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I was genuinely really surprised by how good this is, I went in with little to no expectations of this being good but was super surprised, unlike other shows I had high expectations for in the fall 2025 season such as Watatabe which while still good fell below my overall expectations. Seriously a lot of romance anime can take notes from this show, not every relationship needs to have some dumb complicated build up which lasts the entire anime.

I still stand by thinking them falling in love was somewhat rushed but trading that for focusing on their relationship for majority of the show was ... great. Like dam it takes this show to actually give us a good, proper and intimate couple unlike some shows taking seasons alone to even reach any form of progress. While initially it felt rushed Tsunagu and Mari are unironically one of the best depictions of a couple which has real and absolute devotion and pure love to eachother with no real regard for any other bs around them and seriously some other romance should take notes.

Outside of them I enjoyed the side cast of Yukihiro and Kisara which sure its a small side cast, there was others but only Kisara and Yukihiro had a real major role. I think they both played their parts perfectly fine, I found Yukihiro's 1 sided crush for Mari dragged way too long and funnily enough I feel like Kisara's 1 sided crush on Tsunagu was written off too quickly. But generally as characters they were both amazing and I particularly enjoyed Kisara's dynamic with Mari she was the only girl around Mari's age to have a real major and important bond with her but it was handled very well considering Kisara got introduced fairly late into the show.

Talking about things like the drama of this show I think it was handled pretty well such as the division between humans and the beastfolk was done well enough they setup the world fine and gave enough lore behind how everything is today to satisfy me. Seeing the gradual acceptance of the class Mari was in slowly come to accept and like beastfolk mainly through Tsunagu was super sweet though.

In terms of fan service I suppose this show does have quite a bit but it would probably only appeal to a certain target audience. I always saw those scenes between Mari and Tsunagu just as romantic intimacy between them and thought it was really cute as a pose to being specifically put in to just appeal to people wanting fan service. I think they done well at drawing the line between romantic intimacy and fan service not everyone's gonna like it and honestly you could tell some of those scenes were pretty clearly targeted to a certain audience who likes that ESPECIALLY the first few episodes. I myself am neutral to it I just saw it as intimacy between Mari and Tsunagu and I thought it was done well. Mainly later in the show when they actually were more of a couple. In the first few episodes it felt like fan service nothing more and didn't feel as deep or romantic.

in terms of the completely romantic scenes like hugging, handholding and what not I think this is unironically one of the best romance anime in how it was handled, too many anime take way WAY too long to even set the main pair up as a couple and then they hardly have any intimacy scenes between them. This show however was not afraid to have Mari and Tsunagu constantly showing affection and I think it was handled incredibly well. Again a near enough perfect depiction of a real couple with genuine devotion for eachother.

Finally in terms of art style and animation I quite liked it, nothing more to say im not a expert on that but I think the artstyle was very unique and the animation for this show was pretty good all things considered.

Generally this show will probably go unnoticed by the mass audience since it targets a certain niche but I think people who like this kinda genre are gonna adore this show because its really amazing if you give it a honest to god shot and watch all 12 episodes. Even people who don't actively watch this genre give it a real shot and watch all 12 episodes before making a finale judgment.

An amazing anime overall in my opinion

While it may not be up to everyone's tastes I think what makes this manga so incredible is that it is insanely straightforward and when it comes down to it the story is just your natural old romance with no stupid sub plots, no fanservice (kinda) and I find it don't drag anything out like for example characters getting into arguments which get resolved very maturely and quickly.

Or confessions which get handled really well and characters who initially start of weak or closed off who with time with the guidance of the ones they love develop massively into better people. Its honestly the most wholesome ... romance not just exclusive to the GL genre I've ever read or I suppose in some better sense its one of the most mature manga I've read.

For my own personal taste what I loved is that the first major half of the manga leading up to Nagi and Mashiro's confession was almost exclusively focused on them. I mean like the side characters quite literally got hardly any moments, the only real moments they do get serves to push Nagi and Mashiro in the correct direction. The second half I didn't like as much since the sudden jump away from the main couple to focusing on the 4 side characters kinda threw me off (Or 3 since the teacher don't get too many moments), I think it was written well and they're all unique in their own regard but me personally I would have preferred if the whole manga kept that focus on Nagi and Mashiro. Which I mean even in the second half they do get a lot of moments and chapters together but that's just my own selfish wants it don't take away from how amazing the series was at all.

My main takeaway of course is the development of the main characters Nagi and Mashiro, the other girls are great in their own regards too but particularly Nagi and Mashiro are the better written pair imo. Their development felt so natural and was just a treat to see how Nagi broke out of her shell and came to appreciate school for something outside of just the need to study and how Mashiro could face her weak constitution through Nagi and come to live a normal schoolgirl life. The deep-rooted issues they had within them just gradually went away as they spent more time together and learned more about eachother and love.

And their was over half the manga left to show them dating, of course thats when the side cast took more of the spotlight but Nagi and Mashiro had plenty of chapters to show their relationship plus their devotion to eachother was really special amongst all the couples in the show considering they'd from time to time say how they probably couldn't live without eachother.



Rambling aside my main praise is that its just a natural romantic story with no real silly dumb troupes or overextending any drama. Everything gets handled at a great pace and its just a really fluffy read. My only real complaint is that it wasn't longer but there's not much you can do about that.

A really good read if you want a break from any romance's with over the top or extremely dragged out confessions. Its just a wholesome and fluffy story of love and maturing as a person

After finally getting all 13 volumes and reading them fully I can say without a doubt this is my favourite manga ever and favourite anime, Genuinely this series is incredible, I cried so much reading this series and of course that final extra volume just had to make me tear up even after the story had ended. If I had to choose though I would say the manga is far superior to the anime.

Despite thinking the manga is better I will always recommend people to watch the anime first as a blind watch, Because the first episode is phenomenal at how the zombie apocalypse until ... the end of the episode.

School-Live is split into four segments, the school segment which is the first five volumes (aka what the anime covers), Then the collage segment which is volume six to the end of volume 9, then the transition into the workforce which covers volume 10 to volume 12, and finally the adulthood which is covered by the end of volume 12 and all of volume 13 (Aka the letters extra volume).

Firstly I'll talk about the first 5 volumes because that's everything the anime covered and compare them. While the anime actually done a pretty bad job at following the manga in my opinion it is still incredible and it still ends the same way as the end of volume five with them all leaving the school. The manga is actually far more dark then the anime in that the situation is shown to be far more desperate and realistic. For example Yuki mentions in the manga to Miki when she first arrives at the school how sometimes at night she would hear Kurumi and Yuuri fighting which in the anime we never really see any of that, The bond between the four girls in the first five volumes seems to be held together not very well, were as in the anime they seem to get along very well. I would say the manga was better at showing the desperation of the zombie apocalypse and how they are struggling to cope. Where as the anime did a better job portraying yuki's delusional state.

One thing I wish they included in the anime is when going to the mall were they eventually find Miki they take a detour to Kurumi's house which gives her an opportunity to leave a letter for her parents which was sweet.

Also I'm not sure why but the anime decided to make taroumaru (The dog) an important character, in the manga he's briefly mentioned as a infected dog who yuki wanted to keep but when yuuri and kurumi realised she was infected they got rid of him, and that's literally the end of the dogs story. But it wasn't a bad choice imo it added to the anime a lot.

The really ironic thing is in the anime we see yuuri to be mentally the strongest member of the group and yuki the weakest, But in the later volumes we see that yuuri is easily the weakest of the group and yuki I would say is the strongest,

After they leave the school and we enter the collage segment volume 6 essentially shows them make their way to the collage, Before heading their Yuuri mentions how she wants to go look for her little sister ruu, and eventually we do find her and one thing which blew my mind is that later in the story its revealed that Ruu was a delusion of Yuuri's much like Yuki with Megumi and eventually its revealed/heavily implied that Ruu died before the zombie apocalypse even started when she was hit by a car. Which genuinely blew me away.

The collage segment of the story introduces us to a bunch of new characters (Even a few males) who are all great (Yes even Ayaka). My personal favourite of the new characters would be Touko and Shiiko. The whole story with the militants was interesting to see playout and a member of the militant group gets infected by an airborne strand of the virus which makes everyone think that the new girls (aka the school-living club) killed him which leads them on a revenge mission, One of the group members finds Kurumi and realises she is infected, So what Kurumi does is she leads him to an area far out with a bunch of zombies and just leaves him to die, Which was super cold of her but I could understand why she would do that she's just trying to survive.

The other characters like Tougo and Ayaka despite made to be the villains I do think they are good characters. One really random twist is when The only still living good militant sino reveals that she was pregnant with Kougami's child which was the guy which got infected which lead the militants on a revenge mission. It was a super random twist but welcome I guess.

And then eventually the whole thing with the militants ends with them all dying except ayaka (who just leaves the collage and dies offscreen) and sino who joined the good side, This is when we get properly introduced to probably my favourite character in the story Shiiko Aosoi. essentially a researcher who was immediately able to tell just by looking that Kurumi was infected. Sadly she ends up dying a few volumes later.

at volume 10 which is basically representing the girls transition into the workforce we see them leave with Shiiko heading for the Randall building in order to cure Kurumi properly, by this point Kurumi's infection was so bad she essentially became a burden to the girls to were she was constantly sleeping and couldn't walk even. Shiiko mentioned how they should leave her which kinda sparked a bit of a disagreement between her and Yuki, but obviously they kept Kurumi, Eventually we get introduced to an ai called bowman who they use to ask questions or discern whether something said is a lie or not. Eventually its revealed Bowman was Shiiko, and I'm pretty sure Shiiko made up bowman to give the girls some kind of hope. They contact the Randall corporation trying to make a deal with them but eventually find out how they are planning to bomb the area to wipe out the infection.

By this point the whole situation was super desperate and the girls have no idea were to go and by this point their just travelling around trying to hide from the Randall corporation, eventually shiiko gets infected and miki kills her, which is when we find out about bowman being shiiko, and after looking at shiiko's research the girls decide to head back to the school which is were they find the cure, Miki manages to get the cure but after a run in with her friend Kei now a zombie she gets bitten, but she drinks the cure and so does Kurumi, They both recover but Kurumi never fully recovers as she had been infected much longer than Miki and she remains paralysed for the rest of the last part of the series. Yuki eventually manages to convince Randall to stop the bomb after telling them about the cure. To be honest I'm kinda realsing now I'm just rambling about the story instead of giving much of an opinion.

Well to finalise my thoughts I think the ending was fine all the characters were incredible and personally I believe the best part of the story would be the emotional impact, To briefly talk about the end of volume 12 and the extra volume it depicts everyone's life's as adults three years later. Yuki's adult design was clearly inspired of Megumi and Yuki even became a teacher in Megumi's footsteps which was super sweet.

Yuuri honestly looks no different but she's working and even has a crush which was sweet, and Kurumi is now training to become a doctor, I find it really ironic how kurumi was portrayed to be the muscle of the school-living club but when Kurumi's infection started to really affect her everyone had to really step up to take her place, and in the end she remained paralysed and super weak but she still managed to bounce back years later even if she is disabled now.

Miki's essentially a traveller now and their is a super sad moment Where Miki mentions how she's probably the last person who remembers Kei and if she forgets then who would remember her, Miki had forgotten the song that kei would listen to on her radio before they split apart and when leaving Miki meets with Touko who found Kei's radio tied to a tree and Miki finally listens to the song and breaks down crying and ngl I did too.


But to sum it up both versions of school-live are phenomenal, I love this story with all my heart and every character in it (Yes even Ayaka) If I had to pick a favourite character its incredibly difficult but I would probably choose Miki and Shiiko, they had the most impact on me. I adore this story and recommend it to anyone who wants to laugh and cry.

After doing a rewatch of this movie it only reinforced my love for this movie, its without a doubt my favourite movie ever and just generally one of my favourite anime's.

I love the whole concept of the movie and how it was driven by wanting to escape reality as a dream soldier, I really think the term dream soldier is far better than chunnibyou. Ryouko being a dream soldier and being bullied when she was in class was really hard to watch and so sad, ichirou being able to support her was really sweet.

This movie was very relatable, not in the sense of being a ... dream soldier but rather I found the bullying and wanting to escape reality to be very relatable. I myself have wanted to escape reality before and once tried so when ryouko said to ichirou "lets go to the other world together" it really hit hard.

One of the final scenes of the movie seeing ryouko on the school roof as she was about to go to the other world and ichirou being there to stop her and saying how he once tried to go to the other world too was so sad to watch.

I feel like the movie was really trying to tell us to live no matter how terrible life is

This movie does not get enough attention and is beyond underrated.

Genuinely a heavily underrated gem of a anime. The sacrificial princess and the king of beasts adapts the whole manga from what I’ve seen and is a great watch.

I was initially slightly put of by the beauty and the beast trope but quickly got over it as I was far to captivated by the show (and partly because the beast Leonhart is actually part human as well).

From seeing Sariphi develop from being a sacrifice from taking on many challenges to become queen to seeing the development of Leonhart ruling the kingdom was great to watch.

The supporting characters like amit and lante were also great ... additions and even Anubis was a pretty good character in the end.

A great romance with many lovable characters. I highly recommend.

(Side note cy and clops were both very adorable)

I got this recommendation from my brother a while ago and finally decided to pick it up. I honestly wasn’t expecting anything but I can say for certain this is a incredible watch.

Once again it’s a romance where the main characters confess before the end of the show (I seem to be finding a lot of those recently) which makes it better because it has time to focus on there relationship.

I found akane and Kotarou’s interactions both really cringe and really adorable in the beginning but seeing them broth develop was really sweet.

The ending was pretty sad seeing them be separated like that due to ... family circumstances but the after credits shows a image of akane and kotarou with wedding rings and a child which obviously means they reunite at some point in the future.

Great show and It will definitely leave a place in my memory for how realistic it felt

Real girl was i believe my second romance anime I ever watched and I absolutely loved it. Even after watching many different romance anime I still find this to be one of the best romances ever.

Initially I was kinda out of by the 2 main guy characters being major otaku’s if I remember correctly. But I found they weren’t that bad.

This anime also remains as the first anime which made me genuinely tear up a ton. Seeing Hikari reunite with Iroha after she lost her memories was so emotional and it still makes me tear up seeing that scene again.

And to top it all of ... we see them get back together and get married at the end. My memory is a bit fuzzy if this anime because I watched it years ago but i thought I’d write a review to air out my opinion.

The best part about this anime is that they go through all stages of the main characters romance from confessing all the way to getting married not many anime do that.

Great romance and one of the best

Personally In the time this aired this became one of my favourite romance anime’s ever. I personally really like adult romance anime and found this anime to be great.

I found the whole thing with shiori being a princess from a island and the whole thing with he thorn to be kinda not needed but it was a nice touch to bring our main characters together.

I thought that the dynamic between the main characters were great and I like that it didn’t take the whole show for them to confess. I even found the kids to be quite a nice addition as it made them seem ... like a proper family.

Overall a great show and I’ll definitely be picking the manga up to see the last few volumes they didn’t cover.

Horimiya is great, Every characters great and they give time for each character and develop them as much as possible. It makes sense why this is so popular it deserves the recognition.

Every character has there own personalities and traits which make them unique. If anything horimiya is great because it feels more realistic than most romance and I can only praise the author for making such great and well developed characters.

One of the best parts of horimiya was seeing the progression of izumi’s character up until now. From the quiet alone kid to the charming more outgoing high school kid.

Essentially horimiya piece is like ... season 1.5. It’s not really a second season because it bounces between stories which weren’t shown in the first season. These stories have a more slice of life feel to them.

It’s not my favourite and it’s not close to being my favourite romance but I’ve always really enjoyed Horimiya.

I highly recommend horimiya to anyone looking for a good romance.

Honestly this took me way too long to get around to watching. I finished fruits basket ages ago and am only now watching it but dam I glad I did.

I like that they gave us a mini recap of the important parts of fruits basket from kyo’s perspective. Not that needed it tbh fruits basket has stuck in my memories and had quite the heavy impact.

After the recap being able to see kyouko’s life from a young teenager to a adult was so nice and after seeing how hard her life was and that one seen with Katsuya were she just let all of her ... emotions out made me think she’s kinda like me if I was to not have any control over my feelings.

I never initially had a favourite character from fruits basket because they were all great (although I did like shigure a lot) but after this movie I would say kyouko is my favourite character both in the show and one of my favourite characters overall.

Fruits basket is a incredible show with very heavy emotions especially during season 3 and is also filled with a lot of happy moments. It remains as one of my favourite anime ever and I will always love it.