(this review contains spoilers)
When I first heard about Given getting an adaptation, I was overjoyed. Finally, we got a tasteful BL manga where no one is getting fetishized, there isn't any problematic subtext, and the anime has an actual plot beyond their relationship. All of these things are what makes Given great and stand out from all the other popular BL anime. The anime (especially the first half) tends to be more focused not on the romantic development of Mafuyu and Uenoyama, but rather telling a story about the evolution of their band and how Mafuyu impacted them.
Story
At the outset, the story of this anime seems quite basic - a somewhat stagnant band is trying to light their fire again, and a mysterious person comes along and shakes things up. However, what comes with that person in this instance is quite complicated. The way the anime explains Mafuyu's backstory over time is very well done; we slowly learn why he has trouble expressing himself, why he carries around a guitar despite not playing it, and much more. Most of it was done through interactions with Mafuyu's former classmates, which I thought was a very good strategy of getting the audience up to speed with his past, and most importantly, puts ourselves in Uenoyama's shoes. The only thing Uenoyama knows at this point is that Mafuyu has a beautiful voice, but rumors start to circulate around the school about Mafuyu's past and Uenoyama is intrigued. We learn even more when Mafuyu clashes with Hiiragi, a friend who brings back painful memories of Mafuyu's former boyfriend. As the pieces of the puzzle start to come together, Uenoyama starts to develop feelings which eventually turn into love. I don't seem to remember too much agonizing over the whole "we're both guys" thing either, which is such a tired trope I roll my eyes after more than one instance of it. The story veers off occasionally to talk about the other members of the band and their relationships, but providing more context for the character's actions and emotions (especially when it comes to Haruki having a crush on Kaji for years) is helpful. It also provides good setup for the upcoming movie, which we just learned today is happening.
One very interesting metaphor that comes up throughout the anime was equating love to music, and I think this is quite interesting. We see it with Kaji meeting Ugetsu for the first time, and in the second episode where Uenoyama said that Mafuyu's song "shook him to his core." Although Kaji (in his flashback) stated that hearing Ugetsu play the violin was love at first sight, it was very clear that music was a part of that attraction. The same applies to Uenoyama, at first he was amazed by Mafuyu's previously unknown singing talent, but this develops into physical and emotional attraction as they get to know each other better. Music is used most prominently as a vehicle for emotion in Given, and not only romance. When Mafuyu sings his song about his former love, the whole crowd can feel the emotion coming from his performance, and I thought this was very powerful.
This is my BL-loving self talking, but I wish the ending was more fluffy. Mafuyu's confession was very well done, but I wish that we'd seen a more cute reaction from Uenoyama. We didn't even get to see them have a fluffy "I love you too!" scene, although what happened afterward was consistent with the focus of the show (music).
Character
I thought the characters in this anime were all very well done, especially when it comes to gay romance. There weren't many instances (as I stated earlier) where Uenoyama agonizes over liking Mafuyu, which is good. However, most of Uenoyama's reactions to things are just "eh?" whenever something surprising happens. This is both good and bad; Uenoyama doesn't have a negative reaction towards surprises: after learning Mafuyu was gay, he didn't say anything negative about that, which was good, but this reaction happened so often I wish they'd mixed it up a little. It's part of his character, but I would have liked to have seen Uenoyama be visibly happy after Mafuyu's confession. Mafuyu is a great character as well, his tragic backstory provides for a lot of interesting reflection by him, especially when it comes to expressing his emotions. Since music is the focus of this anime, it fit quite well for Mafuyu's ultimate expression of grief to be a song, and it was incredible. Although Mafuyu acts indifferent towards most things, his real moments of development were when he was pushed to face his dark past and come to terms with it. The best example of this is when Uenoyama is scolding Mafuyu for not having a song ready on the day of the concert and Mafuyu breaks his strings in anger. To me, the most compelling aspect of this was the fact that Uenoyama fixed them for him, just like in the beginning of the anime. The message being that if things are broken, they can be fixed, even if what was damaged before seems irreparable. I haven't mentioned Haruki and Kaji too much, but their characters are also quite good. Haruki's subplot of crushing on Kaji for years is very apparent and makes its way into many many cute moments. His realistic attitude towards everything has somewhat prevented him from confessing, but that is also a valuable trait to have when managing a band. Kaji is a much more carefree guy but his advice really helps Uenoyama and Mafuyu's relationship move forward; his perceptiveness about what's going on in the band was very good to watch. The last character I want to briefly mention is Mafuyu's ex-boyfriend, Yuki. I appreciate how they made him actually a good person. So often you see exes portrayed (not just in anime) as totally horrible people, but the amount of exposition behind Yuki's personality was quite nice! I didn't mention this in the story section, but the anime actually has quite a good sense of humor! The band's interactions with each other are usually fun and lighthearted. Kaji and Haruki add a lot of comedy to the group and seeing the band's internal relationships improve is always nice to see.
Art
The art in this anime was surprisingly good! The character designs are all very nice, although I think some of the characters (particularly Kaji and Uenoyama) have unusually wide necks. Where the anime comes into its own in terms of art is during the performance in episode 9, which had some awesome CG with the guitars, drums, and bass. The detail of the instruments was always good throughout the anime. However, the art was not always stellar. There were moments in the anime where the characters were drawn with no faces for longer than I expected (I especially noticed this in the last episode). There were also 2 or so times where the anime would portray the passage of time by doing a slideshow to some background music (when the band was writing the new song and in the last episode where the school year just plays out). This was effective I guess, but I would have liked to see some animation in the background rather than the iMovie-style "image pan" slide show. Minor complaint, however.
I'll mention the song Mafuyu sang in episode 9 in this section, since I think it deserves to be mentioned somewhere. It was amazing. The first time I heard Mafuyu sing his "la la la" song, I wasn't too thrilled, but his live performance was incredibly well done. Both the lyrics and the song that went with it were so emotional, not to mention the fact that it sounded great.
Overall
I'm really happy with the way this anime played out. It's a great example of how BL can be done tastefully: none of that "dubious consent" nonsense, no age gap, just straightforward romance. Although some people do enjoy those aspects of BL, I think they make the genre a lot less accessible for your average viewer, and when they see the "gay" tag (shounen-ai, boys' love, whatever you wanna call it), some people get turned off immediately. Given is different, however; it's a straightforward romance with satisfying development and conclusion. I don't think we've seen an anime that does this so well since Doukyuusei, and I hope more BL like this comes out in the future. If there's any complaints I have about the anime, it would be that there wasn't as much romance as I'd like. It's a genuinely good drama, but it wasn't until the last few episodes where we got kisses and what their relationship actually looks like romantically. In the end though, this is still an incredible anime that I would recommend to anyone, not just BL fans. Given does an incredible job integrating LGBT characters and themes without making it seem taboo or weird, just people who are in love.
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