Romantic Killer

English.
The truth is I expected less from this series, I thought it would be a typical romantic series of the bunch and although sometimes it is, it also brings to the table an idea that is really interesting, which is harassment, this happens almost at the end of this season but seeing that it is in the series impresses me a lot that they will take risks, on the other hand there are generic episodes most of the time, I know that this is the purpose of the series since the girl does not want to have any love relationship with anyone but I think ... that they were able to make it a little different to make it stand out from the other series.
In general, the series entertains and makes you have a good time, but besides that there is nothing else to highlight, from the beginning of the anime you know who will be the right guy for the protagonist and there will also be a lot of filler in each chapter of the anime.
It is worth it for the animation that is very dynamic and a bit of the story, but don't expect so much from it.

Español.
La verdad esperaba menos de esta serie, pensé que sería una típica serie romántica del montón y aunque algunas veces lo es, también pone en la mesa una idea que es en verdad interesante que es el acoso, este sucede ya casi al final de está temporada pero el ver que está en la serie me impresiona muchísimo que se arriesgarán, por otro lado hay episodios genéricos la mayor parte del tiempo, se que ese es el propósito de la serie ya que la tipa no quiere tener ninguna relación amorosa con nadie pero creo que pudieron hacerle un poco diferente para que se destacara de las demás series.
En general la serie entretiene y hace que pases un buen rato, pero además de eso no hay nada más que destacar, desde el principio del anime sabes quién será el tipo indicado para la protagonista y también habrá mucho relleno en cada capítulo del anime.
Vale la pena por la animación que es muy dinámica y un poco la historia, pero no esperes tanto de esta misma.

The short of it for why I stopped watching, is the main premise of the show gave it a quirky start, but became overbearing to the point that it was no longer interesting.

Premise is girl who is enjoying her personal life with games, chocolate and spending time with her pet cat, gets "chosen" by a magical being to lose her favourite things in favor of finding romance possibilities with multiple real world guys. Main character is avidly against this being forced upon her and fights against whatever the magical character concocts and the execution of the show itself is a good one! But as I ... kept watching more, the quirk of the magical character becomes overbearing and overly contrived. Setting up nonsensical cliched happenstance moments, seemingly brainwashing characters into existence to fit tropes, and loses it's magic very quickly with it's reliance on "magic".

For me, there was clearly a point in episode 3 or 4 where they could have let off the gas on the contrived magicalness forcing unrealistic scenarios onto the characters and let things play out more naturally with nudging here and there. But nope, it keeps forcing things to an extreme degree where the show was no longer enjoyable and became no longer worth the watch. Too bad, because the shows execution, characters & dialogue were all done well enough that I could have liked the show if it wasn't for the overbearing magical "happenstance"!

It was the summer of 2022 and I was scrolling down and checking out which movies and shows are coming to Netflix soon. That was where I came across this anime called Romantic Killer. Never heard about the anime before, didn't see it in any of the seasonal charts, and didn't even know it's based on a manga. Based on the anime's description given on Netflix, being about a girl who's an avid gamer and comes across a mysterious game. At first, I thought said game would happen to be a portal to another world where she gets her own harem, is some assassin, and ... stuff like that. I was expecting it to be a run-of-the-mill isekai and would take some inspiration from My Next Life as a Villainess.
Apparently, that was not the case at all when the preview was released. There is no isekai, no assassinations, no resurrections, nothing of the sort. Heck, it’s not even shoujo; it’s a shounen anime. Oh, and it’s a romantic comedy set in modern-day Japan. So, what on earth is Romantic Killer all about?


STORY:
The story is about a high school girl named Anzu whose life centres around her “Three Greatest Desires):
1) Video Games
2) Chocolate
3) Her Cat (Momohiki)
As a result, she has had absolutely no interest in anything else. And yes, you guessed it right, not even romance (it’s in the name). And since this anime is a romantic comedy, some wacky hijinks are to be expected, as well as getting introduced to some potential love interests. How that starts is uh… well, here’s the gist:
So, one fine day, Anzu is minding her own business playing a visual novel (VN) she recently ordered and was complaining about all the common and clichéd tropes the VN was playing… Then BAM! A weird yellow creature in a wizard’s garb pops out of the TV! Now this yellow creature is named Riri and he is a Love Cupid and his job is to spice up Anzu’s love life by turning her life into a real life dating sim. Why? Two reasons: to help solve Japan’s declining birth rates and for his salary (Yes, cupids in this anime happen to function as an organised door-to-door marriage bureau who will barge into your house if your love life is non-existent. Let that sink in.).
However, there’s a huge problem in kickstarting Anzu’s love life: her Three Greatest Desires. How’s that solved? Well, Riri confiscates all of them. At this point, you might be wondering “Wait, if he’s confiscating the cat, how’s he gonna be fed?”. Don’t you worry, dear reader! Riri has a solution to that! He uses his magic to send Anzu’s parents overseas and sends the cat with them. Now Anzu is all alone in her house and all her chocolate and video games are gone and is left at the mercy of a supernatural marriage consultant shoved down her throat. Riri, marvellous work for promoting parental neglect and putting your client (who also did not want your help) under an informal house arrest. Well done! Will definitely reach out to your agency whenever I plan on getting married!
And with all that the plot of the story finally begins. While the start of the story was bumpy to say the least, the rest of the anime had slightly fewer random moments, which I’ll get to in the characters section.
For the most part, the anime first parodies common romance tropes and then plays said tropes straight to a T. Personally, I found this a bit confusing and thought it was rather unnecessary to lampshade the same tropes it was mocking repeatedly. Even so, the first two-thirds of the story was somewhat enjoyable, just nothing too unique. I did like how some of the characters interacted with one another. I did not like how Riri would show up completely out of the blue and would force me to take medicine to keep my blood pressure normal.
I felt that the last third of the story did not fit the overall premise of the story. It was significantly more serious and realistic. Not that that’s a bad thing, but it definitely stood out from the rest of the story due to its tone. It would’ve been more appropriate had the anime been much longer than 12 episodes and was far less rushed; it would’ve been even better off if it were a separate season or even show in its own right. I won’t delve too much on the last third of the anime so as not to give away spoilers.

CHARACTERS:
1) Anzu Hoshino: The protagonist of the story and the biggest recipient of Riri’s abuse. She showcases quite a handful of traits common among shounen protagonists, such as being hot-headed, passionate, a bit of a ditz, and also being a good friend to others. And while she’s subjected to constant abuse by Riri, she does fight back quite a lot (Oh, and she does go full on macho and muscular on a few occasions similar to Lt. Armstrong from Fullmetal Alchemist.). Overall, a decent character and has helped many of her friends to become better.
2) Riri: The Love Cupid assigned to Anzu and pretty much the one character who has contributed the most in steering the story; he can also be seen only by Anzu. As you might have guessed from my tirade earlier, I do not not like Riri at all. This ball of a sweaty blond Viking’s armpit hair is incredibly obnoxious, selfish, and needlessly complicates things for not only Anzu but pretty much everyone involved. The guy is a huge and overpowered plot device who uses various methods to keep the story going, much to many of the characters’ chagrin.
3) Tsukasa Katsuki: The first potential love interest Anzu encounters. A brooding individual who keeps his distance from others. He also happens to be popular among the girls in the anime due to his good looks, but has rejected all romantic proposals. At first, he maintains some distance from Anzu but after some unforeseen circumstances (Hm… I wonder what could have caused them?), he is forced to stay with Anzu from where he begins to slowly warm up and open up to her. Personally, he is my favourite character in the whole anime. I first thought he would be your conventional aloof character common in romance anime (similar to Kyouya Ootori from Ouran High School Host Club or Sasuke from Naruto) and he did initially play that trope straight. But after undergoing quite an engaging character development and getting to know more of his backstory, I came to like the guy a lot and was honestly hoping he and Anzu get together.
4) Junta Hayami: The second potential love interest we are introduced to. He is Anzu’s childhood friend and has had a huge crush on her since they were kids. He’s also quite popular and plays for the school’s baseball team. Oh, and he’s deathly afraid of cockroaches and cares about his friends (two traits he shares with Anzu). And yeah, that’s kinda it, and that’s my main problem with Junta. Of the 3 potential love interests, I feel he is the least developed and the most forgettable one. I think he was shoehorned into the story just as a tool to play with the whole Childhood Friendship Romance route.
5) Hijiri Koganei: The third potential love interest we are introduced to. He’s the resident rich brat (and later transfer student) who is also popular but has an obnoxious personality second only to Riri. Anzu also sees him with disdain for understandable reasons. So, Hijiri became interested in Anzu because of her lack of interest in him and tries to win her over with gifts, only for her to either return them or outright reject them. While he did start as a narcissistic swine, he does undergo some admirable character development after his dad puts him in Anzu’s public school so that he can learn to be more responsible and learn to live more independently. Anzu also contributed to his character development by prompting him to take up a part-time job as a cashier in order to buy gifts for her by using his own money (he used to use his parents’ money to buy said gifts, something which Anzu calls him out on). While he does retain most of his obnoxiousness, I warmed up to the character after seeing what he goes through. Quite frankly, I was impressed that he decided to work as a cashier and found his narcissism to hold some merit after that.
6) Saki Takamine: Anzu’s best friend and someone who definitely deserved more screen time. She’s also super popular among the boys in her school. While a minor character, I found her bond and backstory with Anzu to be quite touching. I also respect how she snubs comments from other guys. Seriously, why did she not get enough screen time while Riri gets to be a main character?!
Of course, there are many other characters in the anime, but I will not be discussing them for 2 reasons: the character section is already pretty long by now and I don’t want to give out spoilers.
Overall, the cast of characters is moderately decent. Riri can go rot in a nuclear waste-filled hell though.

ANIMATION:
The main studio behind this anime was Domerica. I swear, I searched up the company’s name while writing this review. The company was founded in 2010 and one noticeable contribution they have made in the past was working on the 3DCG animation of some episodes of Girls und Panzer.
Anyway, back to the animation. Well, it’s not bad. For a new Netflix anime, it’s not bad at all. It’s neither visually stunning like Violet Evergarden nor is it eye gouge-inducing like EX-ARM (In case you’re wondering, yes. I’ve sat through EX-ARM. All of it. And I ain’t happy about it.). It’s just that’ it’s passable. The sudden super-deformed artstyle can be distracting, but I didn't see any other noteworthy issue with the overall animation. As someone who walked into this anime without knowing anything about it, I found it satisfactory.

SOUND AND MUSIC:
The opening of the anime “Roma Kira” was performed by Yurika (who also sang for Beastars), while the ending “Romantic Love: Ren’ai Shimasenka?” was written by Ayato Shinozaki and Ryousuke Tachibana (both of whom also wrote for Re:Zero). The opening song was kinda run-of-the-mill; the vocals did remind me of the opening songs of the earlier Tales games for some reason. The ending song was performed by…. *sigh*... Riri (To be fair, it was performed by Mikako Komatsu - Riri’s voice actress.). While the song was catchy, just seeing Riri during the ending segment ruined the song for me. Apart from that the music used in the anime was adequate.
I’ll be honest, after finishing the anime, I don’t quite remember any of the music. I actually had to listen to the opening song again to recall how it was. The only one song I did remember was the ending song… for obvious reasons.

FINAL VERDICT:
5/10 (Average)
While the anime was not as bad as I thought it would be, I believe it did have more potential. My two biggest gripes with the anime are Riri and the show’s indecision with regards to parodying, deconstructing, and playing romance tropes straight. Nonetheless, it wasn’t a bad watch. The characters (sans Riri) were nice and the animation was serviceable.
If you do have some time to burn and just sit back and relax, the first two-thirds of this anime might help out. Do check it out if you’re interested.

Likes: The parody parts of the story, Hijiri and Tsukasa’s character developments, and Saki calling the boys in her class out.
Dislikes: Riri and the story juggling between parodying, deconstructing, and playing the romance genre straight.

This series was really decent, it was nothing special, the story at first could be interesting but after some episodes, it goes down. It all becomes boring. The funny elements are good which is a highlight according to me. The characters are decent, the art style and animation are also decent. What i liked was the Mcs interacting with the ikemens. The romantic scenes come sometimes but the romantic feelings didn't feel any special. It was mainly focused on comedic elements rather than the romantic aspect. It could have been a lot better, didn't feel any special to me.
I give it 5/10.

The series is very competent in execution and Riri is a bless, but I think that it would have benefitted way more as a romantic comedy instead of straight up romance. Right now it feels more like a escapist fantasy than a compelling story.
At least, I appreciate the lesson of "go and live more! You're missing stuff!"

The ending credits sequence is great and I didn't skip once. I recommend that on the very least if you don't feel like watching the series.

The dynamic between the main character and the fairy she battles is awesome and some of the best scenes of the entire show. The ... series truly shines when it embraces absurdity and focus more on the game aspects, and the constant battle that is going on between the main character and the fairy. I love the set up the fairy gives and the lore around why the main character is put in such an absurd situation!

Besides that, things are quite boring. The romantic interests are either the embodiment of the cliche they're referencing or the little background they're given is not very interesting. The two last episodes focused exactly on that, so my interest fell to the ground immediately and I just played them on the background while doing something else.

Overall, it's an okay series, just not what I was expecting from the first trailer. If you're looking for something with high energy and tons of comedy, you won't find it here, at least not after the first few episodes.

I recommend you give it a shot anyways since shoujo anime is very scarce nowadays.