Hajimete no Gal

Hajimete no Gal is the perfect representation of the dreck the anime industry tirelessly manufactures: vapid harem twaddle devoid of spirit and interested solely in selling BluRays to wide-eyed otaku who think seeing uncensored anime panties is a wonderful way to spend 5000 yen. The reality is that Hajimete no Gal is worth less than a meal at Matsuya.

The difference between a harem anime that is well-received versus one that is not is that the popular ones tend to have a certain level of craftsmanship: they look nice-- particularly when focusing on the curvature of the female cast-- and have catchy openings and voice ... acting to drive the senses awild. If one was looking simply for some cheaply-produced masturbation fodder, why not, after all, just watch some 'hentai' (as the boys in the west call it) instead?

Hajimete no Gal begs that question repeatedly.

It is deeply uncertain about whether it wants to be a serious romance or flat-out pornography, and so it attempts to be both. And thus it fails to an almost astounding level.

Repeatedly (often more times in a single episode than can be counted with one hand) the anime will showcase the excessively-censored fantasies of Junichi-- the worthless protagonist-- where Yame and other members of the obligatory harem troupe force themselves on him sexually, begging for sex in the middle of a classroom, a karaoke booth, or some other absurd location that few would ever consider a good idea. Of course this exists because the anime does not have the courage to legitimately have sexual relationships portrayed within the show, and of course it leverages these scenes as an excuse to sell more BluRay copies to sexless otaku who have never walked into an R-18 store before.

The 'romance' of Hajimete no Gal may well be nonexistent, as Yame and the rest of the female cast never give a single reason for why they are interested in Junichi, much less why they so crave his penis. Yame agrees to go out with him, presumably, because she finds him fun to tease - but then blushes like a 10-year-old at the idea of a kiss. What? I'm sorry, but if you're going to sell an anime on the basis of it having a cast of gal characters - the gal trend being defined by promiscuity - then they should actually be such. If you wish to portray a story with toddlers who think 'indirect kisses' are a thing (and, good lord, this show has that aplenty), then please look to KyoAni's Chuunibyou for inspiration instead of hardcore pornography.

Junichi makes Ichika from Infinite Stratos and Rito from To Love-Ru seem tolerable by comparison. He is a spineless loser whose only goal in life is to lose his virginity (as if anyone in Japan these days actually cares if a high school student hasn't had sex), yet when presented with the opportunity to have sex, cowers like a baby or imposes self-righteousness upon them as if he is now somehow above having sex despite his constant, pathetic attempts at such for the entire series. His friends poke fun at how he might be a cuckold, but in reality, he is the embodiment of one, doing nothing when she sees another man hit on his supposed girlfriend, later throwing a tantrum about how worthless he is and how she deserves that man instead, only to get jealous when he later sees them talk to each other. Whining about how pathetic you are is not an attractive feature, and Yame and crew would do well to leave him aside until he grows up and grows a pair - something unlikely to happen in the event of future seasons. (Let us hope such events never come to pass.)

The rest of the cast is also comprised of cretinous wastes-of-space who do nothing to enhance the quality of the show or make it any less infuriating. You have Nene, the obligatory childhood friend character, massive (and frankly impossibly so) breasts included, who refers to Junichi as "onii-chan" and who he of course disregards despite her sex appeal and constant advances because, hey, treating your old friends like trash is a cool thing for anime protagonists to do. Other additions include Yui-- I had to look up her name as I couldn't remember it-- who is conveniently a lewd Nico Nico Douga streamer despite her rich, 'flawless' behavior at school, and Ranko (her name being a pun on the Japanese word for gangbangs...) whose only purpose in the anime is to beat people up, yell at Junichi and attempt to force sex upon him (sometimes both occurring simultaneously). Finally, there is Yame's aforementioned male friend-- a cackling douchebag and dreadful antagonist who behaves in no way resembling an actual human being-- and Junichi's three, pathetic friends who do little else but act jealous towards him and follow him around in the event that one of his harem members might so much as glance in their direction. If the only thing defining these kids and keeping their friendship together is their virginity, then, hey, maybe they were never actually friends in the first place?

Thankfully, there are only ten episodes, presumably because they used so many tropes that there are no longer any more cards left to pull from the hat. Onsens scenes, beach scenes where the protagonist lathers lotion onto the girls-- you name it. All the asinine trash the anime industry loves is here for your eyes and ears to feast upon. Hooray. Yahoo.

Hajimete no Gal looks cheap and sounds cheap. None of the fantasy scenes are arousing in any way, nor are the obscured pantyshots the show is so desperately marketing. It has about the same production quality as the average pornographic anime, which makes it a wonder why it couldn't have just been such instead. Even with the decreased characterisation and story a pornographic format would have involved, it would still have been a better anime. At least then it might actually be transparent and honest with itself.

I'm going to be quite blunt. Hajimete no Gal sucks. It is not quite abysmal, nor does it win the award for worst harem anime (Infinite Stratos is still a bit more egregious), but it still sucks. Don't watch things that suck.

Watching Hajimete no Gal is like consuming junk food of the worst kind. From the food fast menu, there’s McDonalds, Burger King, KFC, Jack in the Box, Taco Bell, etc. Even among junks, there are sometimes decent ones that can be a guilty pleasure. Unfortunately, Hajimete no Gal is none of that and instead appeals as nothing short than garbage. Without a shadow of a doubt, I can safely say that upon finishing this series, it’s garbage behind comprehension.

First, let’s get to the more obvious. The show itself is based on a manga that hasn’t been out too long. (only 2 years in fact) It ... merely has four volumes and yet the producers decided to make this into an anime adaptation. That’s the least of problems though. The real problem begins with the cast of characters. At its core, there’s Junichi Hashibia, a second high school year boy who is an obvious virgin and wants a girlfriend. I can honestly confess that Junichi has some of the worst personalities you can find in anime that’s stitched together into one single entity. The guy has a perverted mind, often clueless about certain situations, and doesn’t seem to excel at anything. He also has some of the most pathetic friends at school and they are no better than him. The only thing that seems to be redeemable about his character is that he is loyal. That actually brings up his involvement with other female characters in the show.

From the cast of girls, we got a variety but the most easily noticeable is Yukana Yame. She’s a gyaru and often attracts the attention of guys and girl alike. Lady luck seems to be on Junichi’s side and Yukana actually decides to be Junichi’s girlfriend. However, their relationship is what I find pretty damn unappealing. Let’s face some facts here because they are nothing really alike. Yukana has school idol-like status while Junichi is a second rate loser. The two have different personalities and doesn’t seem compatible. While the show does give some convincing moments that they can co-exist as a couple, it still doesn’t change the fact that they don’t match. Their character chemistry has very dry humor that often begins from Junichi’s perverted mind or Yukana becoming jealous of other girls. Speaking of the others, the remaining character cast isn’t appealing either.

Nene is the typical childhood friend but instead of looking cute and innocent, the show decides to give her enormous boobs and an underage body. Not to mention, she has the personality of a child as she often tries to get Junichi to “ravage” her. Yui, the other school idol may seem like an elegant beauty at first. Yet, behind her pretty looks is a girl with a devious personality. Somehow, she believes everyone in the world loves her and she is their master. (well, that is except Junichi) Oh we can’t forget Ranko, the possessive close friend of Yukana. My first impression of her character is that she is an animal. Ranko is very aggressive and wants to protect her territory. In this case, it’s her friend Yukana. Unfortunately, it involves Junichi and the two ends up in some rather compromising positions. So there you have it. Our short yet controversial character cast. Now, if the show actually decided to focus more on characterization, then it would have some chance to salvage itself. Instead, it tries way too hard to appeal to their characters that results in questionable fetishes. I honestly felt uncomfortable watching this show because every episode seems to invite viewers to embrace their atrocious ideas.

The series’ storytelling is also pretty dreadful. The first few episodes aims at bringing out as much as fetishes as possible. The way it characterizes its female cast makes them look like sex objects. It seems all the guys in the show are perverted in some way or form with their personal desires. Each episode has moments that will show them, sometimes discretely if you pay attention. The overlay of the story seems to focus more on Junichi and Yukana’s relationships development. As I mentioned before, Junichi actually stays pretty loyal to his girlfriend and it’s even more surprising that Yukana is the most mature of the character cast. However, their relationship gets stale real fast. Nothing special really develops between them and instead relies far too much on sexual acts and teasing to do the work. If this show really decided to focus on relationships, at least move outside of Junichi and Yukana’s circle. Instead, the show overemphasizes on their relationship that itself is nothing but generic junk food.

Studio Naz adapts the animation although the visual quality itself is rather mediocre. The male characters look unremarkable with nothing that stands out from their looks. On the other hand, the female cast draws a lot of attention. Yukana is your gyaru girl and probably looks the most convincing compared to the others. The others all look pretty unrealistic. I mean, just look at Nene on that cover. Ranko is somehow allowed to dress like she’s half nude and enter school grounds without trouble. Yui looks normal on the surface but her other appearance looks like some teen idol character. And yes, it’s an ecchi show so expect tons and tons of fan service. The unavoidable beach episode, sexual positions, and lewd character expressions. You name it. It’s there. At many times, it seems the camera is having way too much fun with its angles.

The soundtrack and music will easily be forgettable as the most noticeable sounds of the show is when girls are moaning, yelling, etc. The OP and ED theme songs contains suggestive camera shots while the character voice mannerism all sound off beat. The only voice I can stand in this show is probably Yukana as she surprisingly sounds the most mature.

Hajimete no Gal is a show that I can’t really recommend to anyone unless you like junk and want to increase your watch-list. I mean, it’s only 10-episodes and it doesn’t take long to finish them all. You can even skip every scene that involves Junichi’s male friends as you wouldn’t miss a second of the plot. The plot itself is devoid of development and instead decides to puts its energy into the fan service. Rather than characterization, it decides to saturate them in the most sexual way possible. Hajimete no Gal is one of the very few shows that I gave a 2/10 this year and looking back, I probably won’t regret giving such a score. Oh but “why would you waste your time watching this in the first place, Stark?” Honestly, I wanted to see if this show can ever become better than the manga but unfortunately, that’s a distant memory now. This show is junk food and you can easily toss it into the trash after you’re done.

“Why do people fight? Why does war exist? A difference of opinion? A difference of religion? How ridiculous… I want to show this to those who would wage war - Three goddesses are pressing their boobs against each other. This has the power to rid the world of all its fighting!”

Oh boy!

The season was Summer 2017, a rather disappointing season altogether, with concepts ranging from exciting new worlds to fucking centaur girls and everything in between, giving even the kinkiest of anime fans something to try. But it seemed like none of them could stand apart from the crowd, rise up and be the season’s ... beacon of hope for anime fans. Kakegurui’s crazy faces could only go so far, Fate/Apocrypha is a shell of Fate’s former self and My Hero’s Academia’s “TOURNAMENT ARC” ended last season. However, I am here to change all of that, because there is one show that not only gives us the kind of “plot” that we want, but aims to break modern storytelling conventions to create something special. People will write it off as just cheap otaku pandering, but that in itself is just cheap. This show is a misunderstood masterpiece as it makes anime economically a viable option to invest time and money in to. And how does it go about doing that? The only way the industry knows how: ANIME TIDDIES!!!

Ok. Enough with the nonsense.

As you can probably tell, Hajimete no Gal has no shame; it’s a show that managed to stand out from every other anime this season purely because of the amount of lewd fan-service jammed into the show. It is an ecchi high school romance-comedy anime produced by Studio Naz. Nothing in that last sentence sounds promising to me as I have only seen one anime before that belonged to those exact genres that I thought was good, that being the extremely sadistic Prison School. And Studio Naz, despite never having seen a show made from them, are responsible for the notorious DRAMA-tical Murder, need I say more. This anime from the start was pinned by many to be disaster, and while I am of the belief that shows that are predominantly ecchi are not inherently bad, I was not looking at this anime with much in the way of expectations. But I still held hope that it would not turn out as a complete disaster. After all, when one first imagines shoving a hotdog up their ass, I would expect the reaction to be rather negative. I mean, who in their right mind would ever shove a hotdog up their ass? But assuming something is different to experiencing it firsthand. Who knows, maybe one would enjoy the feeling of a hotdog inside their ass? You can never really know unless you try it, so that’s what I did. But not the hotdog part, I’m still not trying that. I watched all 10 episodes of Hajimete no Gal, and this is what I thought:

*NOTE: This review is purely for the subbed version.*

Hajimete no Gal in short, is trash. This just so happened to be one of those times when assuming a show is terrible before you even start was the best course of action for many anime fans. It follows this generic-looking pervy dude in high school named Junichi who has next to no confidence at all and is a virgin – this feature being seen in a negative light because in this kind of anime, of course it would. He is portrayed as a pathetic loser who’s saddled with a trio of friends even more pathetic that all lust over women, read porno magazines openly and ultimately keep Junichi from having any real chance at getting laid. But one day, the three stooges force Junichi to confess to the sluttiest girl in school that they know as some sort of prank. Junichi being the weakest character in the entire show goes through with it and somehow… it worked. The “gal” he confessed to, Yukana Yame, knows that all Junichi is after is sex, yet she decides she wants to go out with him. This is implied that she seems to take pleasure in teasing him and making fun of Junichi’s insecure self, but that maybe there’s more to Junichi that Yukana likes that will be developed as the show continues. With this kind of premise, it is obvious that the show is on the trashy side of anime, but the setup did show promise. The relationship at first looked like it could turn out alright, and the way characters were introduced as common caricatures in a harem anime gave the possibility to break the stereotypes within the sub-genre, leaving us with a show that, whilst trashy, has some substance that’s worth the watch. Unfortunately, the hope was all for nought as it turned out to be another shitty harem series.

From the first episode, we are shown every female character that will eventually be a part of the harem: the stereotypical main “gal” Yukana, the big-titted loli Nene and Yui, the Asian prefect (who just so happens to be the only female with a cup size below D). Honestly, their appearances are the only features that matter, because when you take away the T&A, they are all basic bitches that are only there for the sake of the harem and that never changes. Remember that these women all have the feelings for Junichi, the pinnacle of ‘self-insert male protagonist’ that is so bland that in no way can anyone similar to him get the kind of attention he gets. The only female that makes logical sense to be in his harem is G-cup jail-bait Nene, and that is only because of their childhood friendship. Yukana has no sensible reason for spending so much time with Junichi, especially considering how she first met him after seeing him read a porno magazine with the rest of his doofus friends – the future child offender included. Yui is only after Junichi because of this weird fetish for controlling men like him, despite how Junichi seems to be the only guy in the entire show that she is ever interested in, paying no attention to any of his fellow virgin friends. Yukana’s friend Ranko is another character prevalent in the show and is the only girl that doesn’t want Junichi’s virginity, but she has as much development as the rest of the cast here – none. Also, fun fact: Ranko’s character design is a rip off of Mito from Food Wars. The only viewers that I can imagine liking these characters are the ones who screenshot specific clips for “later use”.

The male characters are no better, with each character being completely one-dimensional, cringeworthy and an embarrassment to any man with integrity watching this. Junichi’s best pal Shinpei has one purpose in this entire show: to act as Junichi’s wingman. You might be thinking somewhere along the lines of ‘well that’s pretty shit’, but at least he has a reason to be on screen. The blonde-haired guy of the group, Keigo has no reason to even exist! I had to look up his nam because he was so irrelevant. He has so much hollow characterization that he could have switched spots with Junichi as the generic protagonist and the story would have stayed the exact same. But the worst of them has to be Junichi’s fat ass friend Minoru, who openly admits that he is a paedophile with no shame whatsoever. This guy even says that 15 year old girls are “too old for him” … this is a new low folks. What’s even more cringe is how these little shits seem to nearly always talk about online streams of cam girls when together in school. Hajmete no Gal already shows numerous couples groping each other in public in the first 5 minutes. But when it comes to showing how much of a cesspool the setting is, it goes above and beyond, and that does nothing in the long run. It may be laughable at first, but it only adds to the pile of manure that this show shits out on a regular basis.

Saying that the characters was the only problem is a massive understatement to how far down the toilet this shit sank. The plot is fucking horrendous. It tries to show progression with Junichi’s relationship, but only focuses on random events that happen as the couple gets closer with each other. This type of storytelling makes it difficult to structure plot elements unless there’s good writing behind it, but there is nothing that has been said in this review so far that in any way indicates good writing. Overall, the structure is a mess, riddled with contrivances that destroys most of any chance of development for Junichi and Yukana’s relationship. From the very beginning their chemistry is about as authentic as the lead duo from Fifty Shades of Grey and by the end you are either questioning what was the point of all this, or just gave up on the reasoning and continued watching for the ‘plot’. The dialogue is also dreadful if you ever take the show seriously. And even then, the script writers probably never gave a shit about trying to make anything quality when you hear lines like this come out of nowhere:

“All I want is a dope pussy to fuck.”

All I want is some god damn respect shown from staff to viewers that take time out of their day to watch this content. But it’s safe to say that this show has no respect for even telling a competent story, let alone its fanbase. The consensus around most harem anime is when you’ve seen one, you’ve seen most, but this is such a failure that it ends up as a shell of the common harem anime. There are a lot of problems with this show, and it does not help that there was only 5 episodes that actually had storyline progression. Yes, out of the 10 episodes the staff had to tell the entire story, only half of it has anything remotely meaningful. Producing Hajimete no Gal like this made everything feel incredibly rushed, to the point where there is no possible way that anyone watching this had time to get invested in these characters and care about what is happening on-screen. But wait, there’s more, because along with a rushed plot, viewers are subjected to watching full filler episodes dedicated to fan-service; the kind of content you would expect from a show like Fairy Tail. From the compulsory beach episode, to the entire harem getting a job at a cosplay café, they are a waste of animation resources. And after persevering to the end, I have concluded that there is nothing that this adaptation did that could be considered a positive – it is a terrible adaptation and a terrible anime in general!

Now while it is an awful show with nothing redeemable when it comes to story and characters, the animation and sound is what saves Hajimete no Gal from earning a 1/10. The animation style is usually very common with romance-comedy anime: standard designs with bright, dynamic colours. There were a few jarring points, like how pink lines used for characters blushing go off the side of their face, and the last episode looking more like it came from Chronexia and the Eight Seals. And while it is overall generic and looks very unremarkable compared to similar anime, technically I found it to be just ok. Maybe I have just become desensitised to anime breasts drawn the size of watermelons but it never bothered me anymore than how sloppy the writing was. However, there is something that I want to get off my chest and that is how there is an uncensored version of Hajimete no Gal that has no reason to exist. I watched the uncensored version, therefore I expected uncensored material, yet all I saw were a couple panty shots that got censored in the ‘safer’ version. How in the world are you going to censor panty shots in an ecchi show? Even worse, there’s still censorship in the NSFW version. What the fuck!? So even if you were only watching it for a weekly wank, you’d probably have better luck with a handful of other anime from this season. Kakegurui would be a better choice for that reason, even with the ‘look at me I’m so CRAZZY!!!1!’ expressions. Sound-wise, it’s fine: J-pop opening and ending with basic OST’s, nothing more. Voice-acting was good, with emotions coming through the characters well. Production-wise, it’s fairly competent, and I would be lying if I did not say that I thought some moments were absolutely hilarious. The best scene overall was definitely in episode 6 when one of Junichi’s friends dressed up as Kirito from SAO in an attempt to impress some ladies, comedy gold! Sadly that moment only lasts for 10 seconds, and those kind of moments cannot compensate for how terrible the show was overall and in no way saves this show from damnation.

And thus, these are my thoughts of Hajimete no Gal. There is more that I could have stated, but honestly this show is not worth any more time and effort that has already been given. The show is a throwaway anime that lives solely to sell blow-up sex dolls and lewd posters of the female characters to otaku fans that will buy into this garbage every season. It is a piece of trash that continues to wear down the ecchi genre and ultimately makes me ashamed to be a fan of anime in general. My advice: Don’t watch it, and if you do want to watch it, stop, and go back to my original advice. Unless you plan on watching the dub, and even then, only watch if you're in the mood for some trash.

NAZ, a studio I never expected to come back since Hamatora.

I was very surprised to hear that this got an anime, and boy did my perverted side come into light. An anime about a virgin on his journey to step into the region of adulthood.

I feel like ecchi doesn't get the love it deserves. Of course, being an ecchi series, it's understandable. It's been done a lot and might be annoying to some, which I guess makes sense.

The story is simple. Our MC was forced to confess to a gal, Yukana. Yukana with gigantic titties decides then to tease him and then eventually, Hashiba (our ... MC) gets the girl. Congrats?!

With this a start of a crazy yet amazing relationship begins, as well as some relationships breaking.

Besides the fat pedophile, the other side character friends are quite enjoyable to watch. They support him and Yukana as well as despises him for it.

This is because they never thought Junichi would be able to pull it off, jealousy from the 2 is inevitable once you get a big, pretty gal like Yukana.

As dumb and generic it is, I really enjoy the interactions between Yukana and Junichi. It seems like what a nice, cute relationship would look like (of course, minus the fantasies and teasing Junichi has and Yukana does). But I really do like Yukana's character, She's kind hearted and I guess really loves our MC and tries to do what she can to get closer.

Having read the manga tho, the adaptation was solid, now some parts are either skipped or re-arranged. I really hope it's the latter. Besides that, some characters look different. But I didn't care all too much. But Junichi's childhood friend really needs to see a doctor. I don't understand how she can even walk.

Whatever happens in the future is truly up to the 2 and how they decide to direct their relationship.

In Conclusion, the anime has its points. The guilty pleasure of Summer, with some nice ecchi. Ecchi haters stay away, and perverts go all the way! This anime is for all perverted needs. But as well as nice character interactions. So enjoy it! Enjoy it for its ecchiness!

To start out, I need to establish that this is a review of the anime's dub. I'll explain why later in the review. Along with that, this will also include spoilers, although I doubt they would really change your viewing experience.

To enjoy this show, one must understand it is not meant to be taken seriously. The girls have unconventionally large breasts, and the plot is not the deepest thing in the world, but it's hilarious. I found myself sending quotes from it to my friends just because I was dying from amusement at what they'd say, especially for an American. I am ... not knowledgeable about pop culture from other countries, but this dub was filled with pop cultural references and jokes.

- A Yoda impression
- Mentioning fidget spinners
- "The bomb dot com"
- "Snaps to chat"
- "You wanna know my bra size? 36 Double Deez Nuts"
- Saying "Do you wanna build a sand castle" to the tune of a song from the Disney movie, Frozen
- "The problem is that you've got a bone where your hot dog should be."
- "Bae stealing b to the itch"
- "Shady af"
- "#NoFilter #Seriously"
- "Great googley moogley, I get to touch her"
- "We'll watch your junk anytime."
- And many more

These are unique to the dub. To compare the sub to the dub, in the first episode there are two couples, from whom we can hear the conversations of.

In the sub they say:
Female 1: Let’s go to the amusement park this weekend.
Male 1: Sure. And we’ll spend the night together, right?
Female 2: There’s an event for couples tomorrow.
Male 2: Guess I’ll have to take you then.

In the dub, it goes:
Female 1: Let’s go to the amusement park Saturday morning!
Male 1: Sure, and I’ll show you my log ride Saturday night.
Female 2: Did you hear it’s couples only night at the movie theater?
Male 2: You are going to get so felt up.

One of these is clearly more entertaining, and that is the English dub.

I'm an English speaker, I wish I knew Japanese, but I do not. That being said, I can understand more when there is emphasis of English words better than Japanese words. This lead to a better understanding of the story through each of the seiyuu's voices. I can't distinguish between different Japanese dialects, but the Gals in the anime all sounded like the stereotypical 'Valley Girl' as you would call it in America. They said 'like' a lot, their whole tone of voice was spot on and it made the girls sound believable.

Speaking of the girls, the characters were actually a lot of fun to watch. They were not the most original cast, but they worked so well together in my opinion. The girls didn't all just act the same, even though they were all gals. The main girl, she was not a slut, she wanted a proper relationship with him, which was contrary to popular belief. Her best friend was a lesbian, or at least bisexual. MC's childhood friend became a gal so he would notice her. And the girl who was like the class rep. with good grades and stuff, had a princess complex and was a secret gal. That's not all. The friends of the mc, they were the nerdiest virgins ever, which made them believable. They worked at manga cafes, they made the mc confess, one only likes loli, etc.. If that doesn't convince you then think of how they interact together. It is so easy to image these characters in real life, just hanging out with each other. Their interactions didn't seem forced, (Unless it was the first time they were interacting for the most part.)

While the art is heavily focused on ecchi, it doesn't change the comedic aspects of the show, if anything it makes them better. The mc frequently leers at their breasts, and everybody jokes about it and calls him a virgin. Without the disproportionately large breasts, one of the more basic comedic properties would be gone, and the jokes inside the show would have to cease.

The jokes, references, characters and art are all big components of the anime, but there is still the storyline that has gone unmentioned. The show starts off with the mc having to confess to somebody most people see as a slut so that he could finally have sex. But the story is better than that. They go out and have fun, the anime isn't just a bunch of sex, there is actually no sex in it, no matter how much he wants it. The other girls try to initiate sexual interaction throughout the show, but the mc is better than that, he starts liking his girlfriend more, to the point that he doesn't just want to have sex with any girl, he wants her. He loves her. The highest point in the series is when they kiss for the first time. Even though this was a comedic series, and the mc was super perverted, I couldn't help but root for him and hope that he would get a happy ending with her.

The bottom line, is that this is a fantastic show, if you love comedy, slightly perverted jokes, ecchi, or a slice of life series that isn't super innocent.

Although I can not stress enough how important is is to watch the dub.

Hajimete no Gal....oh what a mess have they done of this funny romcom....

You see, I wrote a review for the manga quite a while ago, in which I praised the pace and how the charachters were introduced, unfortunately the producers turned this enjoyable manga in an anime who you are supposed to jack off, but you cant pull it off since it's censored all over...marketing strategy? Most likely...

Trust me when I say the censoring is the last thing that bothers me, like I said at the beginning the pacing is horrible, you dont have time to familiarize with the main characters, girls after girls are ... thrown in the mix, useless monologue of the main character just to add a little more ecchi in the middle and make the episode long enough, the provocative cutness between our two main characters that is in the manga here doesnt exist, and so on....

There are too many problems with this anime and, to me at least, is impossible to enjoy as much as I did with the manga.

Story (7):
As previously stated in my manga review the story is the weakest point since it's the usual "good for nothing guy date a popular girl", which is not bad if portrayed well.

Art (8):
It's quite difficult to make a mess of the art these days with all the technology around, luckly they managed to make at least one thing right.
The art it's standard, clean, dynamic, colorful, typical of most of harem shows.

Sound (6):
As the opening and the ending are not to my tastes I have to admit that the voice actors do a good job, unfortunately the background sounds are pretty much useless as they hardly ever menage to set the mood for the viewers.

Character (5):
One other thing that I appreciated in the manga was the "mistery vibe" that our main heroine Yukane Yame was giving. In fact her gal character and her actions didn't match, that made it really interessting and funny, in the anime however she seems just like any other girls with the sole purpose to make Junichi harem bigger. Even the moments where after confessing they slowly start to grow closer are missing, what a shame...

Hashiba Junichi in the other hand is our standard harem character, weak, not particularly good at anything.

Enjoyment (3):
I'm not gonna lie here, even witouth reading the manga I would rate this show avarage at best, it's a huge mess, nothing make sense, minutes of daydreaming of sex of our main character, hardly any development shown in the relationship between the two main characters, in the end it's just a bunch of softcore porn thrown here and there to happeal the younger audience.

Overall (4):
Sad I couldn't enjoy the show as much as I'm doing with the manga, if you havent watched too many harem/ecchi show however I'm pretty sure you will at least enjoy it more than me.

Have fun! (if you can lol)

Hajimete no Gal - Something Different

Why do people like ecchi series? Is it because of the boobs, the girls or the story? Personally, I think it's because it's a funnier and an easier genre to appreciate, as being a reliable and a fun combination. And there's nothing wrong with the liking of some ecchi series, including Hajimete no Gal and by that, I'm another one that thinks that ecchi doesn't get the love it deserves.

This story for Hajimete no Gal, as for some others series by the same genre, appears to be simple. Our main protagonist (named Junichi) is forced by his friends to confess ... to a gal named Yukana and then, by surprising, he gets the girl in exchange for some conditions. So Junichi is our male protagonist and he wants to try getting a girlfriend to help him with his insecurity. The girl, Yukana, on the contrary, it's a more interesting character, because she likes to tease him and seems very confident when she's doing it giving an idea or her life's experience.

I think this is what people want when they are searching for a funny romance story with a bit of fanservice and with a perfect pacing for 10 episodes. It also has a great opening and ending song, which combines with the series as a whole.

Apparently, this is one of the best adaptations in this season also including the adaptation of the Kakegurui manga. This adaptation even has some parts that are skipped or re-arranged from the original manga but doesn't seem to be a problem. So yeah, apparently the manga is better so make sure to check out.

Story: 8 | Art: 9 | Sound: 9 | Character: 9 | Enjoyment: 8
Score: 9

Personal Note: It's my new guilty-pleasure, thank you Ueno Meguru sensei. I find it very similar to "Prison School" but that's just my opinion.

Girlfriends, boyfriends, I’m sure most of us have wanted one at some point, or already have one. For those of us who don’t have one, do not fret, Hajimete no Gal is here to indulge you into the experience of having a girlfriend or boyfriend, whether you want it or not. This will not be a painless experience however, so strap yourself in and prepare for the worst, and I mean it.

Imagine this: You are just an ordinary guy, and your classmates forced you to ask a hot girl in your class to date you. After she almost turns you down like the loser you ... are, she instead decides to accept becoming your girlfriend, but is it too good to be true? In most cases, yes, this would be too good to be true, however, in Hajimete no Gal we say "screw the rules! "and make the unlikely happen.

While the premise may seem enticing at first, the show doesn’t do much to expand on it, leaving you with an empty shell of nothingness for a majority of the show. If you’ve seen at least a couple harem/ecchi anime before, then you’ll probably see the pattern Hajimete follows through its episodes. This doesn’t mean that it has nothing going for it, because it does. Every episode centers on our main character experiencing something new for the first time, whether that is visiting his girlfriend’s house, going to karaoke or even getting a job. Of course, you also have your obligatory beach episode that every harem/ecchi seems to have, but I won’t get into that too much, since I don’t mind it.

Another problem is the pacing, it feels really rushed. One moment the characters are doing something random, and in the next scene something dramatic happens without leaving any time to digest what happened. This wouldn't be a problem if the show in question was all about the randomness like Nichijou, but when you add a random element to what seems to be a semi-serious show, at least for me it doesn't work at all.

If you thought you were going to get some nice uncensored scenes, then think again. I watched the uncensored version, but instead of being presented with uncensored material, they instead decided to censor a guy’s boner through his pants, because that’s totally the best way to make someone interested in your show. The censored version is even worse by the way, they censor stuff like the girl’s panties for no reason, which is a big no-no for me especially when it’s an ecchi show.

The characters are for the most part dull and forgettable. The male characters except for the main character don’t really serve a purpose except for being there, which of course entails in almost no character development whatsoever. There’s even a literal pedophile saying that he only wants to fuck little girls, and that 15 year olds are too old for him. There’s not much else to say about them other than that you can literally replace them with clones of Ichika from Infinite Stratos and the experience wouldn’t change that much.
The females are for the most part attractive, if you ignore their humongous almost Eiken-level boobs and the fact that their personalities are barely there. If you’ve even seen a screenshot from the show, or even the cover, you should know what I’m talking about. They feel unnaturally large, especially for high schoolers, since you are not supposed to have such big boobs when you’re between 16 and 18 years old, but hey, what do I know, right? This is anime we’re talking about, where the impossible can happen at any time because the creator allows for it.

As for the art, it isn’t that bad, but it doesn’t stand out either. There was never a moment where I went “wow, this is totally worth it for the art” instead it was kind of just meh. It serves a purpose, but don’t expect anything fancy, since you’ll be disappointed.

The opening was decent enough, and I actually liked the ending theme, it was catchy and felt like a nice end to each episode. Other than that, the rest of the OST was pretty forgettable, mostly just common background music for the sake of having music.

Hajimete no Gal had some okay moments, but the sheer amount of pointless scenes, straight up useless characters and unnecessary censorship pushes my buttons just a little bit too far, and in the end it was a massive disappointment. What could have been an interesting and creative take on the genre instead becomes your run of the mill harem/ecchi show with too many dumb things to explain. If you can, stay away from this show, it is really bad.

Wow I read some of the other reviews and people just don't know what the word comedy means, or maybe just don't know how to let loose and laugh.

Taking overall and enjoyment categories first. This is a solid 9 on comedy and enjoyment. There's plenty of gags in this movie and they're all very well done. Sight gags abound, double entendres everywhere, comic overreactions, all there. The characters are comical in and of themselves. It's all there. Just plain good fun.

Characters: They are all stereotypes, while you may no people like them you'll never meet anyone quite as bad as ... them in real life and in a few cases you can be really happy about that. They are all really funny on their own.

Something that needs to be mentioned. One of the characters has an unnerving fixation that's much more acceptable in Japan than the rest of world. I can easily see his presence destroying the series. I have to admit I nearly walked on the first episode over it and if it can't be overlooked it will make it impossible to enjoy the show.


Story: Avoiding spoilers it's a great change of pace from the usual formulas you see all the time. The MC here knows what he wants but he's not too sure of why he wants it, or how to get it. Him filling in that why and how, while beset by comic complications and the occasionally less than well meaning efforts of his friends are the story drivers. It works well to connect the comedy, and it's a not bad story in and of itself.

Art/Sound/Music: All a bit above average. Not really special but watchable.

It's Good light fun when you want something to laugh at or if you'd like to ask yourself if you were ever quite that bad..

This. Is. Trash. Personally, I'm not a big fan of calling anime trash because I know that even if I don't personally like it there are likely others who do like it, and that enjoyment of it provides enough benefits to those watchers that at the very least they have a purpose. But this anime is the truest definition of trash. Not only is it devoid of anything that could be considered quality but it is massively insulting to its subject matter, to its viewers, and to anyone that could have the grave misfortune of watching this anime.

Where does it go wrong? A better question ... would be where does it go right. Just one look at it and you can likely already tell a big problem. Lots of big exposed breasts, an ecchi tag. This would lead one to think its a show that doesn't even try to be good, that uses fanservice and oversized breasts to sell copies. A show without any artistic integrity. And all of that is true. But that oversells it. There are many shameless ecchi series that have no thought put into their plot or story and try to get by fanservice. And certainly most of them aren't good, but there are two key differences. One, that even amongst those shows Hajimete no Gal is significantly lacking in quality. Two, those anime aren't insulting unlike Hajimete no Gal.

When you look at the main character and his friends it's hard not to see this show as insulting to its primary demographic. The main character's bros are all a bunch of creeps who's ideas about girls are problematic. It's clear from the very first episode that they seem them as nothing more than as sex objects. The first episode has them talking about women's breasts as if that's all that matters. (To them a girl without breasts has no value and isn't worth their attention.) Even when getting close to some girls, or at least having the option to, they still seem more interested in seeing them naked, making them kiss each other, or just watching them in bikinis, more than they do interacting with them. It's as if they solely exist just for their amusement. It's disgusting. And let's not forget about the oversized acorn whose sole purpose in the show is to talk about how much he likes elementary school aged girls, and wants to love them. Yup, you heard me right. And he does nothing else but that. I'm not sure what the point of his character is because it's not funny! He even gets a job at a day care. Why do they let this happen? And while the MC is not like that himself, he still hangs around these guys. He excuses their behaviour even though it's the type of garbage that should be disavowed. Besides he's not really that different himself. He frequently thinks of his own girlfriend in ways that can get him laid or get him to see her panties. He only decides to drag out his "confession" to her so he can catch more glances of her panties. He may be better but he's still pretty much scum.

You may look at these characters and wonder why they're so insulting. They're just characters, right? Well, think about how harems work. They operate on the idea of a self-insert protagonist. You're supposed to be inserting yourself into this loser. The audience is supposed to be able to relate to these people. Furthermore, this is the anime's interpretation of otaku. As men deluded with the outside world that are unable to see it as anything more than fuel for their boners. How is that not insulting? Not to mention, completely wrong.

I shouldn't need to explain how this show is insulting to women. Between the male characters opinions and attitudes on them and the typical fanservice it should be pretty obvious. I'm not one to think that fanservice is inherently insulting to women but in a show like this, it is. When the main role of them seems to be them being slobbered over it's hard not to find it insulting. Especially when every male character in the series is playing 3D chess to try to get them to do something lewd or to see their naked body.

And then the obvious, it's insulting to the viewer because it doesn't give a damn about quality. Now this maybe true of other shows. But when you combine it with how insulting it is it all builds up to be an insulting superpower. Hajimete no Gal isn't conserned with being good. It isn't even conserned with being nice. It's selling sleazeballs and fanservice and hoping that it'll work out well enough. They don't even follow the manga well and instead replace it with this drivel. Is there no stop to their insult brigade?

You may get it now that it's insulting, but how about that quality?

Well it's terrible. The characters are boring and under developed. Only the main Gal girl has enough going for her to make her interesting and even with that, she isn't. Most of the plot is the type of stuff that is found in most generic harems. I don't need to go into it because if you have watched any other generic harem you'll already know what this'll be like. And if you haven't then I suggest you watch those other more popular harems instead because they play them so much better. Situations arise just to give the MC more girls in his harem, as well as to push as much fanservice as possible. What makes Hajimete no Gal special is that the harem comedy scenes feel so much more unrealistic than normal. It all feels like a set up to terrible jokes (that have been done a thousand times before no less) and fanservice. None of it feels natural or feels like the natural reaction of the characters. At least most harems are able to get that part right and feel real even if they are trashy.

For some reason Hajimete no Gal also tries to do a more serious romance arc which not only clashes against its lighthearted comedy base but is also completely mangled and poorly done. The reactions of the characters are overblown for the sake of driving the narrative and it's hard to believe that everything so conveniently fits into the storyline they want. It's bad writing 101. They even add in an obviously bad baddie because screw nuance.

And for a fanservice anime, it doesn't look pretty at all. At least if the animation and art were nice there would be a point to watch this but it all looks pretty ugly, and if you watch with the censors it takes it up to nauseating. For a show that relies on fanservice the art needs to be good or else what is the point of that. Apparently Hajimete no Gal missed the memo on that because it didn't even try.

And that's basically what it is, an insulting stupid generic harem comedy that has no idea how to write any part of itself well. Please for your own sanity don't watch it. I'm sure that there is something much better for whatever reason that you would want to watch this show. Please watch that instead and leave this to die. The less that watch this drivel, the better.

Overall i'd give this anime a 7 which for me means it was simply an Enjoyable ride. Many of the Harsh reviews are from people that came into this anime with huge misconceptions that'd it'd be extremely "Ecchi" maybe some nudity etc and or the majority that have only seen the obnoxious "Censored" version" which takes away from a shows overall quality. That being said i watched the unscensored version and this anime is far from being very ecchi and maybe only has 1-2 episodes with anything more than a standard "panty shot". This anime has 0 real nudity so don't expect that and tbh ... theres no reason for it to even be censored in the first place. Saenai Heroine was probably 2-3x as much ecchi/fanservice as this show to be entirely honest and that show has 0 censoring. I feel as though many people expected this to have Highschool DxD levels of fanservice etc and were rather let down by that bc at the end of the day this anime is purely an awkward love story of young teenagers trying to understand what it takes to make a relationship work.
-In conclusion if you're looking for Highschool DxD lvls of fanservice and ecchi this anime is not for you.
-If you don't like love stories and light melodrama in an episode or 2 then this anime is not for you.
-If you're okay with taking a fun light hearted/slight ecchi/feelgood anime for what it is and not expecting some profound levels of backstory then this if for you.
-If you like a funny supporting cast that at times comes off as quite odd then this is for you.
-If you sympathize with any type of first love stories this is for you.

In conclusion this anime is "Good" but its far from great and tbh the Manga did it a lot better. Overall 10 episodes should have been 12 so they wouldn't cut corners from the Manga but it still remains a decent adaptation. As i said take this anime for what it is and you'll love it but put it under a critics microscope and nitpick every little thing and you probably won't. 7/10

I love a bunch of genres (Comedy, Romance, Ecchi(lul), School,) by that You can relax from more titles like naruto,one piece and more.
But many come out with additional genres like Mystic and more , i dont like this , i love classical School comedy/ecchi And so I paid attention to this title despite the low score
Review after 4 series
Story: 5 - I will not say anything about this in the description, everything is said

Art: 6 - Fine , The drawing approaches well for this work

Sound: 5 - average op and ed

Character: 6 - Many heroes are not disclosed and most likely they ... will not, but I'm extremely sympathetic Yukana

Enjoyment/overall: 6

I’m quite picky when it comes to anime I watch, but I can forgive plenty of short comings : I can forgive plot-holes, underdeveloped characters, minor animation issues, cliches and archetypes (to a degree)... It obviously depends on the nature of the show - for a story-heavy show, which puts proper delivery, tempo and relationships between the characters at the top, lack of development of the characters themselves can be devastating.

I also seldom give extreme ratings when I’m asked to grade a show, a video game or any other piece of media, because it takes a particular effort to make something absolutely unbelieveable, ... be it a masterpiece or a complete trainwreck. In many cases, a show is bad, but it’s not the end of the world, and in the end, it’s likely I’ll forget about it’s existence soon after I finish watching it. Same with good shows - there are a ton of genuinely good, fun anime out there, many of which can’t compete with the absolute top contenders cause they just don’t quite have that special something - maybe it’s the visuals that are just a bit short of greatness, might be that the story is not as interesting or the execution in general falls short.

There also hasn’t yet been a show that I genuinely hated as a whole entity. I despised parts of it (like the main protagonist in High School DxD - a comparison that will be repeated in this review) but I've never despised a show so deeply that I utterly refused to find something that didn’t suck about it.

Until now.

I dislike SAO. I dislike The Asterisk War. I dislike all the generic action/harem shows flooding the Light Novel and anime markets lately. I dislike the cheaply made ecchi shows, selling themselves on absolutely nothing but said ecchi content.

But Hajimete no Gal is a unique specimen. This is one of a kind, and it’ll most likely remain that way until the end of time.

This is a cataclysm of such epic proportions that putting it in mere words is a truly Herculean task, one that makes me almost humbled by how tiny I am in comparison.

Have you ever seen a piece of media with absolutely zero value? No entertainment, no lessons to be learned, no new skill to aquire, just plain nothing. An empty hole, with no creativity, interesting ideas, new concepts and no utter lack of effort in putting it all together, in making it even slightly cohesive.

I’m not speaking about something that you’d call “bad” or even “horrible”. I’m taking about something PARTICULARILY vile. A show that made you remember all the 1/10 stuff you’ve experienced and literally caused you to look at it with far more favourable eye, purely because they weren’t “that”.

Hajimete no Gal is such show for me. This little gem combines every single thing I despise with blind, overwhelming fury and skillfully blends it into a shit-shake the likes of which I never expected possible to create. It looks like shit. It sounds like shit. It’s content is nothing but a shitflood after a shitflood, and the worst thing is, this will not be the last one of it’s kind.

Enter Junichi Hashiba. Junichi is a high school boy who really, really wants to have a girlfriend. He also has a group of friends, who also wish they had girlfriends. So one day, they decide to play a prank on the innocent little Junichi and pair him up with a gal (or “gyaru”, since we need a proper cultural term for it to matter in this case) by putting a letter in her locket, asking her to meet Junichi behind school.. Their plan to seemingly screw their friend over fails however, as the lass actually agrees to date Junichi. If this description sounds bland and uninteresting, it’s because that’s what it is. And once you actually see it in motion, it gets even worse. And then it continues to accelerate downhill at an alarming pace.

Let’s start with Junichi himself. I’m deeply convinced that current LN market has some sort of a vendetta against young schoolboys, since they seem to be trying to make them as utterly repulsive and unlikeable as they possibly can. And I can fucking assure you, they’re succeeding so much it’s getting worrying. I know this theory sounds idiotic, but how else would you explain the absolute avalanche of protagonists that are utterly useless as both people AND a mean to advance the storyline further?

So Junichi is yet another one of those eternal virgin protagonists who have never dated anybody, think mostly about sex and are pitiful when it comes to their contacts with the opposite sex. And I just realized that this entire sentence could’ve ended at “another one” and it wouldn’t lose anything from it’s meaning. That’s really what this dude should be named. “Another-one-kun”. There’s nothing remotely notable or interesting about him or anything he does. Everything he does and says is a gigantic cliche, used with the subtlety of getting a concrete block dropped on your crotch. We’ve got all the ingredients to make LN protagonist here : constant blushing and stuttering, ridiculously exaggerated reactions, repeated to the point of giving the viewer a desperate death wish, sexual thoughts and delusions - because let’s call things by their proper name for once - nothing’s off limits here. The only missing ingredient here are superpowers pulled from the ass dimension, given to him for no possible reason other than because he happens to be the main character. But thankfully it’s a slice-of-life show, so those are (mostly) out of the question.

But I kind of wish they weren’t. If they did appear, it would only mean more reasons for me to tear this show to shreds, and even less reasons to feel bad while loudly disclaiming just how horrible it is.

If there’s one character Junichi reminds me of, it’s the other high school cataclysm from one of the favourite wank-fuels of the modern youth, Issei Hyoudou from High School DxD. He was almost as big of a piece of shit as well, and he was the main reason why I dropped DxD halfway through the second season. But for all of his annoying “hilarious pervert” act, I must admit that Issei at least TRIED, you know? I think they all TRIED to make him at least a decent character. He genuinely worked hard to improve himself, and for all of his perviness, he did respect the harem he got, never making a move without being allowed to. And as much as I hated them, some of his sex-driven reactions were actually kind of funny.

But “making a move” isn’t something you should expect from our holy maiden here. He’s far too busy being useless and getting constantly flustered over gestures and, well, just about anything concerning women. For a man so hell-bent on starting a relationship with a woman, he sure doesn’t seem particularily interested in actually progressing said relationship forward. One could wonder if his awkwardness is, perhaps, caused by dating a woman he hasn’t exactly chosen himself. Love is a complicated feeling, after all, and at a young age we don’t quite understand how it works yet.

But both you and me know that’s not the case. The purpose of Junichi acting like a sexless weirdo is because this is what is expected of a LN protagonist being a part of an ecchi story. We’ve accepted this, we’ve all embraced this at one point or another, and so now this is what we’ll have to deal with.

On the opposide end we’ve got the main girl of this mess, Yukana Yame. She’s a gal. She has a sexy body, and she’s supposedly different from gals in general. We use the term “gal” here to describe a specific subculture and fashion style, and the show’s entire premise hinges on the concept of breaking stereotypes, I suppose. So gal can be roughly compared to what us Westerners would call a “dumb blonde” stereotype : not very intelligent but hot, has a rather casual approach to sex, dresses provocatively etc. Of course it’s a little bit more complex than this, and has it’s own little quirks, but I won’t dive that deep here. She show surely doesn’t do that too much, so it would only be a waste of time.

As far as characters are concerned, Yukana is definitely the best one in this show. She isn’t immediatelly hateable and I believe that with some more skilled writing, she could be made into a pretty interesting girl that would deserve being placed in a better show. She’s also the most visually impressive. And I’m not talking about her body specifically, but about the way she was drawn - her model has by far the highest quality out of anybody else (at least when she’s wearing her school uniform - everything else looks like shit), and the reason is obvious - she’s the main draw of the show.

Her personality... Well, she’s a gal. She’s into fashion, she has blonde hair, dresses sexily, has a friend she hangs out with on a regular basis but, in an unexpected turn of events, turns out she’s actually rather guarded about sex itself. This is the entire plot of this anime : there’s a girl who “should be” into sex, but is reserved and shy about it. Knowing this, you might think that the main plot point of the anime is not judging people by stereotypes, and to give everybody a chance. You’d think that, but I think it’s clear by now that this show isn’t good enough to handle an idea like this with any degree of proficiency. And if it isn’t clear, it will become clear soon enough.

Bonus point earned in the dubbed version : she’s voiced by Jamie Marchi, who you might known from voicing Rias Gremory. And she does fit the role very well. The dialogue is also translated/rewritten to be fittingly cringy, pretentious and difficult to stomach. But the actress herself did a good job. I really do suggest watching this show dubbed, cause with subs it’s not only offensive but just plain boring (see, an upgrade from HS DxD - that one was just boring when subbed).

I was really trying to describe the characters properly and give a wider idea about them, but I find it irrationally difficult. It might be because of how bland and uninteresting they are in general. And you’d think it would be a bad thing, for the main characters to be so horribly written.

Fret not, for the writers have prepared a much better feast for us - supporting characters in this show are the absolute powerhouse of it. And as should be expected by now, not in a good way.

First, let us take a look at the previously mentioned group of friends Junichi hangs out with.
There’s three of them, and every single one is equally abhorrent for a completely unrelated reason.

Opening our trifecta of twattery is the Glasses Dude. He acts as the quasi-leader of the group and is a curious patchwork of a salty virgin, generic pervert and the self-proclaimed romance expert - despite having no experience whatsoever. He talks the most and is the most annoying of the bunch, but otherwise has no obviously offending qualities, aside from the lack of any good ones. But this is the case for everybody here, so I’ll let it slide.

The middle man would be the Loli Lover, and this nickname is much darker and uncomfortable than you’d expect it to be. Ladies and gentlemen, I believe we have the first case of conscious pedophilia in anime (aside from hentai and maybe less known adult-rated shows). The creators of this bog had the perfect idea of taking an artstyle/fetish that’s controversial and divisive by default and then crank it up a notch or twelve. So our man makes it abundantly clear from the absolute start - as if, the first FIVE MINUTES of the first episode - that he’s a follower of the old Catch-Em-Young school of dating, precisely stating that it would be perfect if his girlfriend was around 5th grade. That would be around 10-11 years old, just to clear things out. I shouldn’t even have to tell you what is wrong with this, but this is anime, so I’ll do it anyway - it’s creepy as shit. It’s one thing when a character is drawn in a loli manner cause she’s, say, of a petite build like the girls from K-on or Gabriel Dropout. But when we’re talking actual elementary school kids, it gets uncomfortable. Aside from that however, there’s nothing else here.

And closing the ranking is the last member of the Circle of Bad Fucking Ideas. He is a different specimen entirely, as it’s been a long time since I’ve come across a character this uninteresting and lacking any shade of personality - and remembering how many shitty harems, romance/ecchi shows and hentais exist, this is a big statement for sure, and one I’m confident in. When the first man was the leader, the third one can be seen as the acting hand of the group, notable in that he was the one who placed the love letter in Yukana’s locker. He might have done something more than this over the course of the series, but I doubt it was anything significant and I can’t be asked to find out. Of the three, he’s has the least offensive qualities, purely because there’s barely any qualities in him to begin with.

Another notable character here is the resident loli, Nene Fujinoki. Before we get into anything regarding what she’s like, I need to point out one important thing - her visual design.

If you haven’t watched the show, or don’t remember the characters (not bloody surprising, this fact...) just type her name into Google Images and get a good look at her.

Just look.

The words “holy” and “shit” spring to mind. There’s exaggeration, there’s fetishization, and then there’s THIS.

And just to drive the point home - this is commercial. As if, somebody was hired to create a character like this.

Somebody drew this. SOMEBODY GOT PAID FOR DRAWING THIS. SOMEBODY’S FUTURE EMPLOYERS WILL SEE THIS AS A PART OF THEIR PORTFOLIO.

If you’ve ever felt bad about your work and life choices - remember, at least you’re not that artist...

So our Z-cup girl here takes the role of the supposed little sister character, barring the fact she and Junichi are literally unrelated in any way - they’re just childhood friends and she acts like his little sister because a check-list required an imouto character to be present, so one has been provided. She’s really into him and spends the show trying to change her style to appeal to him more, but since the main couple is established from the very beginning, it’s obvious that it won’t ever lead anywhere. And this is one thing I kind of need to note - the lack of most of the harem bullshit infesting shows of this nature. Although it doesn’t make it any better, it at least isn’t making it worse. Hardly a praise, but you can’t be picky when we’re dealing with a show where the first frame you see is a close-up of the main girl’s camel toe.

There are some more characters here, like the main girl’s friend, who gets pissed/jealous cause her gal friend spends less time with her now, so she tries to make the main couple break up by implying Junichi is cheating on Yukana (read - she’s trying to basically rape him) but it never works, another girl from Junichi’s class who’s apparently into cosplay, but we won’t find anything interesting enough to justify such analysis, so let’s move to the next source of constant torment - the visuals.

Like I mentioned earlier, Yukana is the only remotely good thing in this show, and sadly, when we look at the visual design itself, this proves true again. While the models themselves aren’t horrible, animation is. Often there’s barely any movement in the scenes, which is particularily notable during face close-ups, and the level of clumsiness gives the works of A-1 Pictures and Studio Deen serious competition. Particularily, there’s that one scene where Yukana goes shopping with Junichi and that other gal girl to look for clothes, and when she picks up a dress, she suddenly looks like she has a completely different body type. Her chest in particular grows to ridiculous size - and yeah, it’s not like she’s flat, but in her uniform her breasts look at least slightly reasonable.The scenes show severe lack of budget and possibly time as well, but for a show like this, it’s not surprising. I doubt anybody was expecting it to be any successful in the first place, so the creators propably decided to take what they could, putting as little money as possible into it, to ensure it’ll run profit even without being largely successful (and somehow it still gained following of sorts...).

Sounds design isn’t much better. It just kind of “is there”, so the show doesn’t feel even emptier than it already is. The opening theme is a generic, cutesy j-pop song with nothing appealing whatsoever, and at several times, what I’d refer to as “stock sounds” are used when characters are falling, for example. I know it’s not exactly like every studio records different sounds for every single possible thing happening in the show, but in this particular case, it yet again painfully reminds you how little effort was put when making it. It isn’t even that B-class badness some of you might know. The cheesy, overused stuff that still has some charm to it. This is just bad.

I’m mad that shows like this still keep popping up, but above everything, it saddens me. It saddens me that shows like this is what people who wish to get into anime might get recommended as one of their first shows. It saddens me that crap like this frequently steals the spotlight from better, much more deserving shows. It saddens me how much damage it does to art, character development, humour and ecchi elements, all of which can be used well in a good show to, if not improve it, then at least help it keep consistent quality.

And this crap sells. It pulls views, it pulls numbers, and it’s horrifying. Because with this being the case, it will not be the last one of it’s kind. And somehow, I get the feeling it will not remain the worst thing I’ve ever seen for too long. And knowing how rarely I give extreme ratings, I’m absolutely mortified.

And it’s not even like I hate shows of fanservicey nature with simple plots and character development. One of my favourite shows is Shinmai Mao no Testament, which is exactly that. It features young, attractive cast, strong male hero, lots of action and sexy scenes, while also having only 12 episodes (with second season, though). But Testament isn’t a bad show. It’s has plenty of problems, but the main character is humble, likeable and capable. It’s not difficult to understand his reasoning and genuinely like and cheer for him. While the female cast here suffers from being very mediocore - with one exception - no character there is just “bad”. Some of them just aren’t “good”.

Hajimete no Gal surely has a lot of ecchi scenes, but the general bullshit seeping from every scene makes this show completely wank-proof.

If you’re looking for a fun high school romance, watch Toradora. If you’re looking for a show where a shy MC is sorrounded by ladies with voluptous bodies, watch Sekirei. If you’re looking for a fun ecchi show, watch Shinmai Mao no Testament, Trinity Seven, Absolute Duo or High School of the Dead.

Leave this thing in peace. It doesn’t deserve your time, it doesn’t deserve your money, and it sure as hell doesn’t deserve any legacy.

After watching this and reading some of the reviews I thought i would add a different perspective.

The story whilst an embellishment kinda brought up some nostalgia feels for me. There was generous helpings of panty and boob shots and some of the scenes were quite lewd but nothing unsavoury. However most of all this anime was a light hearted comedy.

The plot revolves around a clueless young man who, almost by accident, starts dating a girl out of his league and ends up getting his first taste of teenage romance. Including the highs, lows and general confusion that comes along with it. I feel you ... probably mispent or are misspending your teenage years if you can't draw any connection to the characters.

I would reccomend this to people who were not robots during their formative years and don't think anime should exclusively be lolis patting each other or musclely dudes beating eachother to a pulp whilst explaining every action they perform in excruciating detail. :)

Pros:
- good fanservice
- decent pacing
- Some romance aspect

Cons:
- Bad characters
- Horrible interactions between characters
- Nothing interesting ever happens

... For: someone who wants to watch a ecchi show thats has some romance in it.

Hajimete no gal is a very classic ecchi harem school comedy on paper, and is in reality nothing really more than that. I tend to enjoy this kind of show, but hajimete no gal did not deliver very good characters which is a very important aspect in any type of anime really, but especially for this type. The characters are very flat and there interactions with each other is boring. They don't feel like real people as they only have one or two sides of their personality and rely a LOT on their trope e.t.c Tsundere, loli, lolicon, and so on. You only ever experience that side of the characters.
What Hajimete no gal had that not all of these ecchi harem school comedy animes have is a decent romance aspect. It was enjoyable to watch but only two characters had any feelings to show, and even that was pretty static but an enjoyable asset to an anime which only ever else offers fanservice.
In the end it lacked something to stand out compared to ecchi animes and this had nothing but the slight amount of romance that was not enough to save it. They tried to go with a gal kinda trope to stand out but turned out to be nothing more than extra fanservice.

I am giving this a 9 out of 10 for a few reasons. As someone who normally just watches anime for the boobs I have to say this was a nice change of pace. I felt the story was a cliche as what in Anime has basically not already been done before however I was absolutely intrigued by how the love story was written. I personally believe this Anime has one of the finest love stories ever written of the entire Ecchi/harem. There were a lot of crude jokes and strong language in it so I would say don't let your kids watch it. But ... if you can live through that some adult situations that contain nudity although no anatomy is ever scene what I believe you will find is an anime with very sweet ending. To me this is what young love should look like and this anime will always have a special place in my heart. I find the ending satisfying although I always hate to see something I like come to an end. There are also some great pop culture references in this show that make the English dub particularly funny in my opinion.

Now I know I mentioned boobs earlier in this review and plainly stated that they are pretty much my only reason for watching anime. I am not going to lie I only watched this because I could of sworn I saw some where that MAL said it was rated R+ for mild nudity but was actually intended for 13 or older. I would argue that the show should probably still be rated R as it contains so much language and crass dialog but that does not mean there are not some hot babes with huge boobs. There are some really hot girls in this anime and there are some boobs just no anatomy on any of them for the sake of PG-13ness.

In closing, I thoroughly enjoyed this anime from start to finish. It was funny, hot and I found the love story in the show to be written in a very wholesome and satisfying way that breaks the trend of if you love me sleep with me trend. This is young love at its finest especially since it only contains 10 episodes and has a very condensed plot. If this how more story focused PG-13 anime is I might actually start watching anime for something other than boobs. No regrets to seeing this.

Now before I start this review, I must say that this is my first review, and I'm currently reading the manga to this, and that I enjoy it quite a bit. Now this adaption on the other hand is a disaster. Now I HIGHLY recommend reading the manga to this instead of watching the anime, this adaption doesn't give the full idea or feelings that the manga gives and is far from enjoyable. This also happens to be the first manga that I've read before an adaption was released.

Where to even start with this? The plot and timeline in the adaption is horrendous. Every plot ... scene and small moments that made the manga enjoyable was either skipped, replaced with a lousy filler, or COMPLETELY rushed just so they could get to the beach episode and finish the anime with fillers.

The timeline too is completely flipped around as scenes that happened around chapter 30 in the manga, were shown well before scenes from the early teens in the manga. The producers gave no extra thought to the effort Ueno put and just disregarded the plot and changed what they wanted in order to provide either more fanservice or just half-assed plot. Now I don't mind fillers or fanservice, but not when they interrupt and completely change every single thing that happened in the manga. The scenes that they did keep, were rushed to point where they showed it for less than a minute, then went straight back into fillers.

Also, who in the right mind thought that when making each episode that adding as much jokes about pedophiles as they could would be funny and good idea?


*SPOILERS BELOW*





Now the points that made me really upset. Why did they feel the need to completely flip the good plot scenes around? During the earlier episodes when Kashii appeared and became a problem for Yame and Hashiba, they didn't go to a cafe to have fanservice thoughts of doing it. No, they went to a mall so he could buy a cute present for Yame but did they show that? No, they only wanted as much emphasis on the sexual interactions between the two. I doubt that they'll even show that wonderful scene we saw in the manga recently with the key chains, why? Because they went and thought that making Hashiba jealous in the final episodes instead of Yame would make for a better end to the anime when it ends next week.

It’s not very often we get an anime where the main character already has a girlfriend or gets a girlfriend in the first episode and Hajimete no Gal was marketed as the latter. Having never heard of it before, it gave me high hopes for its potential. I had hoped that it would explore some themes that are rarely explored having skipped the hurdle that most anime reserve for its climax and its niche of focusing on gyaru could have led to some interesting conflicts. The gyaru theme explored is essentially “You thought gyaru are just easy sluts! Well, they’re actually not!” Needless to say, ... my hopes were dashed.

Like most stories, Hajimete no Gal’s story occurs through story arcs. It’s just unfortunate that most of these story arcs boil down to “Oh no, something bad is going to happen to the girl(s). Well, time for the protagonist, Junichi, to temporarily man up and do something.” While the arcs do allow some of the characters to shine-- which result in some of the better moments in the anime—a lot of the conflicts could have been solved or prevented altogether if people would have just sat down and talked it out. This is especially true for the final arc of the anime and also why it was so frustrating to see it play out. Not only that but even when the good parts are happening, the shot direction can take a turn for the worst like when there is panning upskirt shot of a female character during a tense scene in a café near the end of the anime as if to say “We know it’s not that great of a story so here’s some unnecessary eye candy.”

The story is also filled with blatant clichés. For example, despite Junichi clearly be in a relationship with one girl and one girl only, he still manages to develop this pseudo-harem of girls who all want him for one reason or another and he somehow only realizes the girl wants him when the girl in question blatantly tells him. Or “Hey it’s the king’s game, let’s conspire to have the girls kiss us!” Or “Hey it’s the hot springs, let’s go peek on the girls while they’re naked because we’re not ‘real men’ if we don’t.” Or “Hey, that person’s more attractive than me in basically every way, it sure would be a shame if I had pre-existing self-confidence issues and went into a state of depression which lead to conflict.” The anime doesn’t strive to do anything different and, at the same time, anything it does attempt to do story-wise isn’t executed particularly well.

For most romcoms, characters are the defining aspect which will most likely make or break the show. Hajimete no Gal’s characters definitely break the show for me. Barely any of the characters have any clear motivation so you don’t really know what makes them tick and the majority of the characters are one-dimensional. Most notorious of these is Junichi’s lolicon friend and the show’s constant reminder to you “Oh yeah, did you know he’s a lolicon?” If you were to stop watching each episode the moment the anime reminded you that Junichi’s friend is, in fact, a lolicon, you would probably never be able to watch a single episode in its entirety, it’s really that bad. Junichi’s other two friends are the blue-haired guy with glasses who is a super otaku who is also the mastermind of the group and the blonde guy who I think is an avid gamer. All four of the males are perverted and they definitely give off a Prison School vibe. It’s just that Hajimete no Gal’s male group is the stale, knock-off, store-brand-cereal-tossed-in-the-clearance-bin version of the group from Prison School. You can tell by the lack of names of these characters in describing them how memorable they were to me. None of Junichi’s friends are really developed in any way and despite being the main protagonist, Junichi’s own development seems stunted and/or extremely slow because it doesn’t seem like he changes much through the course of the anime’s ten episodes, if at all. By the end of the anime’s tenth episode, Junichi doesn’t seem to accomplish much other than manage to keep his girlfriend and maybe gain a little confidence. Other than that, Junichi is essentially just used as the conduit for most of the fanservice in the show, whether it’s through his random fantasizing or simply existing around the four main girls.

On the flip side, the four main girls of the anime are Yame, Ranko, Kashii, and the childhood friend in major need of breast reduction surgery who also calls Junichi “Onii-chan”. Of the entire cast, Ranko and Kashii are definitely my favorites and are coincidentally also the most developed characters in the entire show but I’ll first address the final and the first of the four girls, in that order. The childhood friend in major need of breast reduction surgery who also calls Junichi “Onii-chan” is essentially how I would describe that character to someone who’s never seen the show and it’s also her character in a nutshell. But, there’s an extra layer of being an emotional support imouto who wants to be seen as a woman by Junichi and also have sex with him and marry him because childhood friends of the opposite sex need to make marriage promises when they’re young but only one of them remembers that promise being made in the first place. In the beginning, she had a fairly annoying running gag that involved her literally running but that stopped after she developed more as a character and began intruding on Yame and Ranko when Junichi was around. Despite being the “main” heroine, Yame seems strangely underdeveloped. We know she’s an overall nice person who is often adverse to lewd things despite the stereotypes surrounding gyaru and is in love with Junichi but, perhaps due to the story revolving around Junichi’s point of view, she’s consistently somewhat of an enigma. While her actions obviously follow a clear line of logic that makes complete sense to her, the audience is often just completely oblivious to what’s happening in her mind so her actions can seem somewhat random or confusing to the audience-surrogate Junichi, which is a main component of the conflict in the final arc. Ranko, on the other hand, seems surprisingly more developed than the main girl Yame. She actually has some character motivation, however simple, and she definitely steals the spotlight at times. She also gets some random meta love at times like when Ranko was dressed up as Miki Sayaka from Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica in the cosplay café was an interesting nod as her Japanese voice actress, Kitamura Eri, also voiced Sayaka, though this may have just been completely coincidental. Weirdly enough, the character with the most development is Kashii, who ends up going through her own character arc that ends up spanning most of the anime and even ends up solving a conflict on her own while Junichi is busy yelling about how morally inferior someone else is.

As far as sound design goes, the sound effects are the typical stock affair you can find pretty much anywhere and the music is forgettable. While the voice actors seem to do their best with what they’re given, they’re rarely given anything that allows them to work their magic. Overall, the sound design in the anime is average at best but there are still points where it misses its mark.

The art and animation are definitely where the anime falls on its face the most. The animation consistently feels lazy or incompetent and I often found myself surprised when there were legitimately good sections of animation, however rare they were. There are often times where the characters themselves look off-model with their body parts being over or under-sized and, on top of that, looking poorly drawn. The eyes, in particular, will often be lopsided on characters’ faces and tend to have an overall lifeless look to them for most characters, which seems to be particularly true for Yame.

Hajimete no Gal is an anime a few good parts but its many flaws simply hold it back from being average and, even for a “guilty pleasure” anime, it falls short of almost all others in its category. It manages hits that sweet point where it’s essentially unrecommendable; it’s definitely not good but, at the same time, it doesn’t quite reach the point of “so bad it’s good” infamy.

3 out of 10

Let's be honest here, we all came to watch this show for the same reason...

But to be COMPLETELY honest there was a positive surprise for me after the show started running properly. Hajimete no Gal is a harem-anime, but this harem is not in the standard "Every girl is completely in love with the MC just because"-category. It's enjoyable thanks to the main characters, Junichi and Yame and the progression in their relationship, which actually does differ from the mainstream harems quite a bit.

Story: 8 - For a show with not much premise and which only relies on the relationships between certain characters the show ... surprises with its funny and sweet moments. Don't expect TOO much though.

Art: 6 - The art is not bad, but it's not that good. +The "jiggliness" of certain bodyparts is quite distracting even during moments when they are not needed.

Sound: 6 - Again, the sound is not bad, the music is lacking and the characters sound exactly like you would expect them to, but the characters have good parts and the different versions of the MC inside his head are pure gold in a comedic aspect.

Character: 8 - The whole story's point and the clear winner of the show. Read below for my detailed opinion on the character development.

Enjoyment: 8 - I didn't expect to enjoy this show much more than in uh... scientific research purposes only, but I'm actually enjoying the show and I want to see how the characters end up. I want to see a happy ending with these characters (Not you pedophile friend Number 3, rot in a cell and burn in hell).

Overall: 7 - It's a fun show with ecchi for those who are searching for it, but also some normal RomCom aspects that make you invested in atleast a few good characters. I hope to see more of this progress in the future.

So a detailed opinion on the show:
The most positive thing I can give for this anime is its way of advancing characters, or atleast the 3 main characters. When the anime starts you'll just think that the Yame and her best friend are just some random sluts that'll mess around with the MC, but as the story moves forward you'll start to see that they're completely different. Yame just wants a cute relationship with a nice guy and sees Junichi as a genuinely nice guy, who sees her for who she really is and her best friend messes with the MC and even hates him because she's trying to protect Yame.
In short, This anime went from a complete Ecchi-fest to a somewhat sweet story between Yame and Junichi. Now whether or not you're looking for a cute romance is not my problem, there are still those basic pervy scenes with the girls that you can enjoy. I just feel like there might be hope for this anime storywise thanks to the character progression.

I would otherwise rate this anime's characters 9/10 if it wasn't for some FUCKING disgusting parts. For example, there is a literal fucking pedophile in the show. The MC's 3rd friend, a fat fuck, who is only after girls 12 or younger and who LITERALLY says to a girl from preschool "The only way that I could express my feelings to you would be illegal". The disgusting piece of shit is meant as a joke and it barely rolled on the first time around. It has really gotten to the point where I should call the police for whoever even came up with him. The MC's friends switch from funny to obnoxious from time to time, but thankfully they serve more as a comic relief and somewhat help with the story.

This anime is so underrated, it's actully a good romance anime. But why the hate?

- The anime really rush into things.
In the manga the characters were shown when the time past by. They came on a good moment to fill up the story. But in the anime they just came out of nowhere.

- It doesn't really follow the manga.
The manga is great and it has alot of beautiful moments.
However.
- Spoiler -
The anime doesn't show those moments and just put all the characters in one episode. Some events are shown in the anime but they begin very differently and don't play in the same place ... read more