Hiii! Welcome to another blog by yours truely Otaku Central, woo? As it’s now September, it means a new school year, which also means more work that previously! However, now that I am officially off work and have been for a while, I now have a lot more time for writing and watching Anime/reviews and such. Which is going to be awesome.
Today we’re going to be talking about Sukitte Ii na yo. or commonly known as by its english title “Say I love you”. Let’s get to it shall we!
Oh, how I wanted to say, I love you to Sukitte Ii na yo… but I just can’t because you’re a flat two-dimensional romance that just didn’t live up to my expectations. It really is a shame, because Suki na yo had a tremendous amount of potential and gave us some things we don’t often get to see in the romance genre. But as the series winds down I found myself lamenting what could have been.
It’s hard for me to be too hard on the romance anime plot premise, I mean they have pretty much already all been done before and they are all mostly silly as well. Suki na yo is no different, with the unlikely story of the hot and most popular guy in school falling for a shy, friendless loner who kicked him down the stairs because she mistakenly thought he flipped her skirt. The beginnings of true and lasting love if I ever saw it. The girl Mei, and the boy Yamato, both have some interesting personality issues on the surface and despite the silliness of their meeting, there was some enormous amount of potential in their relationship. However, this is sadly mostly wasted over the course of the story.
Now here is where Suki na yo is a bit different from its other romance cousins. For the most part, our lead characters are in a relationship together from the beginning to the end of the series. The typical format is 99% courting with the eventual payoff at the end when our little lovebirds finally realize their mutual affections. While it can often be frustrating when it is drug out with silly misunderstandings and character cockblocks at least by then we have a clear understanding of why they both love each other. The show is called Say I love you, but it should probably more aptly called Say why I love you.
Even though I have some pretty serious complaints about the way the romance and plot of the show unfolds, I can’t say I didn’t enjoy watching this series. But when you compare it with its peers within the genre and even shows that were airing during the same time as this, it comes across as distinctly average and ordinary.
Much in the same way as the story is underwhelming, so are the series main characters. A romance is by nature very character driven and if we don’t get compelling leads it’s pretty difficult to care if they end up falling in love with each other. Mei is your standard “everyman” kind of girl typical in shoujo romances. She’s cute, though not particularly beautiful, and pretty much average in every other way. She’s a nice girl with a strong spirit but very vulnerable as well. Exactly the kind of girl most people can relate too and can root for as well. It’s sweet how she slowly comes out of her shell and makes friends and learns to trust people again as well. Even though this mostly comes across pretty corny and clichéd. Though hell I like corny and clichéd anyway.
Yamato is less interesting and in many ways is also your typical bishounen leading man. Though I will give him some credit for breaking the trend and not being a cold, aloof, and unfeeling jerk. You get the feeling most of the time he has genuine feelings for Mei but at other times his actions around her seemed to be a bit condescending and they he was treating her more like a pet and as an equal partner. I felt some aspects of his personality were also very inconsistent, especially later in the series. For a guy who came across as supremely confident, he was surprisingly weak-willed at times and his distrust of Mei’s feelings at times was implausible considering what the pair had been through to that point already.
The supporting cast is the weakest link though and stereotypical shoujo fair. This plays into the weakness of the plot but basically, the same themes are repeated multiple times over the course of the story. A girl appears, of course hopefully in love with Yamato, the drama unfolds, the girl is rejected and our leads love continues. And the rejected gets new love and becomes best friends with our dear Mei. While I mostly liked the supporting characters they simply lack the depth for them to be actually interesting. Then, of course, you have to look past the unlikelihood that two romantic rivals are going to be besties afterwards, particularly when one side was involved in some pretty nasty schemes and bullying.
Despite all these flaws though what Suki na yo really does best is both its artwork and musical soundtrack. Both are typical of the genre but I really did love both of the songs. The seiyuu cast is comprised of mostly veterans but none of them are real stars. I thought they did solid, if unspectacular work. While the artwork may not be a masterwork, it is very fluid and reality-based, with clothes and body types that stay in the realm of possibility.
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7 responses to “Sukitte Ii na yo. | Say I love you?”
I really like how level this anime is. Even introducing a model into the mix of characters didn’t take the plot out of the realm of the everyday and it just felt like such a grounded story. Why that won’t appeal to everyone, it was nice to have a nice, low key romance for once.
If you have seen it, what did you think of Kimi ni Todoke?
You didn’t ask me, but I’m gonna answer anyways, because a friend recommended both series to me as “the best shoujo romances” at the same time. Tbh, I couldn’t get into either as much as her, but I did appreciate Kimi ni Todoke’s wholesomeness more. It’s just utterly heartwarming!
I did a blog on it at 3 am after a full glass of rum… For personal reasons, it had a bigger impact on me than most people.
I read that post. It was a strong one!
There are similarities between both Anime, Kimi no Todoke and Sukitte Ii na yo, but luckily I’ve seen both and I can say easily that I’ve enjoyed it just as much, maybe a little more than Sukitte Ii na yo. Without I doubt, I think they are both great Anime.
I remember watching this anime and it did seem corny and cliche but I ended up tearing up in certain scenario and mostly when the gift Yamato gave her broke.