Anyway, I’m Falling in Love With You Anime is a pandemic love story
While one of the two new shoujo anime series debuted on Crunchyroll in January 2025 takes quite a while transition from manga to animation, Anyway, I’m in love with you ended quite quickly on screen. Honestly, I can understand why. I got it. This story is rooted in the experience of the COVID-19 pandemic, and telling it through another medium as quickly as possible will help ensure viewers will connect with it better. But the thing is, I feel like this adaptation isn’t as much about telling a unique love story shaped by how society changes and reacts to the pandemic as it could be, although I hope the Future episodes may prove me wrong.
Editor’s note: There will be spoilers for the first episode of the series. Anyway, I’m in love with you below.
While most shoujo series start off entirely focused on the female protagonist and her school life, the first moments of the series Anyway, I’m in love with you Anime adaptations do not. Rather, it’s about setting a scene. Instead, it begins with a vision of a Japanese city. The color palette is washed out and has a gloomy feel. The news is shown on screens in the city. When Mizuho Nishino, our heroine, finally appears, it’s her adult version. She laments that her birthday was terrible and a work email just arrived asking if Megu Kawaguchi’s series might end that year. After seeing a high school girl passing by with four of her classmates, she remembers her own past and what happened on her 17th birthday. I really liked how it started, as it felt different from other shoujo series and made me feel as though it could have pulled from real life events to make this reverse harem love story become unique.
From there, everything goes back to July 2020. This may have been the peak of the pandemic. It was 95 degrees outside and the radio was warning about the heat and “communicable diseases,” which of course was COVID-19. Mizuho’s father walked up to her room while she was having a meal and found her sleeping on the floor with her childhood friend. Her sketches of him were all around them. Of course, he’s understandably upset and warns them about acting like they did as children. She says Kizuki Hazawa is like her little brother, which he doesn’t seem pleased to hear. So we meet her possible first love and realize that because of everything going on in the world, it’s actually her birthday.
We meet the entire reverse harem when Mizuho leaves home to go to school. Besides Kizuki, she also grew up around Airu Izumi, Shin Kashiwagi and Shugo Hoshikawa. In a fairly short amount of time, we learn that she stays up late drawing manga, hints that she is the “Megu Kawaguchi” mentioned in the introduction, and some brief snippets of Airu’s personality, Shin and Shugo appear in response to her being lazy about makeup and staying up late. It was a bit rushed, though I suppose that makes sense since this first episode is more about quickly setting things up and focusing on Mizuho and Kizuki’s relationship.
But right away, I also felt like there were missed opportunities. It’s like Anyway, I’m in love with you The anime adaptation is telling more than showing. I would have expected more people to wear masks this time around, since it was July 2020, but there weren’t. (Since they wanted to highlight the art and character design, I guess I can understand.) Mentions of current events are minimal. We don’t really see the effects of things so much as hear them happen. Prime examples include initial radio reports, Kizuki noting that swimming practice finally resumed after being paused due to the pandemic, and upperclassman Saito Ryosuke mentioning that Classes were canceled for a period of time due to “some infectious diseases.” But instead of properly reacting to it in ways that might have made sense in the first episode, we’re instead given it as an excuse for Airu to tease her about her crush on Saito or for Saito to say about how events, class trips, classes and sports have been canceled for a while.
I guess I was hoping for more reactions like Saito’s. It’s only halfway through the first episode that we see someone reacting to current events, and it’s not even one of the established “main” characters in Mizuho’s group. It was a supporting actor admitting his depression about what happened. The fact that Mizuho reacted to his admission the way she did also disappointed me. I knew it was coming because I was familiar with the original series. And I’m still impressed with Saito’s personality and reaction to her reaction. Honestly, it was the opening moments of Saito and Kizuki that left the strongest impression on me here, as they seemed to be the two with the strongest emotions and reactions here. Both in terms of emotions about the current situation and emotions related to Mizuho, they seem truly genuine and do This first episode.
I hope that is possible Anyway, I’m in love with you starts to feel stronger and more unique as the episodes go on. This first season is very focused on Mizuho and Kizuki, really succeeding through the establishment of other characters and pandemic life. If handled well, it can become interesting. After all, I really like the original manga! I just felt that the anime adaptation was an opportunity to really show and highlight what life was like during a particular time period in Japan, and so far it feels like no other. any shoujo love story more than a period piece.
the Anyway, I’m in love with you The anime adaptation is currently airing in Japan and streaming on Crunchyroll worldwide, and the manga is available on Kodansha worldwide.
