As promised, 2 romance shows.
Hori-san to Miyamura-kun aka HoriMiya (Season 1, 2021)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hori-san_to_Miyamura-kun
A wonderful little high school romance anime. I think this is the only regular type romance anime I've ever seen apart from
Toradora!, which I would also highly recommend. The only other romance anime shows I've seen are harem type such as Tenchi Muyo.
Horimiya started off as a web-manga which proved so popular that it got a physical release. It was then remade into another manga, a manga sequel, a still on-going OVA series, and this anime. It's easy to see why people enjoyed it so much.
Hori is a beautiful girl at school but at home she dresses down and spends most of her time taking care of her little brother. She doesn't want anybody to know about her true homely self. Miyamura looks like a nerdy loner and is always serious and always wears his full sport-coat uniform. In reality, he's not that good of a student and wears his uniform to hide his multiple tattoos. By chance, the two meet outside of school and show each other their true selves, and love slowly blossoms. The two main characters are charming and you absolutely buy that they could make it work, in spite of the doubters at their school. It's like every nerdy guy's wish fulfillment, but actually believable.
I do have some criticisms, but the show is so well done that I can easily forgive (most) of them.
-the editing seems rather haphazard at times, with transitions to new scenes that feel like you've skipped over a large chunk
-new side characters are introduced seemingly out of the blue. Some time is usually spent with them, sometimes an extensive amount of time. I don't have a problem with any of their stories, it just feels like their introductions are not handled well
-Miyamura's family owns a bakery and the show commits the unforgivable sin of showing plenty people of eating food, but not showing any baking footage. Unacceptable.
I want to make special note of one of the random side characters that is introduced who I felt could have been one of the most interesting characters in the show. She's a younger classman that happens to live next door to Miyamura but they didn't know it. It is strongly suggested that her brother committed suicide some time in the past. She goes to Miyamura's and they eat some cake but she only appears one other time. I wanted to see more of her.
There is a second season out called Horimiya: The Missing Pieces which adapts some stories from the manga that didn't make it into the first season. I haven't seen it yet, but I will absolutely watch it when I have the chance.
Extraordinary You (2019)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_You
This is a K-drama and it's the first one I've ever seen. I absolutely loved it, with a few minor criticisms.
Dan-oh is a beautiful high school girl that goes to a premier academy. She's rich, popular, and she's engaged to a handsome boy that she's had a crush on since they were little kids. Unfortunately, he doesn't much care for her, and she has a serious heart condition. She starts having strange blackouts where hours or even days pass by in an instant. It's not her heart, rather she discovers that she's actually a character in a comic book. She doesn't believe it at first, but slowly begins to accept it because she figures that given her backstory, she must be the main character. Then she finds out she's only a minor character who is expected to die soon from her heart condition. When she finds out that the comic is still being written and some scenes are still only rough drafts, she joins with several other characters to change the story, change her fate, and maybe find love in the process.
I found this at my library and was instantly struck by the box art. I then read the description, which is pretty much the above, and knew I had to see it. I'm a big fan of metafiction so this was definitely appealing to me. It's charming and fun. You root for the heroes and boo the villains. It has plenty of fun with various K-drama tropes, which I am not familiar with, but I think anybody that's seen some teen comedy movies can easily pick up on them. From what I can tell (having not seen it), she show heavily riffs on the anime series
Boys Over Flowers for the "main characters" of the comic [Boys Over Flowers has also been made into a K-drama], but it's not necessary to have seen that either.
There is a rather minor character that gets introduced towards the end of the show, and she ends up being very interesting. I wish she had more screen time and was given more to say, because even with her very limited screen time, her character was great.
My main criticisms of the show:
-it gets rather repetitive during the middle section and feels like it's spinning its wheels for a while
-the amazing cover art is not representative of the art style in the show unfortunately. There are a few minor oddities to represent the "undrawn" parts of the comic, but nothing like the cover art.
I found myself imagining how my own personal remake would expand upon what is already presented. There's so much room for crazy ideas, and even too many ideas or crazy contradictory ideas could be thrown in with the excuse that the first idea was just a rough draft, and the second is the final draft.
-characters that have been reused by the author either start worshiping him as a god, or cursing him and committing suicide over and over, Groundhog Day style
-introduce a character that acts as a serial killer, knowing that the murdered characters will be resurrected again by the time of their next scene
-crazy art style. The cover art reminded me of the drama scenes from
Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters. A highly theatrical and non-real representation of the undrawn parts of the comic could be surreal, very visually engaging, and distinctive. Possibly even a Wes Anderson deliberate artificiality could work. Instead they're presented here as almost normal.
Like my review above of Wonder Egg Priority, this show had me thinking about it and my own imaginary version of it long after it was over.
Here is some of the promo art which piqued my interest initially: