This review is mainly comprised of spoilers
Before heading in our review, one small thing: these are my opinions, meaning that they may differ from person to person. If you don't like what I've wrote, I highly encourage you write up your 400+ word essay on this show (no really i mean it, we don't have that many reviews for shows on Anilist + I lack writing skills so this may sound like a drunk guy explaining the office) and express your feeling through the use of words and images. With that being said here we go:
Senpai Ha Otokonoko (Senpai is an Otokonoko / My Crossdressing Senpai) is an anime about self-discovery. We are very quickly introduced to our 2 out of the 3 main characters: Saki-chan, an overly cheery kouhai that confesses to our protagonist in the first seconds, showing her talk now think later attitude, Makoto, the crossdressing high school student, and Ryuuji, his childhood friend from kindergarten. In total, the 12 episodes showcase various problems, Makoto, Ryuuji and Saki go through trying to understand their feelings. It has an LGBTQ+ theme to it, as Ryuuji is trying to sieve through his feelings for Makoto, while Saki is over-analyzing her part. Makoto is also having his fair and share of problems in his family, mainly that his mother is disgustingly opposed to the idea of her son crossdressing(he got caught once, poor soul).
The characters presented in the anime, mainly the holy 3 protagonists have immense depth to their character.
Despite her happy 24/7 face, she deals with great emotional pain, including: her parents divorce and her uncertain feelings towards to her senpai. She represses her own emotions, as shown in her indifference to any choice she is put to make: <code>"I like them both!"</code>, however this is no easy task to keep for long and she breaks down in front of Ryuuji and not Makoto in order to conceal her real feeling to her oh so dear senpai. We can also see that her lack of decision making actually ends up helping Makoto himself, when he was uncertain about joining the basketball club.
Our gay protagonist, unbeknownst to his dear friend also faces challenges with his affection towards him, as he sees it as <code>"disgusting"</code>, constantly avoiding handling it. He is also overly protective of Makoto, to the point where he examines every move of Makoto's other friends (after the whole school found out about Makoto's true identity, most of the classmates and people from other classes started to avoid him), mainly Saki.
The show's bread and butter, our crossdressing, maid uniform wearing protagonist has a very difficult question to answer. Does he want to live as a girl, or as boy? On his journey to find out he realizes that it cannot be a smooth ride and that he will need to take the bumpy path, littered with sadness and adding new questions that need answers. Makoto wants to both achieve his wish to be allowed to be cute and to not upset her mother, who is deeply disturbed by the idea from an incident in her past. With help from his friends and his own determination to solve the "crossdressing dilemma" he confronts his mother with his "weird" hobby, asking only to be accepted. This shows his side of courage, which Ryuuji lacks, and also strong sense of decision making, which Saki lacks.
The story telling in this anime is fantastic. It explores a theme not many people are comfortable watching in a funny but serious tone, leaving many bits of advice to the viewer as the 3 friends explore themselves emotionally. Each episode brings a theme that it tries to solve, to leave it's viewer a message like in the last episode where all ends well after Makoto finally approaches her mother about his fondness over cute things, and the anime ends on a positive note, revealing how courage, even in small amounts creates connection through working together with what you thought to be an enemy. Saki's and Ryuuji's arcs also have valuable lessons to learn, but you'll have to watch the anime to see them :3.
The animation of this anime is, eh, alright. You can get behind it for most of the shows runtime, but it shatters the immersiveness when emotional scenes take place, the most prominent being in episode 3. Overall the animation is ok, not being the 100 trillion dollars budget Solo Leveling animation, but not so bad you find a powerpoint presentation has more frames.
After all that I've written up until now, I think that you can clearly see that I did enjoy this anime and with no exaggerations it will be (for a long time) my favorite. I couldn't care less for it's subpar animation because the story is all that matters to me here. It's a masterpiece of the delicate themes we, yes WE, deal with in our own world (family, friend group etc.). Even if you are not conflicted with your own sexuality, you can still relate to the 3 main characters in other ways.
"If I had, wait a minute... 12 episodes, each 30 minutes... uhhh 6 hours to live, this is the anime I would chose" or something like that. What are you waiting for? Do you like lgbtq+ themes? Do you like femboys? Do you like average animation that in some moments ruins a little bit of the immersion of the anime?!!? THEN THIS IS FOR YOU.
Senpai Ha Otokonoko is an amazing anime, with a lot of thought being put into every character, so you are sure to find someone to empathize with one or more characters. The only place where it lacks is the animation, probably because the budget wasn't big enough, but if you are ok with overlooking it, then do give it a try!
I also want to thank anyone that took their precious time of their lives to read this piece of spaghetti that I put in front of them, just reading means a lot to me. Thank you again, and have a great rest of the day/night!
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