Eromanga Sensei

Genre(s): Slice of Life, Comedy, Ecchi, Romance

Age-Appropriateness: 15+ (Suggestive themes, partial nudity, sexual humor, profanity)

Platforms: Crunchyroll, Funimation

Episodes: 12

TheAwersome Rating: 7.4 / 10 (Is it a great show that’s trashy or trash that’s great?)

Premise: One year ago, Sagiri Izumi became stepsiblings with Masamune Izumi. But the sudden death of their parents leaves Sagiri a shut-in who cut herself off from her brother and society.

While caring for what’s left of his family, Masamune earns a living as a published light novel author with one small problem: he’s never actually met his acclaimed illustrator, Eromanga-sensei, infamous for drawing the lewdest erotica. Through an embarrassing chain of events, he learns that his very own little sister was his partner the whole time! As Sagiri slowly grows out of her shell, just how long will she be able to hide her true persona from the rest of the world?

TheAwersome’s Thoughts: This one left me scratching my head, not going to lie. On paper, it is a trashy and creepy story, the epitome of everything wrong and creepy with anime/otaku/weeb culture. Stepsibling quasi-romance with some strong loli-con vibes, some tropey characters and everyone is falling in love with the high school boy protagonist.

And… I liked it? The animation was great, and the directing was very well done? I’m starting to question my own taste after this, but it wasn’t a chore to watch. Yes, Sagiri as a character is annoying and a lot of this follows cookie cutter writing as far as predictability goes. But there was a lot of interesting things about writing, streaming, and art that were very enjoyable. I will say that the final like, four episodes all felt like OVAs, but I seriously liked one of them.

TLDR: A weeby, trashy, ecchi-themed siscon/lolicon show that’s actually good? I’m still confused.

There were a lot of fun cameos and references to other IRL authors, Light Novels, and anime, so keep an eye out for those.  

I’m still ambivalent on this piece. The story is what I would deem super trashy, predictable, cliché, and borderline insulting with how plainly weeb-male-gaze fantasy it is. All these high school and middle school students are national best-sellers and highly acclaimed artists in their respective fields, and all happen to live in the same area, and all have affection for our protagonist.

But there were a lot of very interesting conversations about the creative process, be it for writing, for drawing, or for streaming. Interesting explorations of how the internet has influenced and shaped creatives in the past and how that’s different from how it does so now. There was a lot of good direction for the characters in the “show, don’t tell” category that bordered on the line of KyoAni caliber. One scene was emotionally touching and while probably not going in the top 10 “favorite anime episodes of all time” it gets close.

So, I guess at the end of the day, it’s probably a very well-polished turd. If you’re well versed in weebery and somewhat numb to this flavor of “anime nonsense” you’ll likely enjoy it. Not a good starter for someone getting into anime though, as it’s a prime example of “why anime is terrible.”

You’ll likely enjoy this if you enjoyed:

• The stepsibling romance of Citrus
• The lolicon aspect of the Monogatari series
• Creative process exploration of Re:Creators
• Good directing such as in Sound! Euphonium, Tamako Market