When I started watching this anime I was ready for a cheesy cute romance of girl meets boy. And that was pretty much what I got from the first episode where the male MC offers a kind gesture to the Angel. She was sitting alone weeping in the park in the rain prompting the male MC to borrow her an umbrella. And this act of kindness causes the Angel to feel compelled to put herself in his life and take care of him. The Male MC then just simply rolls with it and did not think too much about it.
The set-up for the male MC and Angel to come together is so bafflingly terrible. I expected more context later on which expands upon the Angel's motivations for becoming so proactive in trying to help the male MC. Maybe she has liked him for a very long time before due to a past encounter, or perhaps she wants to get close to him for selfish reasons, but no. It is literally because he borrowed her an umbrella. This small act of kindness from a random person prompts this girl living alone to go take care of a complete stranger that is also living alone without any second thought. And when I passed episode 3, this bullshit of a romantic set-up never left my mind and was a constant nagging reminder of how dumb this premise was.
You are telling me that a girl simply falls head over heels for some guy because he borrowed her an umbrella? So does that mean the girl I drove back to her house at midnight to ensure her safety have a crush on me? Does that mean that the co-worker that I walk back to her car park every day is falling head over heels for me? Does that mean I am a clueless anime protagonist with a harem of tsundere girls that like me without me knowing? But I digress, that was definitely not a realistic set-up and if you know me I don’t mind the absence of realism in art. But this set-up literally pushes my ability to suspend disbelief for the sake of fiction. This mediocrity turns into utter inferiority and frustration as the story progresses as it contradicts itself when it comes to their personalities and their backstories.
Then the male MC. It has such a pathetically mundane and laughable ‘tragic backstory’ (the Angel's 'tragic backstory' is not much better either) I won’t spoil it for you but let's just say it's literally something that you experience and get over in pre-school. This causes him to become distant from people because he finds it hard to trust people and yet he has 2 friends for whatever reason. But let’s forget about that and let me remind you he has trouble trusting new people because of his ‘tragic backstory’ but non-nonchalantly lets this stranger into his home to cook and clean for him. What is going on here? I have no idea. And what is it about this guy that makes anyone want to be friends with this male MC in the first place? Let alone cook for him and clean his dirty house? He is devoid of personality, gives off an unwelcoming attitude towards others, and keeps his distance from people. But despite this, he manages to swoon over the most popular girl in school and has 2 friends that actively maintain the friendship without him putting any effort. What kind of sigma male incel fantasy is this?
All this results in a horrible set-up for a relationship especially when the rest of the stories revolve around these two ‘broken’ people finding comfort and happiness in one another. Whether you feel wholesomeness seeing these two characters becoming lovey-dovey with each other I believe lies in your investment with them which I certainly did not have any. Every time they become sweet with one another I don’t fucking care. These characters lack any nuance or believability which makes it hard for me to care and relate especially when the approach they are targeting is a more serious heartfelt romance. This honestly feels like an elaborate parody of the cliched terrible romance that goes: cool antisocial black-haired dude gets the most popular and beautiful girl to fall in love with him without even trying. And the general plot for this anime just seems like perfect material for a comedic parody of this terrible overdone trope.
This brings us to the production quality and execution of this anime: It's mid-AF. The animation is mid, the music is mid, and the character designs are mid. There is nothing visually or audibly spectacular about this anime. I don’t know if it was laziness or pure incompetence but when it comes to the moments that are supposed to matter; and especially the angel's backstory, it was executed in the most boring way possible with them literally sitting on the couch and TALK. When the Angel started opening up about her past and situation I was genuinely excited because I thought this was the payoff, I thought my investment in this Anime is going to be worth it and finally, I get to empathize and connect with these characters. But no, it is literally just her parents hate her and want to disown her like some Disney villain step-parents for fucking god knows why (I know why, but it is still so fucking stupid and vague). To add to its detriment, it was delivered in the most monotone and emotionless way possible and the anime just proceeds to show the Angel sitting down with the male MC and TALK.
I HATE THIS SO MUCH. This is ANIME, not TALKIME. When characters are pouring out their deeply rooted insecurities and emotions please let the viewer really feel what they are feeling whether through engaging visuals or powerful music, don’t just sit there and TALK. The voice acting is NOTHING impressive either, there are no hints of sadness or emotions and they sound like they are reading a script. I was utterly baffled at how the production team utterly disrespected the potential of the medium when watching these supposedly important moments by just showing them SITTING DOWN AND TALK. This is Anime! be creative! give me abstract visuals of the Angel experiencing despair, give me flashbacks of the Angel crying in an empty dark room, give me menacing expressions of her parents through the lens of a child, show me the Angel coming home to a cold TV dinner, show me the Angel doing her homework in a dimly lit room while enduring the noise of her parents arguing, show me the face of defeat when the Angel fails to impress her parents with a straight A report card... Give me something to work with to appreciate the emotions you are trying to convey in this work of art that I hope you give a shit about...
If you read through here I thank you for your time and I hope you can understand my frustrations with this anime. If you enjoyed this Anime, all the power to you and I am sorry if my tone in this review came out too vitriolic. If anything I feel frustrated with myself because I was not able to enjoy this anime and experience it as so many others had. I wanted to have a good time and I wanted to experience a simple cheesy wholesome romance. But I was too caught up with its terrible writing quality and mediocre production quality to enjoy it. Romance is one of my favourite and most consumed genres and maybe that’s because I cannot enjoy this particular anime. I have seen way more romance anime with similar premises with far better characters, plot, and production quality. And probably that’s the reason I did not like this anime, I spoiled myself with too many better titles to enjoy by The Angel Next Door Spoils Me Rotten. I expected this Anime to simply be mid and boring like a 5/10, but its terrible writing and production value is something I cannot ignore which leads to my personal rating for this Anime. ChatGPT would have written a better script for this sorry.
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