Oh, this poor boy…

Karakai Jozu no Takagi-san
Studio: Shin-Ei Animation
Genre: Slice of Life, Romance

CVoyage: Last time on How To Train Your Future Husband–

EvilBob: Wait… that’s not what it’s called.

CVoyage: No. But is that not what it basically is, now?

EvilBob: …Point. I mean, she might as well have the guy on a leash. She did get him to promise to come to that one spot every single day of Summer Break.

CVoyage: For tandem riding practice, of all things. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. There’s still a little school left to get through.

EvilBob: Funny how Nishikata and his friends wonder why they have low scores. But, to his credit, Nishikata does decide to stick to it and study for the test.

CVoyage: Yeah… because his parents threaten to take away his games if he flunks.

EvilBob: It had me going, there, for a second. Thinking she’d actually help him study. O’ how foolish I was.

CVoyage: To be fair, she did help him understand some of the math he was struggling with.

EvilBob: Yeah. Too bad it was an English test.

CVoyage: Hey. He didn’t ask. So it’s entirely on him for getting such a crap score. Gotta love how she turned their scores into a guessing game. Knowing he’d get overly excited about her getting it wrong and-

EvilBob: And announce his D- to the entire class.

CVoyage: She really is a friggin’ mastermind.

EvilBob: And apparently has a tracker on him, somewhere, because she just happens to run into him at the bookstore too!

CVoyage: Yeah, that’s just uncanny. Almost like she can sense his energy or something.

EvilBob: Holy crap, she’s a Saiya-

CVoyage: I swear to god if you bring that theory nonsense into this show too I will strap you to a chair and force you to watch SAO on a loop for a week.

EvilBob: …Does your cruelty know no bounds?

CVoyage: The poor dude and his closet obsession with Shoujo manga just can’t catch a break. She baited him hard too.

EvilBob: Seriously! She knew what he got and played dumb the whole time! Even let him lie to her face despite knowing full well what she got. That is some pro level manipulation, right there!

CVoyage: But the whole “secret for a secret” thing. Just… dude.

EvilBob: And then the whole “I never lie to you, Nishikata” bit. Dude. Dude.

CVoyage: There! That’s it! You no longer have an excuse! My dude! Take. The. Hint! “But she told him she was lying, right after that!

EvilBob: Technically, she never said that was the lie. She just said that she told him “a lie.” And the lie… was that she never lies to him. So there. As much as the dude overthinks literally everything else, he’s out of excuses here, man!

CVoyage: Yeah, yeah. And a lie on a lie turns itself inside out or whatever. Something, something, Re:Creators. You get the idea.

CVoyage: I swear I wanna shake this boy.

EvilBob: Who knows. Maybe pez will come out.

CVoyage: …What?

EvilBob: Uh… yeah. My mind can get a little dark, sometimes.

CVoyage: …Right. Well, speaking of dark, I gotta hand it to ya, dude. You called it.

EvilBob: Yup. Test of Courage. One of the staple tropes of any romance series, really.

CVoyage: Or any teen comedy at all, really. Even Cardcaptor Sakura had one in its original run. And, true to form, it was absolutely adorable.

EvilBob: And hilarious. Don’t forget hilarious.

CVoyage: Eh. Yeah. That too. But can we just talk about the whole knee thing? Because that was freaking precious. Nevermind that he actually tried to keep her from falling, look at how genuinely concerned she was when he got hurt trying to help her!

EvilBob: And did you catch what she was saying about summer?

CVoyage: You mean how she’s liking it now, even after telling him that she “liked school?”

EvilBob: Dude, this is getting heart-meltingly cute.

CVoyage: And it only gets cuter! The next episode is just… guh!

EvilBob: Oh yeah. The shopping incident.

CVoyage: …You said that like it was some sort of epidemic.

EvilBob: It was. For him.

CVoyage: …Honestly, truer words were never said. You’d think he’d wise up by now and order these embarrassing little books from, like… the internet. But nooo. He had to go and tempt fate again.

EvilBob: It was even a different bookstore, this time! Dude, that’s just unlucky!

CVoyage: …In what universe is that unlucky?

EvilBob: …Truth.

CVoyage: So then she has him help her pick out a swimsuit after he loses another bet.

C&E: …*sigh*

CVoyage: He really needs to stop challenging her like that.

EvilBob: He really does.

CVoyage: But, of course, he still doesn’t get the hint. And at this point, I literally want to beat it into his skull. With one of those huge cartoon mallets. Just for good measure.

EvilBob: Make sure it has her face on it. Otherwise, he still probably won’t get it.

CVoyage: And then they decide to do some studying. And where does she suggest they go?

EvilBob: The library? The local community center? A cafe? O’, dear naive viewer… to his house, of course!

CVoyage: Interesting how he couldn’t be bothered asking if they could do their homework in the kitchen or living room or whatever.

EvilBob: Nope! Straight to his room! One would think that’d be more distracting than helpful.

CVoyage: Dude, having her anywhere in the house would be more distracting than helpful if we were him.

EvilBob: True that. But…

CVoyage: But…

EvilBob: So-

CVoyage: Freakin’-

C&E: CUTE!

CVoyage: I mean, I wanna punch the boy, but that entire segment was adorably awkward. Still, it’s pretty interesting how this played out. I mean, if you notice… she hardly teased him at all. And not just in his house, but in the entire episode. Maybe two or three really small jabs?

EvilBob: Yeah, no. He pretty much did it to himself this entire time. He is his own worst enemy. The whole thing with the manga was pretty much his fault. He psyched himself out when she came into his room, it was all him.

CVoyage: But I admit. His keeping that thing she wrote about him was sweet.

EvilBob: Yeah. Like the rest of the show, really. But, dude. There is one important thing we’ve still yet to discuss.

CVoyage: And that is?

EvilBob: The OP for 100% Unrequited Love!

CVoyage: …Yeah… not gonna lie. The was impressive. Going through the work to actually develop an entire OP for an anime that doesn’t exist. That is some god tier world-building, right there.

EvilBob: That’s dedication is what it is. I mean they even got the music to exactly match that style of anime! I was expecting them to cut away to Nishikata watching it before the OP was done, but nope! They actually played the whole thing! That’s that. This is staying firmly in my favorites list for the season. 10 out of 10. Evil as a Super Villain. Calling it, now.

CVoyage: What more can be said? Aside from being funny, it’s also one of the cutest shows to come out of this season. It’s sweet, endearing, witty, this is yet another Super Effective pair of episodes. I am loving this, so far. But if you like things to be a bit more mature and/or a bit zanier, check out our reviews of Dagashi Kashi 2.

EvilBob: Or stick with this one. Karakai Jozu no Takagi-san is Simulcast on Crunchyroll, Mondays at 11:30am EST. And that’s basically all we’ve got for you today, folks. Thanks for letting us waste your time, people.

CVoyage: As always, thanks for reading. Keep up the awesome…

EvilBob: And Keep it classy.

CVoyage: Take care.