I had virtually nothing to gawk at in this week’s Seiren, which was certainly a change of pace. Instead, this was just a remarkably grounded and overall successful slice of adolescent romance – understandable conflicts, multidimensional characters, and satisfying resolutions. I was pretty surprised! I certainly don’t mind, though – if Seiren permanently jumps from a weird oddity to a reasonable show, I’d be very happy.

You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my notes below.

“Don’t get her chairs and act like she’s some princess!” Tsuneki is right

“The way she treated girls and boys the same gave the boys the wrong idea”

This is actually some pretty sensible backstory!

Yeah, Toru pushing away the other boys in middle school makes sense, and Shoichi’s lack of ego helping him avoid the same problem now also makes sense. Solid character work

It was her older brother that got her into games

Toru being embarrassed about this old game show is also good

An endearing, rambling conversation about their career plans

Toru feels responsible for the group “breaking up,” and doesn’t want to hang out

These backlit shots create a nice sense of intimacy

None of this drama or these reveals are overplayed. Really nice stuff

“I had no idea not interacting with gamer buddies would be so stressful”

She decides to actually take his advice and make more mascots

I like how Shoichi is still intimidated by her. It’s far from a perfect relationship

“Want to go to ComiMa with me?”