Every character is incredibly two dimensional. For a shoujo romance this is fairly standard, but considering this one features a disabled lead you'd expect it to be handled with a bit more care.
So, what's the problem with Yuki? Yuki seems like a self insert in every worst way; she's small, pretty, timid, shy, naive. None of these are inherently bad, I personally am just sick and tired of this trope of women in anime. Basically the perfect girl with absolutely zero flaws, but also enough of a blank slate for the viewer to be able to insert themselves into her shoes. She has basically no visible family, hardly a past, no memorable life events - it's like she just popped into existence as soon as the first episode started for the viewer to begin vicariously living through her. And that's ignoring the pull point for this anime, the fact that she's deaf. Now I'm not deaf so I can't speak for anyone, these are just my own opinions; but it just feels like she's infatalised because of her disability, not only by the people in the show but by the creators of it. Her disability is only used to give reasons for the men around her to jump in and make themselves appear in a better light.
That brings me onto the male love interests. Itsuomi is, much like Yuki, the perfect guy with absolutely zero flaws. He's tall, pretty, conscientious, considerate, loving, (all things I wish real men would be) he travels, speaks 4(?) languages, is incredibly popular. Despite this anime toeing the love triangle line, it's just so painstakingly obvious he is made to be for Yuki - and by extension, for the viewer. Him having no flaws is such a problem as it just makes him an incredibly boring character; it seemed at times like they were hinting at him having more depth that was waiting to be revealed, but nothing ever happened? Lost opportunity I say.
Oshi is the childhood best friend, the sorry excuse for a part of the love triangle. It is very obvious that Yuki has zero interest in him so to me, he was never perceived as a threat. His only contribution to the story was to infantalise Yuki and pine for her. I'd argue that he was the most fleshed out character in the show, to me it seemed like the only reason he liked her was because he could (and did) learn sign language to communicate with her, something which the vast majority - in fact everyone other than Itsuomi, didn't do. It felt like he had a saviour complex, a flaw! Unprecedented, I know. But it was interesting, it just wasn't explored at all which is an incredible shame.
I can understand that the general theme of the anime was Itsuomi taking this sheltered girl with a barrier to the world, and helping her overcome that - but that again just seems incredibly infantalising (sorry this is becoming a buzz word), why does it take a man to 'save' her and teach her these things? Their relationship just didn't feel real to me, it always felt like they were just kind of pushed together without knowing each other? It really made me struggle to believe they actually went well together, the lack of connection was palpable.
I don't have much to say about the other side characters, the pessimist in me doesn't enjoy how idealistic it all is but that's just the type of anime this is.
Animation is beautiful, I see the art style is devisive but I thought it was incredibly pretty and I didn't think anything else of it a couple episodes in.
The sound is fine, op is okay, no stand out there. Voice acting performances are good, despite the poor international languages which is all too common.
Overall it was an enjoyable watch, just a lot of missed potential that could have been fixed with some better characterisation and even pacing.
