What we have excreted from an institution housing prudent and well-meaning talent such as Production I.G and lauded by many of the film festivals it was submitted to is a terrible quasi-utilitarian short film that vilifies people for transgressing against a social contract wherein the rudimentary supplements for sustainable life—indeed, never does the film suggest that the girl living in the middle of remote-nowhere thrives off privilege or luxury—come at the cost of your very organs. Stop and think about the film's message and the way it handles it: The ordinarily inanimate objects who, for the purposes of desensitizing the viewer to a homeopathic presentation
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of the film's themes, are provided the excellence of speech and intelligence that us viewers can parse for ourselves and empathize with. The film introduces us to its moral landscape by beginning with a physical spat between clips of differing colors, sprouting from libelous exchanges across the clothing they embed, developing into a full-blown battle against each other leading to their separation to individual “clips” broken down to the coil, and comically ending with the girl's mending of them by connecting their separate parts—separate by color or limb—to one another to supersede her now-destroyed batch of clips and proceed with her clippings. Notice my usage of the adverb “comically” prior to that final clause and recall to mind that comma-clipped insertion in the sentence following that colon mark. Have you now reached the cave where my breadcrumbs trail?
Before I dig my heels down this film any more than I already have, let us first remind ourselves of its title: Pigtails, that innocuous string of eight letters arranged for international release that, when serving as its crown for promotional material, engenders a sweet frailness within our hearts and deceives it with a supposed innocence. What of its Japanese title? Mitsuami no Kami-sama, of which a literal translation on the Wikipedia page spells out “God with the Braided Pigtail Hair.” It isn’t as poetic or concise as Pigtails can be, nor does it fit well with the minimalist aesthetic bound to be many of its audience's first exposure to it, but it does grant us a single thread which we can pursue in its thematic fineries: that being its description of the female lead as a “God” (“神様” or “kamisama” in Japanese). This word is essentially the cement to which we are ascribe the role of deity to those above our planar perspectives, and its manifestations in the film can be seen in the relationship between the objects and the Pigtails Girl as well as the Pigtails Girl and the government whose scientists periodically maintain her health in preparation for their eventual dissection of her, while also supplementing us with the lenses through which we can reason out its animistic personification of the objects. The Goddess of Pigtails exercises her control over the Talking Clips by mending them by means of connection of one white leg to its red counterpart. Likewise, the Pigtailed-Girl herself shall, when her time of “expiration” comes about, be dismembered by the authorities for the sake of bringing happiness or rejuvenating life to several other people in need of her organs. We are to first laugh over the irony of the former before straining ourselves over the utility of the latter.
Whenever the film cares to hammer down the girl’s desire to seize happiness for herself, it must negate that humanity with an ever-waning, unethical philosophy that comes outside of her own autonomy as an individual and citizen within the country. Since telling this story outside of flimsy animism would conjure up a nightmare of a facility that breeds the invalidation of one’s own rights for the sake of supposedly “hard-earned” cash, we see the spans of this decrepit exploitation through the homeopathic lenses of its objects. These talking puppets become the sole groundwork for which we can derive and apply much of our interpretation of the film: Our female lead finds the comfort she needs through the recollection of memories dear to her heart, whether it be her parents’ toothbrushes she keeps in spite of their owners demise or her acquisition of a stray balloon stirring the white vignettes of a day whose clouds were permeated by the flight of released balloons. Whereas the mailman has sprung newfound happiness within her, these objects bring about happiness driven by the comfort of the past. Yet, this steel conviction comes without prudence: A radio is rebuked by an umbrella and a pillow for meaning to tell of the terrifying truths that plague the world as it is, but it soon appeases the two when, brought by the mailman to the girl’s bed, it broadcasts a song that sends a string-strum melody and honey-sweet mellifluousness down to the comfort and protection they provide themselves. If you find this to be anything besides a strengthening of the biases that have envenomed us for centuries, then you have successfully fallen for the trap of Ichiko Aoba’s lovely composition, which had initially tempted even me, and you have forsaken information for the bliss of ignorance.
Moreover, when the truth of Pigtailed-Girl’s reality is told to us by the red balloon brought from the outskirts of the walls, interspersed with the mailman’s discovery of a surgical severing and disembowelment of one of these victims, we piece together the governing principle within this facility: one that champions the maximization of happiness and well-being of the involved parties, brought to you most notably by that Mill whose eloquence is far beneath that of Milton’s. We do not see a well-constructed debate in this scene, only a brief sequence of exposition by the refugee ballon followed by a proposal for conformity by a worn-down teddy bear. Its lack of substance is precisely why it allows the swift and jarring transition from conformity to transgression in the following scene, where even the teddy bear who found a pragmatism in utilitarianism urges the Pigtailed-Girl to run for her life. At this point, it comes as no surprise that the instilling of sentience into these objects has worked its way towards the path antithetical to an affirmation thereof. Though the transmission of material now useless in its current apparatus to a newer one may be deemed sustainable, the contextualization of these ideas through literal sentience puts into question the ethicality of the deed. Utilitarianism as a philosophy doesn’t work in any functional society because it eradicates the bodily autonomy one may have over oneself while allowing itself to be justified by the often-exploitative social contract which demands the individual be stripped of certain expenditures of their self shall they wish to live under a certain society. Why is it that the mailman and the janitor who cleans his room do not know of the dissections until the former spies on one of such procedures? Simply because parading such to the public would bombard the government with scrutiny among the masses. The film proposes to us a society in which the upper class can pay for the organs of those more unfortunate than them, all for the sake of its prosperity which is literally capitalism. So much for maximizing good with the least amount of harm.
If you still find yourself unpersuaded by my claims, you need only replay the scene in which the girl feigns her inclusion with the boy to that world outside the walls that have barricaded her from freedom for so long. Why, upon letting go of her hand, does the boy become distraught and the film cut to downward shot of her body falling, of whom its surroundings are momentarily transposed by a spatial nothingness soon becoming occupied by a clutter of fresh, clean, and new objects all suspended in time, then disrupted by the sound of the ladder hitting the ground, damning us by the sight of her white dress surrounded by the disordered mess of shattered, disposed, and old objects. She revolts against the objects conditioned to serve her under subsidiary, inanimate roles; she appeases to the government that violates the autonomy of another person to maximize utility—she becomes an “object.” Why do you think that the film never shows us the verbalized thoughts of the objects when she returns to her house, that cage binding her to her one purpose in life, besides that of the red balloon having loomed from the other side? Where balloons had once been the stimulus reigniting memories of former happiness, they have now become the symbol whose happiness she must protect. Our protagonist’s maturation comes from her rejection of that which would have soothed her humanity, love and happiness, for the sake of the oppressive and exploitative “common good,” diluted through the shreds of propaganda and mass manipulation. Forever holding the white vignettes of her childhood, she chooses to stay inside the cave.
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Jan 29, 2025
Mitsuami no Kamisama
(Anime)
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What we have excreted from an institution housing prudent and well-meaning talent such as Production I.G and lauded by many of the film festivals it was submitted to is a terrible quasi-utilitarian short film that vilifies people for transgressing against a social contract wherein the rudimentary supplements for sustainable life—indeed, never does the film suggest that the girl living in the middle of remote-nowhere thrives off privilege or luxury—come at the cost of your very organs. Stop and think about the film's message and the way it handles it: The ordinarily inanimate objects who, for the purposes of desensitizing the viewer to a homeopathic presentation
...
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Apr 1, 2024
Jaku-Chara Tomozaki-kun 2nd Stage
(Anime)
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(Edit [4/23/24]: Since MAL doesn't allow its reviewers to use BBCode, I've decided to stylize the titles mentioned in the below review in all caps to avoid confusion between the terms "Tomozaki," the titular character of the series, and "TOMOZAKI," the series itself, which I slightly treat like an entity in this review.)
BOTTOM-TIER CHARACTER TOMOZAKI is an anime that suffers an inorganic script despite its desperate attempts to achieve a sincerity that’s only muddled in its convolution and contrivance; its symbolism is so on-the-nose that it disgraces the subtlety inherent in incorporating such in a composition. (Think about any sort of foreshadowing of Mimimi’s infatuation ... for Tomozaki and Kikuchi’s play here.) It alienates its viewers even during its most intimate because of the rigidity that it’s afraid of discarding for something truly sincere and resonating in its audience’s hearts. With an incredibly mundane script that’s degraded whenever the anime tries to color it with its shoehorned platitudes, the anime remains clunky even in stationary instances, and its delivery always seems insufficient. One particular aspect that I furrowed my eyebrows at whenever inserted in the anime’s already lackadaisical script was the occasional usage of video game terminologies and analogies among Tomozaki and Hinami, which are of a nature so ludicrous as to cheese in the savviness of the two characters in video games. It must then follow that the only notable development I ever found in this season was the virtual absence thereof throughout the second half of the story, of which it becomes more bearable without my personal issues with the bland script. However, the plot that carries such, as well as the presentation that burdens itself with that upon its back, erodes the majority of possible, positive comments that I could ever formulate in my head regarding the anime. Another feature inherent in TOMOZAKI that I would like to mention is certain characters’ adjustment to generic attitudes for the sake of soothing themselves into their environment, for Tama’s character demonstrates a development of that gone successful through the generic conversational jabs she learns from her friends, contrasting Tomozaki’s incapability to let a conversation he isn’t intrinsically drawn to flow. Note the following down: TOMOZAKI isn’t an anime about genuinely expressing one’s own feelings; it is an anime that aims for generic appeal, whether that be founded in its world or in a meta sense. Any hint of sincerity one may derive from TOMOZAKI is shattered the moment one finds that it is about reaching a level of social moderation; the factors contributing to such matter not. Hinami solidifies this whenever one allows her the moment of speech for Tomozaki. Her plans for him are merely only ways for him to reach a level of accessibility and openness to others around him, whether the way he conducts his strides towards the goals she’s arranged for him is inorganic or of sincerity. What matters first and foremost is the objective; the means through which one achieves such is of secondary importance. Tama's character arc is spoiled with a script that doesn't trust the viewer enough to make a point without pampering them. (No, Tomozaki, I would much prefer this scene without your monologuing an already conspicuous element prominent throughout it.) It is detached from provoking any pinch of engagement from the viewer with its convoluted developments and comical tamings of Tama’s character. This banality is only amplified more with its bleak presentation, utterly devoid of any visual literacy: in the most tense, mere pans and amateurishly but adequately stitched sequences; in the most sentimental, attempts at obfuscating a shred of intimacy by over-emphasizing lighting or tonal dissonance, much grounded in the anime's tactlessness to its surroundings. This inflexibility in presentation is elucidated in the latter half of the season, in which the narrative focuses more on character development, one awfully relative to others. Soon, Tomozaki, Kikuchi, and Mimimi enter a love triangle that shapes the latter half of the season, in which the most character development Tomozaki acquires from oscillating between the two main heroines is from the manifestation of such selections, when his introspection familiarizes us with his current discontents with his interpersonal relationships with those around him—soon resolved by the action of one of those he holds a comical attachment to, Mimimi. Once this detachment is enclosed, the character development of Tomozaki remains stagnant, and the nourishing of such shifts its focus onto the two, current main heroines: Kikuchi and Mimimi. Any sort of nuance to be possibly found in his self-resolve is disintegrated for the sake of polishing these two and their personal conflicts. Kikuchi’s main concern is the overreliance she’s refined in her comfort space, which includes her zealous interactions with Tomozaki and her taciturness, all of which have materialized a desire to branch out from her space of solace for what she obscurely describes as the “world’s ideal,” i.e., how she perceives others necessitates her to become, one she believes contrasts her nature to the presumable perfection of the class Madonna Aoi Hinami. Of course, this is all a confinement she has surfaced with mere assumptions of her environment, which ultimately disregards how she truly feels about certain objects significant to her and so is thus only a self-centered overview on the environment. However, instead of portraying the dimensions to her situation with a cohesive fragmentation that simmers the nuances within such, TOMOZAKI figures its best utility to be the iron ladle with which it brews an unengaging approach to her conflicts: So little attention is actually focused on Kikuchi’s development as a character because of the rushed pacing of the narrative as well as the narrative’s inclination to molding a character like a boring university lecture (or a dialogue of minimal stylistic endeavor, for that matter). Viewers are spoonfed the situation around Kikuchi whenever the narrative ever cares to showcase her direction of the class’s practices of their play—the script of which she wrote, and so she balances between directing and scriptwriting, though this feat is hardly ever probed upon, something I consider a missing piece in her character development—but the narrative never dares to come close to Kikuchi’s internal conflict aside from superficial instances of interlaced discord, thereby instead focusing on the environment rather than the character. One could argue that this is a commendable touch to the sort of “oppression” Kikuchi feels from her surroundings that are never controlled under her stead, but the dialogue between characters assessing the situation contrasts that notion by trying to empathize with Kikuchi’s inward discontents. Thus, disorientation is founded by an acute clash between two significantly equal layers of narrative in audiovisual form. It isn’t any less surprising to say that how the anime showcases Tomozaki’s attempts to trace Kikuchi’s behavior are as insipid as the ambivalence thereof. Again, this structure of the story is struck by its attempt to shoehorn the dynamics of all the characters in a rushed manner. As I previously mentioned, the story arc’s focus oscillates between Tomozaki’s relationship between the two main heroines, Kikuchi and Mimimi, of which the former bears a denser application in the plot. Consequently, whenever the focus of the story awkwardly shifts to Tomozaki and Mimimi’s adorkable interactions (with the subtleties in their expressions and bodies a refreshing touch to see, considering the anime’s abstinence from such in other departments), the perplexing abyss within Kikuchi’s character arc is only ever so enhanced. Though I could have tolerated this sort of attitude had it been handled with more tact, the narrative expects us to consistently understand that Tomozaki is brewing an adequate model of her character in the intervals between his charming banter with Mimimi. Indeed, it plays a role in amplifying the shared experience of the viewer and Tomozaki, both of whom lack the layers through which their lenses may operate under, but it is done at the cost of a contextualization that the anime continues to expect you to hinge upon. In the 11th episode, Tomozaki, upon remembering a Michael Andi book of significance to Kikuchi—THE POPPER ON RAPTOR ISLE—decides to leaf through it overnight. Unlike the several, vivid drafts of Kikuchi’s play, crudely titled MY UNFAMILIAR WAY TO FLY, that are iterated throughout the course of this story arc, the details of the book are simplified so as to deliver a single, direct unveiling of Kikuchi’s character. Naturally, in eschewing the fine minutiae—a characteristic that Kikuchi unequivocally scopes upon due to her inclination towards nuanced character writing, as implied throughout her numerous chats with Tomozaki—the impact intended in such a blow is lost, felt to be shoehorned at best, blundered at worst. This juncture only worsens as the scene progresses, as Tomozaki suggests elements that even the viewer is disillusioned about considering their unfamiliarity of the work being importantly referenced at the moment. He provides her a push that feels weightless to the viewer, so the only good the scene does then is to continue the plot with a forced development. Moreover, since Kikuchi’s play’s drafts are iterated throughout the story arc with the essential elements intact (thus decently forming a cohesive whole I shan’t complain about much), the whiplash upon seeing it being shoddily performed on the stage is of attention to my withered eyes. With already salient symbolism that abandons any nuance or subtlety in the concocting of the play and the visceral feelings Kikuchi holds for it, it’s a shallow enough article of reliance that the narrative frequently uses to express Kikuchi’s current states of thought. Bulldozing through the sordidly rigid-looking postures and actions of the actors—of which the characters they portray are representative of Hinami, Tomozaki, and Kikuchi’s personalities (although you already knew that considering the fact that Mimimi utters them with complete conviction, used as devices for maximized comprehensibility of the situation and plot progression, another nail to the head on the anime’s on-the-nose approach to its narrative)—numerous moments of spatial inconsistency, a condensed performance of the story that the viewer’s become all too familiar with, and the other pompous characteristics it blindly wears, one finds Kikuchi’s mundane attitude towards Tomozaki according to her “ideal world.” Again, since any shred of character development Tomozaki could’ve attained through this story arc is eschewed for the sake of developing the main heroines instead, Tomozaki is at a stagnance. Though he may have been dejected for a while after understanding Kikuchi’s intentions with that bewildering and perplexing conclusion, a little push from Mimimi sends him to convince Kikuchi in a world that would be ideal for her: not through her words, but through his. Throughout the anime, Tomozaki has always refined Kikuchi’s ideals by offering his own thoughts that then supersede her perceptions for the presupposed “better.” He tells her about refining her solace in the world instead, for that is what she is truly passionate about. Therefore, Kikuchi’s character development isn’t the embracement of a world by her unadulterated accord, but a refinement of it—pertaining to her personal desires—with her reliance on Tomozaki. Therefore, Kikuchi’s character development is practically nil. Of course, her relationship with Tomozaki has deepened, but her state as a character is essentially the same as always, a girl passionate about nuanced artistic expression through language and reliant on Tomozaki as a supporting pillar. However, this holds little difference to her starting square. The whole point of her taking the courage she needed to shape the class play was for her to develop as a girl who others could rely on, for she was dissatisfied with her preceding notions of bonds, but Tomozaki tells her that it’s okay to regress to that as long as she can still branch out while in that state, which is something that Kikuchi had already been doing. Him opening up about this only made her slightly more demanding of his attention—the absolute crux of this character development nonsense. As with how Tomozaki oscillates between Kikuchi and Mimimi in his romantic endeavors, Kikuchi’s story arc has been loaded with her oscillating between the “world’s ideals,” as perceived by herself which immediately questions the concreteness of such a phrase, and her desires—one tiresome, lackadaisical treatment of character writing akin to that of a ping pong match. On the other hand, Mimimi’s inner conflicts are more romantically centered than those of Kikuchi’s. Mimimi constantly finds herself in a conundrum with the mass of girls she finds to be held in a potentially romantic regard for Tomozaki, though a fair number of these are her little delusions, such as the moment in which she encounters Tomozaki’s co-worker Tsugumi Narita and her friends and proceeds to comically doubt his decency as a man. Mimimi’s character development is rooted more in resilience and acceptance, as she cherishes the transient moments she shares with Tomozaki while hiding herself with a face of acceptance of his state of affairs, a passive approach that contrasts Kikuchi’s active actions to cater to a world she deems “ideal” in her story arc. Besides a few savory moments ruined by the anime’s insipid production values, the moments in which Mimimi interacts with Tomozaki are brimmed with the appropriate atmosphere and tone. Though their snark is repetitive, it feels digestible from a mellow perspective of an adorkable couple of high school children with a romantic ambivalence tied to their relationship. Mimimi can act in rather exaggerated ways, but they complement the density and rigidity of an individual like Tomozaki. The script doesn’t particularly flourish around these instances, but it definitely has a standard that suffices the dynamics between the two, and it pertains to said dynamic enough to be free of acute criticism. However, as with the case of Kikuchi, I find the anime to be too afraid of shifting character perspectives for a satisfactory amount of time. Because of its adherence to unfolding through the lenses of the protagonist Tomozaki, it misses the moments in which Tomozaki’s presence cannot be savored by the environment. When Mimimi tolerates Tomozaki leaving the park to focus on the play with Kikuchi, I wish to see more of Mimimi’s conduct once he leaves. I wish to see the nuances that tug her heart to her desire for him. Most of the time the anime cares to show us Mimimi lamenting over her infatuation for Tomozaki, Tomozaki’s presence is there for her to consider and think about. This reliance the narrative holds for Tomozaki is a flaw that deters the viewer from thoroughly understanding the minutiae the characters bear in themselves, a characteristic I think enhances the resonating quality of a narrative set in one’s juvenile years. Subsequent to pushing Tomozaki to confront Kikuchi about her presumed rejection of him, Mimimi bawls with her broken heart, but that bawling is only a superficial layer to understanding her character, which, once again, eschews the significant reason why this love triangle was set in the first place (to develop its characters). In spite of its efforts to produce a raw sentiment among its cast, BOTTOM-TIER CHARACTER TOMOZAKI 2ND STAGE lacks a conviction in its delivery dichotomous to the one Mimimi has to support her loved one, even if it risks the structure of her relationship. The series is loaded with superficial elements that hinder any possible nuance in its progression as a truly sincere work. Its presentation is second-rate and insufficient to the anchor its content holds with its saccharine desire to reach a level of sensibility and relatability. At its best, one finds slightly nuanced interactions (not necessarily exclusive to dialogue) between characters. At its worst, an insipid, regressive work that lacks the vitality to achieve the humanity it shallowly emulates. Tomozaki is a banal work that cannot balance any of its layers, thereby propagating one mess of a script of character writing, symbolism, plot progression, all of which is never elevated by its rigid audiovisuals.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Jun 14, 2023
Kanojo mo Kanojo
(Manga)
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Recommended
Make no mistake—Kanojo mo Kanojo is a series that’ll deter one’s number of brain cells the more he or she consumes content of it (be it the series itself, a shitpost, or even a review). I suppose that it’s simply inevitable that any critical thought on the series would state a fair amount of flaws. Really, it’s a dumpster fire. However, it is also a series that is not meant to be consumed seriously overall. Thus, even if not constructive, I shall spout “fire” about Kanojo mo Kanojo, as it is a manga that I adore to the core.
Kanojo mo Kanojo is quite the ... eccentric series thematically; its characters are schizophrenic—especially the main girls—and the many ridiculously immense stupid happenings within the plot blow quite the whiplash. This only accumulates as the manga progresses; most of the time such is executed comically, but sometimes it’s also done in a slightly much more serious tone in (obviously) more significant scenes that could alter the story’s trajectory. I don’t exactly consider this as a bad aspect of Kanojo mo Kanojo, as I wouldn’t even assess it seriously in its entirety, since I think it's much more proficient in its comedy than its drama, though such is a trait I often expect whenever consuming a comedy or harem anime or manga. Anyhow, in turn, you’ll either love or hate (most likely individually) the characters. Each one of the characters in this series acts in varying degrees of impulsivity, the most tantamount to the summits of such being the main character, Naoya, whose defining trait is that he’s insanely straightforward and, as stated by his first girlfriend SakiSaki, someone who “somehow always gets what he wants.” He’s also the character who yells the most, which I suppose could cause a bundle of readers to tune out or even loathe his character. But, surprisingly (not!), every other character in this series is just as brain dead as Sir Straightforward, and they all worsen in intelligence as the series progresses. As I wrote a paragraph ago, the most schizophrenic elements are found in the main girls: SakiSaki’s temper and ambiguousness, Nagisa’s tenderness and consideration, Mirika’s fiery determination, and Shino’s (Kino’s) shrewdness all amalgamate to tropey brain damage—only that this time it exceeds in such. Yet, Kanojo mo Kanojo endlessly entertains me with its absurdity founded in its inability to hardly take itself seriously. The characters are so immensely hysterical in most of what they do that it’s hard to ever catch any substance of rationality. It’s a sense of the cast’s chemistry that utterly engages me, and it continuously drives its momentum to sheer entertainment, resulting in nothing but my succumb to it. The humor in Kanojo mo Kanojo never disappoints in consistency. It mainly constitutes overboard surreal, slapstick comedy (who would’ve guessed that it had such a unique comedic structure, huh) that heavily exaggerates itself. Comedy (in this case being surreal) is a highly subjective genre, and slapstick is quite hit-or-miss. A great handful of the comedy in Kanojo mo Kanojo consists of the characters’ degeneracy as they slowly lose any faint sound thought throughout their spiral of adapting or opposing to the polygamous relationship instigated by Sir Straightforward. A character’s intrinsic nature engulfs their sanity, and then they proceed to follow just that, causing the many antics the reader will experience and possibly be amused or dismayed by. Frankly, I’m of the former. It’s pure delirium, regardless of however formulaic, that continuously bewilders me each panel. Even if a scene doesn’t exactly make me laugh, I’d be lying if I ever said I was never stimulated by it. It’s genuinely nonsensical and electrifying in that sense, and I’d gladly take it. To amplify such lunacy, Hiroyuki (the mangaka) incorporates a fair amount of simplistic dynamic effects (e.g., “speed lines'' most noticeable whenever SakiSaki punches Naoya) to evoke the sheer momentum within the most comical scenes in the story, while soft additions (e.g., "love bubbles" in romantic scenes) are employed in delicate scenes so as to illustrate a character’s warmth. All of this is standard practice in manga technicalities, but Hiroyuki utilizes such at just the right number of doses when most relevant or appropriate. I also think that Hiroyuki showcases his best character designs in Kanojo mo Kanojo, as each one of them sufficiently expresses the defining qualities of the character. Sometimes the background of Kanojo mo Kanojo, especially in the two-page spreads, arouse jarring juxtapositions between it and the scene’s subjects, though such isn’t executed so horrendously that it would make me dislike it. I actually like it and find it endearing. The art of Kanojo mo Kanojo isn’t anything fresh or the like, but it is outstanding in what it attempts to achieve, and such is perfectly suitable for its narrative. Moreover, lying under the multi-layered comedic structure is the series’ baffling tackling of polygamy. While Naoya simply wishes to sustain a satisfying polygamous relationship with his girlfriends, the rest of his harem feel conflicted in various ways. Such an unorthodox concept in romance fiction isn’t addressed the best here, noticeable as the characters’ approach to such is hardly constant nor concrete. However, something I think it tackles adequately is the character dynamics, often questioning how each one of them feels about their relationships with others. The author understands that this varies between each character and often uses it within the plot. Romance is a topic that simply isn’t exclusive to a single variety. It’s diverse, and, despite it being comically displayed here, can concoct a delightful narrative. The absurdities within the spectrum of infatuation and love conceived aflutter in each one of their arbitrary minds, so fragile yet firm, so instantaneous yet gradual, so ambivalent yet acute. Nonetheless, Kanojo mo Kanojo seems oblivious in one or two aspects, but I, at the very least, enjoyed reading it. One could perhaps say that I’m simply overshadowing a value over another, but Kanojo mo Kanojo is a story that I believe hardly offers anything notably valuable thematically. Rather, its greatest strength is its direction for amusement. If even something substandard can unironically pleasure, whether guiltily or not, its consumer, it at least deserves commendation for such. Thus, once again, I indulge myself in escapism, and I find it charming. Schizo Kino Kiryuu/10.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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