2025.7.5
I do suggest one refrain from doing whatever this show is doing. To randomly bring out an adult figure to put the "real love vs. co-dependency" trope onto the table almost always feels like nothing more than a cheaply-made Deux-Ex-Machina: these key characters feel like the insertion of the author himself because they almost always have ore information than their position in the story could've ever provided them with. To put it another way, they know the main protagonists are going through a co-dependency phase not because that's a conclusion that can be reached merely through their knowledge, experience and observation, but simply because that's what the author had in mind. This is - to adopt software engineering lingo - an abstraction leak. I do need to acknowledge that considering the true core conflict of the average Japanese highschool student - 進路 (career path) and its 調査 (survey) - being more like a looming background threat than anything, it would be hard to find a more natural and (more importantly) more common conflict than someone's love life without potentially offending anyone; and to claim that the main protagonists are in a toxic co-dependent relationship might very well be the only way to provide a chance to move towards a total resolution. But, even if that's the case, one would still need to execute this properly exactly because all of these clichés are well-expected...