Yaoi/BL/Shounen Ai anime (C Group) short reviews
15. Super Lovers
Rating: C+
Watch it for free: https://www.crunchyroll.com/super-lovers
- This show is a straight-up romance that follows the trials and tribulations of a single main couple. The show leans too heavily on misunderstandings and a lack of communication between the main couple to have it be as interesting as it could be. Tropes are leaned on pretty heavily here too (main guy is so hot that even the moms at best guy's school drool over him, best guy is so cute that all the hot guys want to do him). Also, the elephant in the room: this main couple really, really skirts the line of pedophilia. The supporting cast is great, though, and are really, really under-utilized. They basically all exist to help or cause problems for the two main guys, when they are each very interesting in their own right (aki, shima, natsuo, haruko, kiri, etc). Upsides: nice character animation, great supporting cast. Downsides: too much misunderstanding/communication drama, the pedo vibe, severely underutilized amazing supporting cast.
16. This Boy Can Fight Aliens
Rating: C+
Watch it by pirating it (I had to)
- "This Boy" series. The art is weird as usual, 3rd out of 4. The story for this one is a lot different, and it doesn't honestly seem to have a romantic plot at all... exactly. It can possibly be inferred, but it's all in subtext, and because there are 3 principles in the series, the relationship lines are blurred. At the end I was still not completely sure if this had any romance in it at all, and the crap video quality of the version I watched didn't help. All three principles involved in the main story seem to be adults. The show relies completely on the plot and the personal issues of the main character Kakashi, to hold itself up, and I think that's fine. This was the most unique of the four shows in terms of storyline anyway. Upsides: Unique plot. Completely unpredictable. No Yaoi tropes at play, no rapey situations, no weird pedo plotlines. Downsides: Short. No clear relationships. Disappointed that Arikawa didn't get the play I thought he was since he would've been a very unusual love interest for a BL story.
17. Junjou Romantica (all seasons)
Rating: C
Watch it for free: https://www.crunchyroll.com/junjo-romantica
- From the same creator as Sekaiichi Hatsukoi (World's Greatest First Love), this follows almost the exact same beats as Sekaiichi but does them all worse somehow. We have 3 main couples who are focused on throughout the series, whose members are all interrelated through a university. All three couples are problematic in this series. Main couple's relationship was incepted by a rape scene, and the main character is at least 10 years younger and is in high school when they first meet, and main character is one of the worst girl stand-ins I've seen yaoi to date. The second couple's relationship starts from a creepy stalker scenario where the younger top (Nowaki) meets older main guy for the first time, follows him home even though he's told not to, and steals main guy's apartment key, then later just barges into main guy's house unwanted. This is extremely creepy behavior, and I just cannot get into Nowaki even though he's consistently depicted as a nice guy after that. Third couple is a couple that literally goes nowhere because it's a high schooler that's in love with a researcher and their age difference is close to 20 years. Even worse, this series is loaded with yaoi tropes so bad it would almost be funny if it had just gone the parody route. But instead, it plays it all straight. There are way too many chance run-ins that make no sense. Everyone loves main character for literally no reason at all. No one seems to care how the objects of their affection feel about things. Upsides: This show has good animation and goes on for eternity if you like any of these couples or the ridiculousness of the situations. Downsides: Extremely rapey and not ashamed about it. Implausible scenarios everywhere. Main character is super girly and is approaching epic levels of appeal (sexually) to other men for no explainable reason. Terrible yaoi tropes. No setup for the main relationship even though by far the most time is spent on them. At least 50% of every couple is unlikeable.
18. This Boy Suffers from Crystallization / Kono Danshi Sekika ni Nayandemasu
Rating: C
Watch for free: https://www.crunchyroll.com/this-boy-suffers-from-crystallization
- "This Boy" series. First thing noticeable about this show is that the animation style is very weird and trippy and could be called bad (4th out of 4). Like the others, it is also only a single episode. However if you think of the art as an experimental thing and let it slide in favor of what the story is trying to convey, it's not too bad. The plot is nothing unusual but it is centered around the extremely weird conceit of one's body turning into various minerals depending on the person's mood (and receding when they calm down). The love story is a teacher/student one, but it plays it fast and loose with the questionable ages by presenting the student main character as "older" because he's been held back several times due to his medical condition, making him likely older than 18, so the potential pedo-ness gets a grudging pass. Upsides: Absolutely no rapey-ness despite the teacher/student kink plot. Teacher tells him to graduate first before they even kiss. Downsides: Predictable character arcs. Short. Weird animation. Missed opportunity to do the tear-jerker route and have Tamari totally crystallize at the end.
19. Seitokaichou ni Chuukoku / Hey, Class President!
Rating: C
Watch this on youtube (not licensed in R1)
- This is a short 2-episode OVA with a single romantic relationship between a senpai/kouhai. The main character is effectively the kouhai "top", and his extremely brief struggle with being attracted to the class president, who is a year older and a total himbo. This would've been rated better if it hadn't been for a couple of creepy pervert storylines - basically class president is constantly molested on the train to/from school, and someone breaks into his house and sexually assaults him (it's never clear who, although it is clear that it's not kouhai). The class president blushes through every assault he takes, so it's not really clear if he really is attracted to kouhai or if he just has an unhealthy relationship with getting assaulted and/or topped. I mean he says in his mind he's attracted to kouhai, but... Anyway. Also, I didn't like kouhai's character design. Upsides: animation is pretty decent. Rape isn't technically used as an inception to their relationship. Class president is pretty adorable. Downsides: Assault plotlines present even if kouhai didn't cause them. Too short. Story is lacking. Things occur that don't make sense and are never explained.
20. Ikoku Irokoi Romantan
Rating: C
Watch this on youtube (not licensed in R1)
- This is a 2-episode OVA that contains many yaoi tropes but makes up for some of it by having an actual plot that isn't 100% predictable and adds to the romance story, with good humor. Of note is that this show actually gets pretty explicit. The complicated relationship between main guy and his yakuza rival added a lot to this story, and would've been better overall if they had explored this angle further. It would've been nice to see main guy getting plowed by hot ship captain guy while yakuza rival guy plowed main guy's wife. That was a missed opportunity. Downsides: rapey things happen but at least it's not the basis for a romantic relationship, and there are some ridiculous situations that happen plus some pretty common yaoi tropes we have to suffer though. The character designs and animation could've been better. Main guy also skirts the border of being a girl stand-in since he is constantly called a pretty boy by all the men in the show and is constantly victimized while the hot wife has nothing particularly bad happen to her, which is completely implausible.
XX. Maiden Rose
Rating: C
Watch it on youtube (not licensed in R1)
- This is a 2-episode OVA in an alternate universe setting that takes place during something that looks like ww2. The main character, Klaus, is from not-germany, and fell in love with a not-japanese boy named Taki (it was mutual) when they were in university together (age diff is something like 4 years). Taki was suddenly called away when his country went to war against Klaus's country. The only way Klaus could stay with his lover was if he were "knighted" to Taki, who is some kind of "divine being" in his country. But Taki being a divine being or whatever means he must be "pure" (ie, no relationships, sex, etc) and Taki begins acting cold to Klaus because of this expectation put upon him. Anyway, Klaus didn't find out about this purity crap until after he was already bound, so he decides: fuck that, literally. Of course none of this is explained in the OVA, you have to get it all from the manga (I didn't, but one of the comments on the video summarized this info). There's also some minor war-related plot and intrigue but the series isn't long enough to make this stuff more than superficial. You're here for the well-animated rape sex. Upsides: Animation quality is good. Taki's character design is good. The animation quality is good. The sex scenes are well done and hot af if rape is your kink. Downsides: rapey rapey rapey rapey. Klaus is drawn... ugly, to me, and it's very off-putting. Honestly, his design would be ok if all the people were drawn like him, but since everyone else is a bishounen and he's the only one drawn like a (gay) bear, it just doesn't mix well. The plot is not good enough to carry the OVA in the state it's in, and needs a good episode or two more before all the rapey stuff happens to really explain itself. Yet the sex that you're here for is cringey af if you're not ok with rape kink sex.
21. Dakaichi - I'm being harrassed by the sexiest man of the year
Rating: C-
Watch for free: https://www.crunchyroll.com/dakaichi-im-being-harassed-by-the-sexiest-man-of-the-year-
- This is a tv series that follows two adult men in the world of acting as they meet again when they costar with each other a few years after their initial meeting on a different set. The series has some heartfelt moments but is in general questionable in theme. By far the most stand-out thing of the show (but not in a good way) is that the art and character designs - they leave quite a bit to be desired in a show essentially about two hot guys boning. From some angles the two main characters look good, but much of the time they don't seem that attractive, and the consistency in the quality of the artwork is pretty terrible (especially given shows like Love Stage!! with amazing character designs and consistent art). But more fundamentally, this show relies too much on the girl stand-in trope with Junta. Junta also comes off as creepy/stalking/obsessive throughout the series, and I just can't ignore the fact that his incessant nagging would irk me in a relationship. Also, the show leans way too hard on rape and implied rape in the dramatic parts, leaving the audience feeling completely uncomfortable, although the show tries to hand-wave it after the fact. The series goes straight into the sexing before even a bit of romantic mood is established so it just feels jarring, although again, after the fact it tries to provide context to the initial meeting. In the end, the viewer can't feel completely comfortable with the relationship because it feels rather unhealthy, which makes the show suffer significantly.
22. Uragiri wa Boku no Namae o Shitteiru / The Betrayal Knows My Name
Rating: C-
Watch it on youtube, but don't bother watching it because it's bleh
- The plot is such a paint-by-numbers modern supernatural plot with christian symbolism that I could barely sit through four episodes before giving up on it. It just feels like a poor-man's rip of X/1999 or the like. Main character, Yuki, is a girl reincarnated as a guy, and his love interest, Luka, from ancient times (another dude) is fine with that. But of course that means we have a typical girl stand-in bottom main character who is always getting into trouble and constantly has to be rescued, which is never a set of tropes that I like to watch. Plus the whole plot bs where no one wants to tell him what's going on and his powers have to awaken by being stressed, etc. Luka's character design is very typical too, with all the christian/gothic trappings. He's just too cool to really be anything but a parody of every character like that, except this show plays it straight. Also everyone in the universe is interested in Yuki of course, who is The Nicest Person On The Planet, also of course. Just way too many tropes at play for this to be considered a good, unique show. Upsides: Animation is good. Um... there's a plot outside of romance, for those who like it. Downsides: Barely any BL/yaoi aspects in the first few episodes. Show was not interesting enough to wait any longer for them to appear. Plot points are completely predictable. More chemistry exists with schoolmate glasses guy than cool-guy Luka. Can it really be considered BL if Luka really just thinks of Yuki as the girl from back then?
23. Tight-rope
Rating: C-
Watch it on youtube (doesn't seem to be licensed in R1)
- This show is less offensive than Junjou and has a fully consensual main couple, but it is so boring and dull that I fell asleep halfway through. Main guy's love interest isn't very interesting. Main guy isn't very interesting. The "plot"-ish situations set up throughout the series don't seem realistic and hold no tension. You get the impression that things happen just to get the main character into situations where his boyfriend can try to get him into bed. Upsides: inoffensive main couple. Downsides: boring. Go watch a shoujo anime instead.
24. Tyrant Falls in Love (Koisuru Boukun)
Rating: C-
Watch it on youtube (doesn't seem to be licensed in R1)
- This is a well-animated set of OVAs that severely lack in the story, character, and plot departments. The setup is an extremely homophobic senpai who is loved by his kohai (college-level), who had confessed to him but was silently ignored by senpai. Situations occur and kohai basically rapes senpai. Then the series is turned around to give the situation a victim-blaming slant, and it's extremely cringy. Upsides: good animation. The premise could've worked but went very wide of the mark in execution. Downsides: legitimate rape. victim-blaming.