Review: Aharen-san wa Hakarenai
I recently decided to get Crunchyroll so that I could watch a couple shows that I was interested in. This was something else I saw.
Aharen-san wa Hakarenai is about a young man, Raido, with resting bitch face and a young woman, Aharen, that either goes too hard or not hard enough in friendships. They meet in high school where Raido is determined to start making friends despite how scary he looks to other people (a bit they end up ignoring later). His first attempt is with Aharen, who is afriad of making friends because she was to ointense the last time she tried. They spend the episode with Raido trying to figure out a way to get Aharen to talk, then to hear her when she does talk. He ends up learning that she was happy that he tried so hard to be her friend. The rest of the show is about the wacky hijinks surrounding their friendship.
The show is more episodic than narrative. There is a regular plot structure, and everything more or less resets at the end of each episode. Each episode begins with Raido noticing something different or new with Aharen, or an issue she's having (tired, nervous, etc.). He then tries to help her with it. Occasionally, he'll see Aharen do something different and then build this wildly outrageous scenario for what's happening. They are almost always wrong.
For example, in one episode Aharen asks Raido to record her dancing. It was just for a school project, but before he learns this, Raido thinks that she's trying to become a huge Utube idol and helps her with her dances and video taping and everything.
It's a lot of silliness, and that's the main thing I like about. There is an undercurrent of romance, but the main point is the absurd comedy. Raido is never lecherous, Aheren isn't used as a sex object. An issue crops up, and they deal with it in a silly way. Like Aharen crowd surfing the other students in line for lunch. Or re-arranging 20 different ways (including her sitting on his shoulders) so they can both see the class chalkboard. They are always there for each other, they are always supportive, and I think that's great.
I had two issues with the show. One, Aharen is naive about some things. She sometimes acts very helpless for mundane things like eye drops and lip balm. The show hints that she's very capable, but that's not shown unless it's about cooking or games. I was also worried that they would lean into the sexy baby trope. A thing were a character is incapable of basic self-care or wildly childish or naive, but is also used as a sex object (think Leeloo from Fifth Element). Fortunately, they don't do this here. Aharen is naive, but she's never used as a sex object.
The other thing that bothered me was one of the teachers, Ms Tobaru. It was a running gag that she would frequent, excessive nose bleeds when she saw Raido and Aharen together. I'm not sure if there's other meanings behind nose bleeds in Japan, but all of the shows I've seen treat that as an indicator of horniness. A teacher getting those when she sees her students together gives me the creeps.
In any case, it was an overall good show, and worth a watch.