Watanare Anime Review(Full Spoilers)

In the beginning God created man and women and when She saw what She had made She promptly cast man into the fire, for the sake of yuri and all that is good in the world.

On the second day She created Renako Amaori so her gravitational pull could keep everything cute and lovely in the world together. For the sake of yuri and all.

On the third day She created Mai Ouzuka so Renako could have companionship, kisses and most importantly could learn that even pasta was straight before it got wet. For the sake of yuri and all.

On the fourth day She created Ajisai Sena so that the world would have light and so Renako could learn what love at first sight is and develop a proper girl crush. Consensually. God makes no mistakes but maybe overlooked that one with Mai, oopsie. For the sake of yuri and all.

On the fifth day She created Satsuki Koto so the world would have an equal, an opposite, a north pole to Mai Ouzuka. Secondly so Kana Ichinose would get cast because the world needs it’s Kana Ichinose. For the sake of yuri and all.

On the sixth day She created Kaho Koyanagi so that the girls with no chests and even less game could be represented. With Kaho the bro was invented, the flesh fang, and even the permanent friend zone(as of now). For the sake of yuri and all.

On the 7th day God rested and looked at the world She created. Full of beautiful gay(in both ways) girls it was a land of peace, prosperity, and passion. There’s just one problem, Her daughter on earth Renako Amaori grew up to be a loser, antisocial and with confidence issues as big as her bosom. The earth was without sin but Renako was without bitches, and wasn’t all this made just for her. God sighed and called a few friends. Mikami Teren would be the one to help write Renako’s next chapter and anime studio I’m not even joking MOTHER would help bring it alive. There’s also a manga drawn by Musshu but we’re not talking about that today. When all was good and in order God let this story continue in these able hands and went off to create another world, another story, a whisper of a love song. For the sake of yuri and all.

There’s No Freaking Way I’ll be Your Lover! Unless… or Watanare for short is exactly what my take on the good book presents it as, a outrageously cute yuri harem anime which on purely a design front is probably the cutest entry into that genre in existence. I say probably because I do not watch or read harems often, the tropes and foundational construction of said genre being exhausting and unfun no matter how cute the drawings can be. So, what sold me on this one? Well I have already revealed what or more specifically who but if you don’t know the name of God than let me enlighten you on one person, a little yuri artist that could named Eku Takeshima. I…am not a disciple of Takeshima, I’ve never read any of her works, don’t follow her on any of the social medias, nothing. Which is the why of Watanare because when I say I am obsessed with her artwork I mean it from the bottom of my heart. From the moment I saw the first cover of Whisper Me a Love Song I was struck down immediately, love at literal first sight. I have known for a while that she could very well be the greatest drawer of cute girls in existence but since I also like only reading completed works(WSJ being the exception that proves the rule) I have held back from reading her big work and I also completely forgot to check her others, my bad, fake fan I know. That rule doesn’t apply to anime though so I was ready and waiting for Love Song’s time to shine and when it finally came it led a legendary run of catastrophic production failure which kept me away permanently, I still don’t know if the completed version is even worth your time now that broadcast delays are behind us. I didn’t have to wait long for a replacement to arrive though, a replacement purposely chock full of her signature cute girls. My first yuri harem, Watanare.

Eku Takeshima is not directly involved with this work. Eku Takeshima isn’t even the writer of the original LN or the artist of it’s manga adaptation. This was her side gig to Love Song, every year a contract unknown to me but probably small amount of drawings to fill high impact pages and the covers of course. But that was enough of a stamp for me to get interested and apparently the anime staff too because when I say this production is religious towards her work I am not joking around. Anime adaptations almost always simplify detail for the sake of animation itself with roles like Character Designer and Animation Directors all focusing on maximizing the sharpness of a design with preferably as little lines as possible to assist in their animation friendliness. It is an art to know what your staff is capable of working with that is different for every studio and project. Kyoto Animation has the time and talent to produce unfathomably detailed animation so when Akiko Takase went from the LN illustrator to Character Designer and CAD on Violet Evergarden(as her debut in those roles no less) she kept the immense illustrative details and the staff rallied around them, producing a true medium defining work of character art that puts just about every to shame. More recently Kazutaka Sugiyama overhauled his Chainsaw Man anime’s character designs for Reze to bring them closer to the looser and lighter look of the manga to great success. That’s Mappa and Kyoani at the pinnacle of the medium though, what about the other guy’s, what about studio MOTHER(that name cracks me up everytime). They’ve made some anime huh. Yamato is the big one but I’d hazard to say it’s not representative of their usual output and staff. Arifureta is a co production that I’ve heard looks like a dragons asshole. That leaves us with Manami Ishida‘s production line and it’s previous titles of More than a Married Couple, but Not Lovers and a 2024 entry into the isekai slop bucket whose name I refuse to write.

In short, I had no clues about this productions capabilities and had no idea how they’d adapt Takeshima’s designs for animation. Could they pull off detailed work as close to hers as possible or would they very understandably dumb them down significantly which from afar is what it looks like Love Song’s production did and hey I think that works(not that it did for them). I didn’t think the former was possible in even the best circumstances for a small studio but apparently they disagreed and formed a staff makeup very top heavy to attempt it. This was not an animation friendly production on the outset because they decided to go all in on luxurious illustrative detail. First comes Character Designer Hirokazu Kojima(Kojikoji), a animator of high, Trigger aligned pedigree who also worked on More than a Married Couple as it’s ED artist. With his designs we have not 3, not 6 and not 9 but 12 Chief Animation Directors to oversee about a episode or 2 apiece and than under them the normal ADs. All 50 of em. If you didn’t know that is absolute ton of CADs and about 10 tons of ADs, these numbers are scary like usually that’s a signature sign of production collapse. I am not saying that that AD number isn’t concerning because it actually is but the CAD allocation being high and purposely spread out definitely hints to the high AD number being the plan all along, all for the sake of drawings. Because let’s be clear here, this is one of the most gorgeously illustrated anime of the year. The average drawing here looks better than the manga adaptation which is basically illegal to pull off all for the sake of fulfilling the fantasy of Eku Takeshima’s drawings that live and breathe in this new medium. The cost was clear though, the animation itself was never the focus and so very few cuts stand out, the best one being the energetic POV at the start. I don’t fault this though because it very much was the aim to be as dense artwise as possible and the end result is a sumptuous feast for the eye’s the likes of which no harem I’ve seen(again very few) can even compare to.

Takeshima got me in the door but her designs are just the cover of this book so how about we dive in and talk about the story of Renako Amaori and her various entanglements in the gay. I’ve already introduced her but Renako’s days as a loser are in the past as she quickly narrates her debut in high school as a normal, not nerdy, totally social girl and in that pursuit embeds herself in the most popular friend group around. Renako’s desire to pursue “normalcy” hints at quite a bit about her character from the start but for now all that manifests in is a big joke as she reaches her limit as a sociable human being and implodes in front of her friends, introducing her true self to the viewer. Renako isn’t just a cute face, she’s also a crazed face, a stressed out face, melting blob face, a woman of a thousand faces who at any time is probably tweaking on the inside and doing a hilariously poor job to cover it on the outside. Someone noticed though, and that someone reaches out, jumps forward and catches her… in midair falling off a building because have I mentioned this is a comedy anime that can get a bit crazy. The first person that noticed her though is a bit of a problem for Renako and Watanare as a whole because Mai oh Mai, this anime gets off too a shaky start. Or should I say, a forced one.

Mai Ouzuka is the It girl of her school, rich, smart, popular, gorgeous(in universe, she’s blond so not my type) in short, a perfect princess. She’s the type to take what she wants and after their little hardcore parkour shakes them up and Renako confesses that she’s actually a antisocial introvert gamer girl they build a deeper bond than the shallow face of one they had previously. In Renako’s eyes she just made her first friend, emphasis on the friend. Because in true harem logic Mai immediately falls desperately in love with Renako and in a way not fully cute. Mai is as strong willed as Renako is weak, especially to other people and so when Mai confesses her love and Renako responds with a solid uh what, no freaking way what about the friend thing the power dynamic immediately shifts against our heroine and in an instant she becomes Mai’s plaything. It’s a harem comedy, it’s not a serious show on premise alone so it might be on me but Mai’s treatment of Renako in the first few episodes is uncomfortable and uncute, jumping on her like a predator on prey. I liked Renako immediately, she’s just like me ferreal but also cute as hell so seeing her suddenly forced into situations she’s both vocally against and always on the defensive end immediately made Mai an enemy in my eyes. She serves her purpose of proving that hey we ain’t baiting in this show, girls be kissing girls from the jump and it’s not like Renako is being physically assaulted because by those points she’s kinda into it(she claims not to be gay because she is a dumb dense MC) but like couldn’t we have done this better, couldn’t we have consented to Mai, couldn’t Mai herself have waited. This is an isolated set of incidents that the show will eventually acknowledge and deal with but as an introduction Mai comes on stronger than I think served the story and immediately singled herself out as the harem member to hate because she simply can’t be trusted.

All this forced cuddling and kissing did awaken in Renako certain desires she never knew but she suppresses them for now, she’s trying to be normal and what’s normal about love I mean uh the same sex variety, definitely not normal we can’t be doing that no never. Renako is a confused women whose had a questionable first experience with love, so now what, whose next. Well Houston, we don’t got a problem because we have an angel to light the way and her name is Sena Ajisai! Voiced with the most precious softness by Yukari Anzai this perfect creature has Renako gushing on first sight and every single conversation afterwards, proving so potent that our wannabe straight girl confesses her love in about 5 seconds flat and thus ensues some properly annoying harem writing as we have the definitive couple immediately established yet kept at arms length by Mai’s meddling and other plot. This becomes the status quo, the two cutest and most in love girls in the set being kept from properly becoming a couple due to the need for other girls introductions and the complicated question of Mai herself and Renako’s very confused state of mind towards her.

Satsuki Koto gets her arc as a wedge between Mai and our MC, fake dating her to eventually get back at her rival. Satsuki is the Kana Ichinose voiced ice queen, second best to Mai in every way(she’s definitely more attractive though) those two are the most interesting potential pairing for Mai since it’s a toxic and turbulent state of affairs. Satsuki is deeply in love and just as deeply in denial leading to the rivalry having a bitter flavour while Mai knows but isn’t interested when Renako is already in her clutches, this might be the toxic yuri I’ve heard about and I say let it cook… so my girl can escape the scary blond. Satsuki’s arc is actually pretty good and does a better job of fleshing out her and her potential relationship with Renako. She’s a blunt realist, exactly the kinda voice a confused and permanently frazzled girlfailure like ours needs and her she becomes a consistent if annoyed rock for Renako to rely on in her own struggles in love which become increasingly convoluted as the series progresses. From being a day on day off forced girlfriend of Mai Renako ended up developing some sorta feels that she commits too in a very wet way before deciding that uh no actually romance is too much how about we just be friends… who are gay but definitely not dating no freaking way. Our MC is pretty hopeless with her feelings, she’s a Bocchi reminiscent ball of clashing thoughts and feelings and when she finds herself suddenly the object of very aggressive affections she melts into a ball. Satsuki doesn’t put up with this though and while shenanigans ensue like magnetic boob hands(Renako truly is a harem MC) they bond in pretty natural ways and Renako is actually all aboard for the sake of repairing her friends relationship. The Mai influence is strong though because Renako is pretty forward in her actions, stealing Satsuki’s first kiss and probably her heart by the end, not that she’d show it.

With Satsuki introduced though the show enters it’s final thrust because there’s only two choices for Renako and we’re not wrapping up before she can decide. It’s a hard choice too, or it would be if things weren’t so clear. Ajisai Sena’s main arc is all fluffy adorableness, affirming that she has fallen just as far for Renako as Mai did but without the red flags and it becomes almost sickeningly sweet watching the two run away together for a long and fruitful date. When Mai crashes into the party it also changes her because suddenly she sees the girl she loves happy without an asterisk and realizing the error of her ways she sees herself out, committed to letting this pairing run it’s course without her.

The Renako and Ajisai ship is like a puppy, pure overwhelming blissful mutual love between the two absolute cutest anime girls this decade. This anime very well could’ve pivoted to just them, abandoning the messiness of Renako’s previous entanglements and the spice of the harem setup. But that wouldn’t actually be as healthy as it seems nor would it solve the emotional thrust of this entire series because with Ajisai Renako gets to abandon her worries and just win win win, hellbent on landing this angel she puts on a pedestal who accepts her entirely. Renako Amaori deserves this mutual and consensual love but Renako Amaori needs to solve her own issues first and while it took me off guard a bit this show has the chops to realize it, eventually. S1’s 12 episodes honestly aren’t worth the deep dive substantially, this is average romcom writing at best carried by the overwhelming cuteness of it’s shiny veneer and quirky personality that gets consistent laughs outta me, my favourite being the running joke that Renako’s looks are average at best. Friends I hope I don’t need to explain how that joke, rooted in usual harem tropes of a self insert basic mc don’t stand in this show where our mc looks can be compared to Chika Fujiwara. Like I know looks are personal taste but I feel the thicc in all the right places, pink haired, short queen with a thousand adorable faces has a higher average appeal than the skinny and tall almost bishounen styled designs of Mai and Satsuki. They’re definitely gorgeous in their own right especially so for Satsuki but brother this joke absolutely sends me like the dissonance is crazy. Renako’s gamer brain means she’s always making cringe references and her constant form shifting gives her extravagant comedic potential maximized by the lavish art and have I mentioned yet that Kanna Nakamura is the best, because she’s the best. But in the end yeah, this story was appealing but not mind blowing, I never intended to write about it and even now I struggle to care about the big picture of this season. But wait, there’s more!

Watanare wrapped up in a neat bow as Ajisai at the push of Mai confesses properly and romantically to Renako and surprisingly our girl doesn’t fumble, she immediately accepts these feelings and becomes her girlfriend, happily ever after yadda yadda yadda normal stuff, hey Renako discovered normalcy in a harem situation like she always wanted and she didn’t have to address her own issues either isn’t this just great. Taken as is this ending made me happy because I never expected much and I received the level of writing I found acceptable in a genre that’s generally much worse and even more thoughtless, all this needed to be was cute and boy was it cute, what more could you want, what more could you need. Well it turned out alot more actually at a much higher quality because after wrapping S1 in September Watanare would return to theaters with 2 hours of continued material to wrap up this act of the story much more thoughtfully, eventually reaching the West at the start of 2026. When I say I never intended to write about S1 I’m not lying, I only watched it for the art and while I became smitten by the characters the substance didn’t give me much to chew on. It’s this years arc that threw this plan through a loop because when I say Watanare suddenly became one of my favourite new anime I mean it, these 5 episodes are fantastic. My previous allusions to Renako’s psychology were only piqued by this material as was my focusing in on the unhealthy “normalcy” she chases. Because Renako’s main issue isn’t that she can’t choose in love, it’s that she can’t love herself and thus can’t commit to a romantic relationship with that uncomfortable baggage. Her desire to change is a double edged sword because she should change, she has to change but she also needs to refocus her aims because from episode 1 normalcy is already established as unhealthy for her, she burns out when she fakes it and it hasn’t done her any good aside from making her currently shallow friendships.

This years arc isn’t about a new romantic pairing to further confuse and complicate our MC’s crazy life but about bringing a shallow relationship into a healthier platonic place that Renako can grow from and move forward to a more fulfilling end. Kaho Koyanagi is a character I wrote off immediately as a harem contender because she is first and foremost a bro and by monogamous one girl has a shot harem standards she just wasn’t gonna cut it. She is adorable though, fiesty and flesh fanged Kaho is everyone’s friend and a outspoken gay girl herself with crushes on literally everyone outside of Renako. She didn’t get much play in S1, bordering on flat(is justice) comedic relief but her time to shine has come and hey why are you grabbing a rock oh no Renako’s about to die!!!

Yeah this little girl has hands and and a past to boot that just like Renako herself she wishes to bury, the only problem being that they shared it and than buried it. A supremely shy nerdy 4 eye’s lies behind Kaho’s current veneer of everything Renako thinks she wants to be but she also see’s the distance and the cost. With cosplay as the catalyst(catgirls and maids for life) Renako is shown the cost of keeping in character and watches as Kaho disintegrates the moment her contacts leave her, breaking down into someone much smaller and meeker than her bubbly veneer exudes. Through this though the two form a genuine no strings attached friendship, building each other’s self confidence up through normal avenues like asmr mind control and physical violence, I’d say boys will be boys but that’s not strictly accurate here even if that’s the vibe. Mai keeps herself out of the proceedings between Renako and Ajisai which is appreciated since we got an absolute peak date outta it and the most stunning not kiss off the series but that’s not a end result Renako has ever been comfortable with and neither is Ajisai.

I don’t like harem writing, I find it the most pedantic and unfocused way to attempt a romance between two people and while the winner is lazily obvious most of the time the concept of choice drowns them and their less successful peers. Harems are either dragged out and obvious or an ass pull that satisfies no one with very rare exceptions which is why I’ve stayed away from them in favour of straightforward romances. Harem logic where every girl is after one dude(or girl) is also generally cheap and stupid especially so when things get serious despite the premise. There is a way that works for me though, a way both actively as stupid and unrealistic as the core premise while satisfyingly executing on every characters romantic pursuits. It’s called polygamy and unfortunately we’ve already received the pinnacle of harem fiction thanks to it, otherwise known as 100GFS. Watanare isn’t like that though, Renako wants to be normal right, that simply must be the way. When push comes to shove though Mai giving up and letting Ajisai have Renako all to herself isn’t what everyone truly wants and it isn’t what would be most satisfying so Renako finally gets the proverbial balls to reciprocate… and chooses both! She accepts her own feelings and both of the others in one fell swoop at the end giving us a ultimate catharsis, the undeserved first crush, the two timed and innocently into second and Renako at the center, less a girlfailure than ever before and ready to provide all the love she can. By harem logic this is basically the perfect ending for me and I promise in the moment it hits like a train, especially so since the art and everyone in cosplay for reasons is the most beautiful in the entire series.