I truly struggled with this anime. I watched it immediately after watching Paradise Kiss, another anime based off a manga by Ai Yazawa. I haven’t read either of the manga, so I can’t speak to that. But I loved the anime adaptation of Paradise Kiss, and obviously Nana has always been well liked, so I assumed I will love this anime. I will be comparing Nana and Paradise Kiss a lot in the review, because to me Paradise Kiss was genuinely the gold standard, a 10/10 anime.
So going into Nana I hoped that I would love it as well. And I did! For the
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first 25 or so episodes, I was totally hooked. Now, I did feel that the art was not my favorite. Actually, I really like Ai Yazawa’s style, and in the ParaKiss anime it was perfect. But something is a little off in Nana, the animation is just not as well done, and the unique, y2k japan style we see in Parakiss does not come through. It feels a lot less artistically impressive. But it’s still decent enough, if I were not comparing it to ParaKiss, I don’t think I would have noticed this. I also was less impressed by the soundtrack - this may just be personal, but I just didn’t like Nana’s soundtrack, and I also didn’t feel it fit the anime very well. Blast is supposed to be a punk band, but it’s not really punk, is it? I wasn’t sure if this was a cultural thing - like is this what jpunk was circa 2007? Don’t really care enough to research. But the opening and ending just weren’t for me. And the rest of the soundtrack wasn’t anything special.
However, I like the character design, I liked all the characters (to begin with), and the plot was super compelling. The borderline homoerotic relationship between the two Nanas, the top tier shoujo romance scenes, and the themes of young adulthood and finding your way in the world all hit just right. In the beginning, it felt very similar to Paradise kiss. Hachiko is nothing like Yukari as an mc, but they are both long women of close to the same age who are trying to find independence and sort of stumbling at every step. When you watch these shows and recognize the characters for what they are; young adults, still teenagers in some cases, trying to figure things out - to me it makes sense. Yes Hachiko is foolish and immature - some people seem to really dislike her. But to me I just found her to be real and relatable. A lot of my friends were similarly irresponsible with money, not good at holding down a job and bad at love at 19. Her relationship with Nana reminded me a lot of my first roommate-ship with I was 19, and I lived with my 18 year old friend who worked at the same job as me. I had to take care of her in a lot of ways. Watching Nana, all the memories flooded back of going furniture shopping, grocery shopping, eating dinner together after work, debating how to decorate the apartment and of course crying about our terrible love lives. I think this show depicts this life stage pretty well.
So I really like Hachiko, I feel a little protective of her when I read these other reviews of people who despise her. It feels to me like they are just 40 year old men who don’t get it, and never had the amazing/terrible experience of being a woman in her late teens/early 20s. Until I got to the whole Takumi/Nobu/Hachi love triangle. At this point, I became frustrated, because it felt to me like Hachiko had changed into a totally different character.
In the beginning, Hachiko is ditzy and lacks direction, but she is still fiercely devoted to those she loves! That’s the whole reason for her nickname, right? The early episodes show us a girl who is not sure what she’s doing, but still has passion for everything she sets her mind to. She is determined to make a life for herself in Tokyo, so she gets a job after she is laid off. When Shoji cheats on her, she is quick to shun him from her life. She will basically do anything for Nana, and spends a lot of time preoccupied with trying to figure out how to make her best friend happy, or how to get closer to her. She is this optimistic and positive character in the beginning, and as the viewer its easy to understand why the members of Blast would want to adopt her as their pet.
However, once Nana becomes involved with Takumi, she completely changes. Here begins the arc where Nana is perpetually crying or looking forlorn. She is no longer passionate or decisive. She seemingly looses all her agency overnight. And it’s somewhat hard to understand… I guess she felt she had to stick with Takumi at first, because otherwise people would think she was a slut, just sleeping with him because he’s a hot celebrity. But of course Takumi is a terrible manipulative man, who is literally just using her for sex and some kind of fucked up feeling of masculine control. So as an american woman in the 21st century this was all hard for me to empathize with - I don’t believe there’s any issue with casual sex, and I would certainly go ahead and have a one night stand with a hot celebrity if the opportunity arose. But I supposed in Japanese culture, and this was 20 years ago as well, women were not as free to have casual sex. Yet, even after she breaks things off with Takumi and commits to Nobu, once the pregnancy issue arises, she is once again totally lacking in agency.
I hated this so much, because of how much it conflicted with the message of Paradise Kiss. In ParaKiss, Yukari is often complaining and blaming others for her situation in the beginning. I think this is a pretty fair thing for a teenager to complain about, especially in Japan, since most teenagers have little agency in their lives anyways. But George berates her for this, and essentially tells her to take control of her own life. And she does this! She stays focused on her goals and her own career, not worrying about whether she will be able to salvage her relationship in the process. I think this is an incredibly strong thing for a woman to do, and its an important message for teenage girls. Always make choices for yourself, do not forego your own goals in the name of love, because, as is accurately portrayed in Parakiss— You’re probably not going to be with your high school boyfriend forever. So the whole point in Parakiss was personal agency, Yukari took charge of her life and achieved her dreams. (Also side note Isabella did too, when she defied her parents in living as a woman.) Comparing this to Hachiko, she seems to somehow go through the opposite transformation. She comes to Tokyo full of energy and passion, and then is basically reduced to this pathetic crying damsel, letting Takumi just come into her life and destroy it.
It could be argued that this is a normal response to manipulation and abuse. And I do think it is, and I think Takumi displayed a lot of scary abusive behaviors and I don’t think it would be wrong for anyone to necessarily shut down when being faced with this treatment. She was basically in an abusive relationship, and felt scared of him because he was genuinely scary. When Takumi came into Nana’s apartment against her wishes and locked himself in her room and used her phone to tell Nobu about her pregnancy… That was genuinely scary, abusive behavior. But my issue is that authors make choices, and I don’t understand the choice to make Hachiko like this, and have her go through this. It just felt totally out of character. She just cried and said nothing the whole time. And frankly, it’s not the story I want to see. it just feels like trauma porn and it has no point, except to make me wonder what the hell happened to the girl from the beginning of this anime? There are essentially rape scenes in this where Takumi initiates sex w/ Hachiko and she protests, and he pins her down and tells her to just be quiet. It’s painful and upsetting to watch. Wasn’t this supposed to be a comedy? Furthermore, while I as the viewer may recognize this as abuse, the anime itself does not seem to view Takumi this way. Everyone around her seems to take her choice to marry him as a sort of unfortunate but inevitable decision, and none of her dear friends try to stop her from throwing her life away with this terrible, horrible man. Who Hachiko herself believes is horrible!
And then when Takumi essentially tells her she would have to let him be a father to this child, she says she’s happy? Even after all the times she admitted he was a terrible person that she hated. It becomes this weird pro-life argument, when in my opinion Nana O. is totally right… don’t fucking have a baby you can’t afford to take care of. But because this anime is for some reason all pro-life suddenly, she decides to have this baby and marry her rapist/abuser. Cool. If you care about women at all or have ever experienced anything like this, you will find this really challenging to get through. By the end of the series, Hachi is just this crying girl that’s always looking down all the time. it’s completely depressing and misogynistic.
So what does this anime tell young women? It says that yes it is more important to marry an abusive rapist so that you can have a traditional family with your baby than just have a fucking abortion or be a single mother. Or...god forbid.... Be a single mother and still date the guy that you claimed to love, who may be able to be a step parent to your child one day. Of course Japanese culture is very traditional and conservative when it comes to family dynamics, but coming from a writer who has seemed to have no issue with depicting sex outside marriage, sex work, transgender people, and (worst of all!) women enjoying sex... You would think he would have a more progressive view on this.
So I give this mixed feelings because the beginning really is enjoyable, and if you want to watch anime where all the female characters suffer and become completely disenfranchised for their sins of sexual promiscuity, then this anime will be great for you! If you want to watch an anime where the characters go through realistic and normal growth and make rational decisions, you will be tearing your hair out by the end. Sadly, if you loved Paradise Kiss, I have to say Nana does not live up to its predecessor.
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Apr 3, 2023
I truly struggled with this anime. I watched it immediately after watching Paradise Kiss, another anime based off a manga by Ai Yazawa. I haven’t read either of the manga, so I can’t speak to that. But I loved the anime adaptation of Paradise Kiss, and obviously Nana has always been well liked, so I assumed I will love this anime. I will be comparing Nana and Paradise Kiss a lot in the review, because to me Paradise Kiss was genuinely the gold standard, a 10/10 anime.
So going into Nana I hoped that I would love it as well. And I did! For the ... 
Mar 22, 2023
On the face, it seems like a pretty mediocre anime. The soundtrack and animation are nothing special. The premise just seems like anime seventeen again. However, the writing and character development were well executed and had me entirely engaged. The main character, Arata, is relatable and charming. One thing I did take issue with is that Arata is technically not a NEET... He was employed at a convenience store. This may just be a cultural issue that I don't understand since I am not Japanese, but I do consider that to be a real job. However he did seem to be in a stagnant point
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Mar 20, 2023
Platonic Chain
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I only mark this as mixed feelings because I recognize some will not appreciate it. But there is a specific audience that should enjoy this. Don't compare this anime to any other modern anime, because it's just comparing apples to oranges. This is a historical artifact and should be enjoyed as such. A lot of people will complain about the CGI art style, but given the hindsight of 20 years - it's awesome. I think it's perfect for this anime; lifeless, creepy CGI animation was this thing that was everywhere for a very short amount of time until everyone finally realized it was totally ugly
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Feb 26, 2023
Totally over the top hornyness, definitely to the point that you will feel uncomfortable if this is not your personal fetish. There are moments that are straight out of a hentai. The world is very unbelievable and its one of those school animes where you literally never see a single teacher and you're wondering how they ever have time to do their homework. The main character, Yumeko is somewhat OP. Yet, I was very entertained. For an anime so stupid and lacking in depth, the twists in each episode are surprisingly clever and engaging. Each episode has its own game where the characters will gamble
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