• Anime Title: Tomo-chan Is a Girl!
• Episodes: 13 episodes
• Where to Watch: Crunchyroll
• Publisher: Aniplex of America

Since I saw this anime on the list of winter anime, I knew I would watch it. Why not? Finally, a tomboy in a romance anime. In this anime, we follow Tomo Aizawa (a tomboy) who has been in love with her best friend, Junichiro Kubota. This follows Tomo as she tries to get Junichiro to see her as more than one of the boys.

The comedy here stemmed from Tomo trying to be “girly” so that Junichiro would notice her. This was due to the fact that her other best friend, Misuzu Gundou, told her that she needed to be more traditionally girly. Honestly, this was the only thing that I found a bit meh about the anime. It was funny. Seeing Tomo out of her element and trying to navigate the girl world was chaotically comedic. Though I laughed, I just found it a bit difficult to agree that Tomo needed to change herself and be girly.

Anyway, Gundou as a character was interesting to me. Why? She seemed like a dark character to me. A lot of girls were scared of Tomo because she was tall and loud and could kick a dude’s ass without batting an eye. But honestly, Gundou was the scary one. She was cunning and almost sadistic. I loved her devilish smirk that often graces the screen. She was often seen messing with Tomo and Junichiro.

There were some characters that my boyfriend and I did not know how to feel about at the beginning – like Carol. But it did not really take away from our enjoyment of the anime. It was really nice to see the progression of Tomo’s and Junichiro’s relationship. I mean, it was young love. What not to enjoy about it?

Overall, this was a pretty good romance, slice-of-life anime about young love. We definitely enjoyed it. Would I watch it again? Maybe. I mean, it would not be my first choice of anime to rewatch. I want a season two though just to see what happens to this love story. Just note, if you’re going to give this one a try, watch the sub. The dub for Tomo sounded unnatural.