What most people agree on is the anti-social protagonist,about how the series deserves praise for tackling this type of character instead of having the usual bland boring lead most rom-coms have.
Lets get one thing straight out of the way : many other series had anti-social or depressed lead character (Welcome to the NHK, Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei...) that have been handled much,much better.The closest thing explaining Hikigaya's behavior was him breaking his leg in a car accident and getting turned down of a few times in some very insignificant situations like changing phone numbers or practicing during Physical Education class while being in elementary school,that's it.
Secondly he isnt really anti-social, he is just a self centered ,overly cynical and downright hipster of a character,with the "im above all these sheep who get together and form friendships" that kind of self indulging superior way of thinking, all while totally contradicting himself by staying in same damn club ,which he was completely against being dragged into (only in the first episode of course) in the first place.It doesn't even cross his mind to leave the club because how else would the producers make a high school related anime without including this very tired and unoriginal trait?
Call this the Kyon from The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya syndrome of constantly complaining and trying way to hard to be ironic about every little thing just for the hell of it.Because that's funny and in no way gets repetitive almost instantly right? right? ....
Yahari Ore no Seishun has almost no romantic elements ,which would be ok instead of forcing one down our throats,but it briefly tries having one mid series that gets completely forgotten by the next episode,like nothing has ever happened.Which is ever worse than having a bad romance in the first place.
And the comedy is mild to non existent ,this depends on your subjective taste of course.I can only remember 2-3 moments where the show got a smile out of me,most of the time it felt like a total drag despite being only 13 episodes.
The "story" ,if you can call it that, is just the usual high school slice of life with all the usual situations and locations you've seen a million times: the fireworks festival,going to the mall shopping,the school festival....
It had a episodic nature where it introduced new character each episode alongside their petty problems in order to resolve them,no that all fine and dandy but surprisingly almost no of the issues really get resolved,they are either forgotten or just handled in the most .In some cases it goes into complete nonchalant territory such as :"Hey you're sad and lonely,stop being sad and lonely" - "well ok if you it that way" , "Hey you need money to provide your family.Why don't you get a scholarship?" - "Oh ok,ill get one right away".
That's when the writing was just abysmally bad,it also didn't help that everything was brushed away under the rug after each episode ended with no future mentioning.
I've touched upon the main character ,but what about the other 2 female characters? Are they well developed or interesting in some way?
Nope ,Yukino is a condescending ,overly direct ,perfect in all she does type of character .You could have literally replaced her with a robot with no understanding of human nature of emotions and it would have been exactly the same.
Yui is the typical air-head ,overly cheerful character that is pretty much mandatory in any high school related anime nowadays.Not much to say about her.
You only need to take a brief look at the cover for this anime to guess what kind of characters they are, its that simple.Character development is non-existent ,nothing has changed about them during the events the show presented.
The rest of the side characters are completely one note and extremely forgettable ,such as a the girl who likes guy on guy "action",the boy who looks like a girl and is mistaken for one everytime,the cute little sister who constantly repeats "onii chan" over and over again .
Notable mentions goes to the useless ,short tempered teacher who punches students and constantly smokes around them ,because that's funny and in no way gets you instantly fired in real life right ?.....
Overall its a very mediocre and forgettable anime that didn't even try bringing anything new on to the table ,it just rehashed the usual anime tropes.The high school setting has been easily the lowest common denominator for a very long time now,and this series does nothing but to reaffirm how tedious and uninteresting it has become.
Mediocre animation that takes you back to early 2000's series ,not something made 2013,decent VA,almost no story or character progression,bland and one note character ,that's Yahari Ore no Seishun in a nutshell.
Oh and just to make matters worse ,of course there has to be a sequel to this.Because every shitty ,unoriginal,mediocre series warrants a sequel nowadays.
