Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai (2011) 🌟

Info

• Title:: Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai
• Title_EN:: Haganai: I don’t have many friends
• Studio:: AIC Build
• Year:: 2011
• Format:: series
• Episodes:: 12

Log

2024-08-17: ep1–5

god i’m really loving this? but what does this say about me?!

a found family can be dysfunctional too perhaps, and i’m glad it recognizes that.

is it bad that i was a little upset that rika taking all her classes in the science room wasn’t supposed to imply that she’s actually special needs? like, i thought that would actually be a valuable development of the societal reject theme, but instead we have yet another genius girl who’s forced to bear the curse of high iq. sigh… at least there’s always fanfiction to fix this…

2024-08-18: ep6–9

announcement that rika is absolutely my type. i guess that’s to be expected, since harumi’s pretty similar in temperament and ambition – it’s just that rika ramps it up to 11, like everything in this show does.

2024-08-25: ep10–12 + ova

rika gets me so horny it’s unreal. though i feel like i’m kinda taking the easy bait by doing so?

and maybe yozora hasn’t changed, but instead has just discovered the power of discretion and choosing easier targets to pick fights against.

2024-08-31: s2ep1–5

god i wanna smash rika every which way the good lord affords us.

anyway,

if i were to rate these characters by how sympathetic i feel towards them, sena would be pretty high up on my list. sure, she’s a spoiled rich girl, but everything that’s come from this upbringing seems to be maladaptive.
she may be bright in some respects but absolutely idiotic when it comes to interpersonal affairs, and that’s how she gets outplayed every single time.

anyway, were it up to me, i’d date sena but keep rika as my secret mistress (because i feel like she would find that hotter), then just jump ship to rika after that all falls apart.

2024-09-02: s2ep6–9

the episode where they all celebrate kobato’s birthday together is so cute and charming!! it honestly almost made me tear up… but maybe small birthday events just do that to me. it just feels so personal and meaningful that i can’t help but be moved.

2024-09-07: s2ep10–12

i guess forcibly removing yourself from the central love triangle is one way to resolve it, though rika suddenly jumped into the lead as the next active contender, and she at least has the forthrightness to actually go through with it.
not sure if pelting him with ball bearings was the right way to resolve this issue, storywise, but i guess it gets the job done.

but also, this ending feels right with yozora’s character. it really feels like she has tried the hardest to actively resist character growth – to whatever extent the characters in this show have grown.

homo hole (or yaoi ana)… oh wait, apparently the yaoi hole is actually a thing in japanese culture?! is their sex education really that anemic?!
but this now makes yukimura’s comment about how his penis just hasn’t grown in yet make sense: he developed the yaoi hole, and now he’s just waiting for the cock to come in.

tier list of who i would fugg

• true ❤️ love
  • rika: if kodaka had any sense then he would’ve taken this late-game third option to resolve the love triangle, but maybe i’m just projecting my own desires. but she would be perfect for me, huh? smart, sensible, passionate, eager, depraved, so passionate… i think i’d feel comfortable to be myself around her and i’d respect her for her interests too. and we would be fucking like rabbits, no doubt about it
• expand polycule
  • yukimura: i have a type. i don’t think i’d like that type too much if he actually went on hrt and tried to masc up, but i think it’d be ok to try to push him toward an atypical masculinity. i could love a soft boy, and i would ravage his yaoi hole too
    • plus, i feel like rika could be open to us making this a throuple
• take your pick
  • sena: i find her easy (easier) (easy-ish?) (possible) to empathize with, and i (naturally) find her attractive, but i also don’t know if i’d be able to put up with her for very long. but i could never hate her
  • kobato: she’s just a cutie, and she hits the moe moe part of my heart. i like the kobato who lights up with affection toward her brother, but don’t really like the kobato who uses her chuuni identity as a defense mechanism. i sincerely wish that she finds happiness
• no opinion
  • maria
  • maria’s sister
  • kodaka: seems nice enough, but i don’t swing that way
• no thanks
  • that red-haired girl: she just seems annoying is all
  • yozora: both sena and yozora are characters who are defined by sob stories that, upon reflection, are hard to take seriously. yozora is a bully-who-is-bad-at-it whose tragedy is that she lost her best friend and then never was able to make another for ten years due to having a shitty personality,¹ sena is a poor rich girl who is unable to make any friends due to being too pretty and too talented and too rich and eager to flaunt it in everyone’s faces because she believes that displaying superiority over other people is the key to making friends. the difference, then, is that sena has the capacity to learn and grow; whereas with yozora any personal change feels like pulling teeth to her and, when taken to task, she’d rather run away than actually confront herself. i’d genuinely like to watch another season just focused on her,² but i’d be too scared to come within ten feet of her personally

Quote

watermoon — 09/09/2024 11:53 PM
(if i dated yukimura, i don’t know if my constant joke references to nobunaga’s ambition would piss him off or if he’d take them really seriously and believe that i have a deep appreciation for sengoku-era culture too)
sheepb puppet — 09/10/2024 2:15 AM
I think yukimura would think you’re trying to inspire him with those references, he doesn’t seem like the sharpest katana
watermoon — 09/10/2024 5:18 AM
i’m imagining it backfiring and getting yukimura hooked on koei games in the same way that sena is hooked on eroge

Notes

paralogue: comfort media

Quote

Haganai: Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai

maybe this shouldn’t count since i first watched it last year, but since i finished it i’ve had this constant urge to rewatch it, and i finally gave into the urge recently.
 
for some reason its portrayal of a dysfunctional found-family sticks with me, and i find the show’s non-judgmental commitment to letting these characters express their strange desires to be reassuring. and i love them. i love all these freaks. i want to be friends with them and pursue some of them romantically. i too want a place where i feel okay to be myself – messiness and all – so maybe this show is a vicarious outlet for that desire.

Footnotes

1. and then the only person with the patience to handle her in the first place was that friend she met originally! she reminds me of ████, honestly: eager to dish it out but unable to take it, and then carries a grudge toward those who do retaliate which can last years. ↩

2. i do, however, believe that the ending she got was the one that thematically made the most sense for her. ↩