2025.11.24
Context: Chitose-kun wa Ramune Bin no Naka
This is my preliminary review 5 episodes in of the show, originally posted on MAL on 2025.11.14.
This is Hayama Hayato (from Oregairu
) 's wet dream after his philosophy being completely crushed by the world and reality around him and his girl being taken by the gloomy guy he's supposed to be better of. If he'd somehow fuck up his life after becoming an adult and decided to become a light novel writer, I can imagine this is the type of story he'll write for his debut.
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Apparently MAL does not like it when reviews are short. Unfortunately the one sentence above pretty much summarizes the whole thing up to ep. 4; it's just as bad as I've said but we'll see how things go from here. I really should take back what I've implied about Wataru Watari's writing skills in my Oregairu last season review, because whatever we're having here is magnitudes worse.
Now - is Hayama Hayato's way of doing things wrong? No, it's not wrong. Is Saku Chitose's way of doing things wrong? No, it's also not wrong. But if both of them are not wrong, where does the problem lie? See, in the case of Hayama, Watari constructed him to truly believe that the world is/can/should be perfect while constructing an imperfect world; Hayato's belief of the world's perfectness becomes part of the flaws of the character, and this belief and the world's imperfectness, composed by the flaws of the surroundings and the hindrances that come his way, is very obvious right from the start. In the case of Saku Chitose, the world is simply perfect, which is not only simply ridiculous, but also a slap in the face to the majority of people who would choose to watch anime.
We'll see if this show goes into an absolutely painful drama which drags the main protagonist through multiple layers of blood and dirt in the future. If it does, I can still accept the beginning part as a painful-to-watch introduction that overstayed its welcome. If it doesn't - well, then I'd recommend you to not waste even half a second of your time on this series.
Welp, at least the OP is one insanely good song, so good I decided not to skip. The art is also good, which is such a waste.