read dozens of manga about (usually) kids tailspinning around their own gimmick for 100 chapters until they finally grow the fuck up and get together. The titles of these works are so cliche they can basically be madlibbed at this point: [anime girl name] is [adjective] etc. etc. To be a bit more charitable, these titles are comparatively more flexible than their harem manga predecessors in terms of what kinds of relationships we’re allowed to see. They can be romantic associates with a single cogent goal like in Komi-san, they can be basically dating in everything but name like in My Dress Up Darling, or they can be straight-up dating from the start like in Shikimori. As similar as these works tend to be, they all have at least one specific trait that sets them apart from the others, on top of whatever wish fulfillment they’re trying to convey to their audience.

After spending two paragraphs getting to the fucking point, Boku no Kokoro no Yabai Yatsu is a pretty good example of this type of romance story. The fantasy this time is, what if you were some socially maladjusted chuuni who also so happens to have attracted the hottest girl in class, and she’s autistic! In all seriousness, what made me interested in Bokuyaba from the outset is the neurotic angle the series takes toward its male and female leads. The only reason the story is even possible is BECAUSE the characters are as neurotic/neurodivergent as they are.

If I had to describe what the author was trying to do with Bokuyaba, it would be: redeeming the parts of Shoujo manga that made it appealing, cutting out the cringe(y fetishes), and conveying that exact appeal to an intended male audience. Don’t get me wrong, Bokuyaba is just as fetishistic as those girl’s manga tend to be, it’s just more so in its design sensibilities than in the scenario writing itself. Like, when I was taking glances at the manga to look for any interesting comparisons for the sake of this review, all I could think was, “Wow, this mangaka really wants her audience to fuck this 12 year old girl.” Sure, there’s a character who’s a literal fat fetishist, but he’s not the focus, nor is the story trying to forgive him for being such. There’s no attempt to legitimize middle schoolers trying to pound their 25 year old teachers, or their cousins, or their 25 year old cousins, in the same way as the supposedly wholesome main couple of a Shoujo manga story. In fact, I think Bokuyaba’s romanticism coupled with its acknowledgement of its character’s sexualities is one of the work’s strengths. There’s this adult-like attitude where yeah, these kids could totally have sex at some point in the future, and that doesn’t ruin anything about the story or the power fantasy. It’s not why you’re watching per se, but it makes the story feel more “real". I won't lie, when Kyoutarou in episode 12 stops then—in a flash—anxiously checks his trashcan to make sure his "tissues" were tossed out while Anna was IN HIS ROOM like two feet away, I was fucking howling. I genuinely wonder if the author has a younger sibling and they told her of a similar humorous story (though, given the subtle siscon stuff in this show, for the love of god I hope not).

And what’s more impressive is that it doesn’t annoy me that the characters aren’t immediately getting together. A defining characteristic about good anime romantic comedies is seeing how the two main leads develop, both because of and independently of each other. Despite how Anna is very obviously DTF for much of this story, the main reason they’re not is because the main character is a horrifically insecure and anxious kid. Kyoutarou HAS to change in order for their relationship to even be possible, because where he is at the beginning of the story is far too emotionally fragile for there to be anything healthy. He has to accept who he is, and accept the possibility that people CAN like that. While I wasn’t completely relating to the main character in every situation (the kid is more of a well-dressed edgelord than I’ll ever be), there were moments where Kyotarou would misinterpret an event in an overly negative light, and I would go “Bro, that’s literally me when I was his age.” It’s kind of unsettling after a certain point, but it makes me appreciate what the author was trying to do with her main character.

While there’s less to say about Anna Yamada, she’s pretty good too. She’s not impotent or powerless, she’s actually quite proactive in her feelings, but also quite considerate. She tries to be subtle sometimes, but she's also very clumsy and awkward—she isn’t tongue-in-cheek in the way a lot of “quirky” anime girls try to be. Anna is a child so much of her attempts at romance boil down to a combination of internet research, media portrayals, and guesstimations. Much of Anna's mindset towards her relationship in this story is having her special fru fru Shoujo manga romance based off of a series she likes, it's another reason why the relationship progresses more slowly. I joked about her being autistic earlier, but when Anna in like episode 2 straight up tells another character that they’re “practicing their jokes” implying they don’t entirely understand what makes a joke funny on an intuitive level, I’mma think a certain way. I still can't get over how right after the scene of Anna doing the little happy dance in the park because she recieved a keychain as gift from her (not)-boyfriend—I got a text from an IRL friend of mine, who's also on the spectrum, of TikTok of a dancing flamingo telling me how it was literally them (my friend will, in fact, dance when happy if you let them), it fucking kills me. Anna is still a normie, and in fact, the show goes out of its way to note this multiple times. But, she’s a weird normie, one who’s survived due her exceptional upbringing and good looks

In relation to Anna, another thing I’ll praise about the show is its subtle character writing, masked through the subjective lens that the story filters itself through. Early on, there’s a bit where Anna asks Kyoutarou to borrow his paper fan and mentions how good the fan smells. Kyoutarou explicitly mentions that he didn’t buy a scented a fan when walking over to Anna to vet her point. And while Kyoutarou was too distracted by how beautiful Anna was to figure it out, the only scent the fan could have was FROM Kyoutarou because he was holding it all fucking day. When I realized this, I was like, “Nah, she did NOT just try that shit.” And while it didn’t work, that’s when I realized the mangaka really did care when crafting her scenarios and that I should be paying attention when Anna does things. I love stuff like that, and Boku no Kokoro no Yabai Yatsu is full of it. Some people have questioned why the show takes place in middle school, and I would chalk it up to the point I made earlier about "redeeming the tropes" or whatever. The world Bokuyaba takes place in is grounded enough that if these kids we're any older it wouldn't be believable. Hell, characters IN universe hardly can and they're like, thirteen. And since chuunibyo is a key element of the text early on, middle school jives well with the story's overall atmosphere and themes of adolescent self-acceptance.

To talk about the more technical aspects of Bokuyaba for a little bit, the show overall looks pretty solid. While the storyboards and character design work are (usually) nothing to write home about, Bokuyaba is animated fairly competently and the show looks its best when the digital compositing puts in the hard work to make its scenes really pop. Kensuke Ushio of all people did the soundtrack, and while I think it’s weaker when compared to his work on Chainsaw Man or A Silent Voice, there’s a few tracks on the Bokuyaba ost that just hit to such a satisfying extent and really captures what makes those scenes significant to the main character.

Bokuyaba is, for the most part, fairly simple outside of what I described. It’s not completely vapid, but it’s also not peak anime kino either, though it's not trying to be. Bokuyaba is trying to do something distinct and special in an increasingly over-saturated rom-com scene where a new quirky couple pops up every other week. And as someone who had been loosely interested in the property for some time, I can say I was pretty satisfied with the product I got. Good things are made sometimes and I don’t need to be all cynical about it. It helps that my life has been legit hell recently and I’ve had some of the worst weeks of my life just occur, Bokuyaba was a nice respite in the midst that. And I’m sure if any of the creators of either the show or the manga read what I just wrote, they'd feel just that little bit more confident in what they made, frankly, they should.

Have a nice day.

Reviewer’s Rating: 7

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Jun 18, 2023

SpRayquaza11

Mixed Feelings

This show, like the title did say was quite ~yabai~ in the first few episodes but trust me it does develop fairly well in the later episodes.

I thought this was just gonna be a chunni freak show with weird fanservice which it manages to fit in quite a good amount of, the boisterous and ultra well endowed little giant of girl yamada anna , (who we are somehow supposed to believe) is a middle school student and a model is alarmingly unaware of her antics of overeating and accidental fanservicing which are fueled by the chunni and Perverted delusions of our main lead ichikawa who ... also fantasies about murdering people in elaborate ways? Yeah I was gonna drop it soon too.

But,

We actually got a decently written Romance in which the MC actually improves as the story and his love progresses and he goes from I gotta murder her to protecc her quite smoothly and the subtle hints of romance and the doki moments are well placed with no bs ecchi accidents and are usually quite heartwarming! It is a slow burn and definitely stings to your cringe bone for a while but it does get better later on! Does that warrant a watch?

Well it depends


story(6/10)
I know even after showering it with praise I can't sing much home about the plot and its progression as such, the gluttonous genki girl who belongs to and is the star of the unattainable group of cute girls gang somehow catches the attention and spends time with the most chunni and loner guy of the class, there are the standard christmas date , study camps ,sick visits, and photoshoots topped with, obviously, sex jokes and lewd remarks which are either supposed to be funny or be relatable to our own dark past do not amount to a substantial plot , its mostly always just a setting for the characters to get closer to each other. I seriously cannot emphasize enough about this THERE IS SIMPLY NOTHING UNIQUE in this story , is it heartwarming and cute at times ? sure yes it is but that is definitely the characters not the plot.

Characters (8/10)
The character development is all the romance anime have to show any semblance of plot and subsequently romantic progression , and in this anime the journey of Ichikawa from being a perverted and frankly messed up lonely murder fantasy nerd , whose only intention of even justifying his actions is “Oh ill murder her some day” to someone who is able to stand up for her and openly admit that he loves here was a slow but enjoyable and frankly very cute ride. Yamada as well becomes more aware of her.

Art and animation (7/10)
Okay I will give it some points for the art style being a bit more unique than standard and definitely the animation is okay and actually surprisingly good sometimes for a romcom.

Sound and VA(7/10)
The OP and ED or even the ost is not much special except on maybe the "karte" moments , Voice acting of ichikawa is mostly the standout thing , but that is cz its 80% of monloguing , the other VAs do an good job too.


I can recommend this only if one has the persistence and tolerance of powering through the first three or four episodes , because it certainly only becomes a mildly interesting romance after them.

Reviewer’s Rating: 7

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Mar 10, 2024

Satania_san

Not Recommended

People love to dump on Rent a Girlfriend because of the brainless plot and the snail-pace story progress. But oh boy, is that show a masterpiece compared to this cringe fest, and I simply can't understand its popularity or why it's so highly rated. First of all, the show is a complete insult to people that struggle with social anxiety and have trouble fitting in. This is the most shameless and lazy wish-fulfilling escapist fantasy that I've seen in recent memory. No chance in hell that a literal model would fall for this tiny creepy guy who dose absolutely NOTHING throughout the whole show or ... has any meaningful interactions with her. This is the ultimate loser fantasy of "what if the hottest chick in class falls for me for no apparent reason while I do absolutely nothing about myself" which is not a recipe for a good plot. No wonder they made the girl so dumb and clueless that she literally fell in love with the protag because he offered her candy when they hang in the library (??!!). Yes, the characters are this cringe (and what's with this awful character design? Why did they make the girl look like a a woman in her 20s and the guy like he's a 10 yo boy?).

Concerning the writing, the two main characters rarely have any interesting or meaningful dialogue, literally every scene is just about them getting embarrassed around each other after finding themselves in some kind of cringy situation (and without the show ever making clear why they have a chemistry in the first place). This is like a low IQ version of Takagi-san, without the witty exchanges and the good humor. It's like watching cringe in slow motion, so if you enjoy second-hand embarrassment this is the show for you.

And aside from this, the show is extremely slow, and there was absolutely no reason to make two seasons out of it. It just drags and drags with very minimal character development or story progression. There are plenty of good romance anime about an "unpopular guy gets a girl" that there is no reason to watch this trash. The best ones are Nagatoro and My Dress-up Darling, each great in its own way. Another very good one is the recent "The Girl I Like Forgot Her Glasses", which despite the ridiculous premise has very appealing characters with heart-warming interactions (a honorable mention is "My Love Story with Yamada-kun at Lv999" which is a shoujo). A truly great and underrated show that deals with social anxiety in very realistic and relatable way is Watamote and I can't recommend it enough. So please save your time and watch something else.

Reviewer’s Rating: 5

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