Masamune-kun no Revenge? You are absolutely right; there's no revenge, thank you for once for being accurate, Title-san. (It's a joke, don't get your knickers in a twist.)
Here's the summary: Boy is overweight, boy gets made fun of by girl, boy and girl go to separate paths, boy becomes super jacked, boy meets girl again, girl doesn't recognize him, boy devises a plan to get girl to love him to then break her heart for his "revenge."
I hope it's not a spoiler when I say that there's no way to just have such a simple revenge plot exist on its own. Who do you call when you need more screen-time in a romance anime? If you said harems, you are right. If you said poorly calculated love triangles, you are also right. I don't care how ripped you are. I don't care how many push-ups you do, or if you're skinny/buff. There is no possible way you end up with this many girls after you. If you need to add a harem to make your main romance interesting, it's a big, fat red flag.
Characters
Guys, I'm going in with an unpopular (I think?) opinion. This guy is cool, and his obsession for dieting and exercising feels normal. I felt his insecurities like a second skin, and honestly, the one good thing about this anime is that it appeals to both its overweight, underweight, and...er, weight audience. Masamune as a character was rough on the edges, I will admit, because only an anime character would hold a grudge for that long, but everything felt proceedingly normal until we got to tea-time girl, but that's another problem entirely. I think both of his looks (young and older) were really well-drawn, and the style reminded me of Love, Chunibyo, and Other Delusions and Sword Art Online (proceeds to have war flashbacks), which are both really nice-looking. I liked how there was real complexity in his character, as his arrogance stems from lack of real confidence, and he's different from your typical blank slate of a main character, ripe for putting in a field of harem-girls. Speaking of girls -
This is the girl who Masamune wanted to get "revenge" (I'm embarrassing myself using that word for this situation) on. If I told you Aki had depth, dynamic growth, or was anything but the caricature of a tsundere, I would be lying to you with a grimace. Aki is your typical tsundere, who's laced in hypocrisy. She makes fun (read: bullies) Masamune because he's fat, and yet, she consumes truckloads of food like no tomorrow. I'm sorry, but if Aki had a sucky metabolism, this anime would've been over before it'd even begun. Aside from her icy demeanor, Aki also frequently belittles Masamune for little to no reason, and after twelve episodes, there's not a peek of character growth. Yeah, lust isn't character growth! Speaking of lust, everything Aki's felt speed-runs down the cliff when she meets a random overweight guy posing as Masamune. This didn't feel like a romance anime; it was about a desperate weighty-turned-thin guy and an aloof girl with a fat fetish.
It's harder to find a good love triangle than to find a good romance. Change my mind.
Everything about Neko is dreadfully boring, predictable, and horrible as the last. If Aki Adagaki - tsundere of all tsunderes, the girl who gave Masamune self-confidence issues - fits better with the main guy than she does, there's an issue with Neko. What I will respect about her is that she's not too flamboyant; she's...well, I'd say something, but it's hard when Neko really doesn't have much of a personality. And no, tea is not a personality. Everything about Neko and Masamune's relationship was random, and the worst part is that the summary never advertised its harem-ness, so I came hoping for an enemies-to-lovers relationship with cliché scenes and comedic moments, but I just ended up with some love triangle that's blander than bland. I don't hate Neko's character; honestly, most days, I don't even think about Masamune's Revenge, never mind this sore thumb of a love interest.
To be honest, I enjoyed Yoshino's character, and even though, I just found out through manga spoilers that she also ends up with a...you-know on you-know-who, I still think she was funny and cool to read about. I liked how awkward she was, and how Yoshino felt like a spy in some scenes. There wasn't any depth to her, and the best part was that the anime knew it, using her as their plot-driver. Probably one of the best things the anime did was have Yoshino as a character.
The Plot
The first episode wasn't bad. There, I admitted it. It trampled on a lot of tropes and was exactly as I expected from the get-go, but there was nothing abhorrent about it.
The rest...just sunk downhill from there. I think of Masamune's Revenge as two parts: the first part and the second part.
The second part is where some random chubby guy comes in and whisks our heroine off her feet. Seriously, everything is so ironic in this anime that I start to wonder if the creator was aware of this, or just made up a nonsensical plot. It stumps me how Aki is so naïve and just downright dumb. Is Masamune's fat bod all Aki cares about? Romance anime, my ass.
Then came the play scene where we get the moment where the audience thinks, Finally, Aki will stop acting like an overdramatic tsundere. Guys, most animes work with a reward-and-punishment system; they give you something bad, then offer up something good - rinse and repeat. There is nothing good or gratifying about watching this abhorrent character act the same she did ten-or-so episodes ago. I suffered through all that "bad" just to hit an even worse note.
Final Thoughts
I came in hoping for high-school angst, drama, and self-worth issues. I knew it was a romance - knew it so well - and yet, I took a chance with Masamune's Revenge. I came out of this anime with a myriad of things: an underdeveloped heroine, a boring harem, a plot that's as dry as the Sahara Desert, and secondhand embarrassment.
The worst part about it being boring is that even if I know it's bad, I can't criticize it to my heart's content because I can't even think of any specifics. This was your everyday romance anime, except somehow worse.
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