Heart Cocktail

Heart Cocktail. A cocktail of bold and unassuming. Unconventional and earthly. Rapid and placid.
As you can see from the score below, this is one of the animes of all time for me. But how come, despite my numerous gripes against the episodic shows and romance genre in general?
Well, the thing about HC is exactly that it doesn't try to be anything special. Now, make no mistake, this show makes a very bold statement by its very existence, yet it remains faithful to itself and to its original premises in a manner, inspiring appreciation, respect, and admiration. It remains mature, devoted, touching, and moving ... all the way through, without losing that mellow old-fashioned mood.
The writing in this is remarkable, certain 4-minute sketches are filled with more creativity and inspiration than an entire season of your average isekai. The attention to detail is reminiscent of that of good literature from the beginning of the 20th century, to the effect of making the series feel very vibrant and alive. More vivid, in fact, than any 4k 60fps Unreal Engine 69-produced anime, as it lets you feel the stench of character's cigars, the chilly ocean breeze with the nearest bagel store 500m away on your skin, the man's spiky bristle, the woman's obnoxious cologne, the heart's tumultuous high school years. One could say it makes up for the rather primitive animation, but that'd be missing the forest for the trees. It's this very primitive animation that gives HC this book-like feeling, this incredible advantage of being able to exercise your faculty for imagination, when combined with great writing. Make no mistake, I love a good-looking anime just as much, but most of the time, the fancy graphics are used as a cheap appeal for the wide audiences, ironically, becoming anything but cheap in the process, resulting in budget cuts for the actually mattering elements of production. Meanwhile, I have an enormous respect for shows that prioritize good scripts over good looks.
BGM is also majestic here. It's hard to believe how well it fits the big picture sometimes.

Among the few downsides I could find, the propensity of stories being told from a man's point of view, due to author being a man himself.
Some of the sketches also feel underdeveloped and cut short, but well... That's kinda the whole point of short novels like that. They're cut out to squeeze the best part from a simple love story of two. If they were longer, they'd inevitably exhaust themselves in no time.

Overall, it's supposed to be an excellent anime (with excellent subs to boot) for someone with an attention span as short as mine, but ironically, such people would hardly ever stumble on it, with all those strange premises, age, bland visuals and unfamiliar concept.
9 cyclamen pots on a woman's windowsill / 10