English Dub Review: Tomo-chan Is a Girl! “I Want to Be Seen as a Girl!”

 Overview:

Tomo Aizawa and Junichirou Kubota have been best friends since childhood. Tomo is in love with Jun, but the issue is he doesn’t see her as a girl. She doesn’t act like your average girl, but her ultimate goal is to get Jun to finally see her as a girl.

Our Take:

It’s an interesting idea to want to turn a bromance into an actual relationship, especially when one of those characters is actually a girl. When Tomo tells Jun she loves him, he reciprocates the words, but more in a brotherly way. The two have been friends since they were kids and they learned karate together. Throughout their friendship, Tomo has always been a tomboy, so Jun doesn’t see her as a girl.

At first, the episode makes it seem like Jun is oblivious to the fact that Tomo even is a girl. However, he is aware of that. It’s more like he sees and treats her like one of the guys and overlooks the fact that she’s a girl. I originally thought he was a complete idiot, but Jun at least knowing that Tomo is a girl is a start. He’s still a moron, but he’s not completely unsalvageable. It’s also revealed that Jun may have some feelings for Tomo. He never says it in this episode, but the way he acts when subjects like that come up makes it obvious.

As for Tomo, I think she’s great. She’s very fun to watch in this episode. She does follow some of the usual tropes, such as hitting Jun when she’s frustrated or embarrassed. However, it’s at least justified here because it’s been established that the two roughhouse and study karate together.

I also enjoy her interactions with her father, her karate team captain, and a couple of girls who have a crush on the captain. Tomo’s father is over the top, which leads to some great back and forth between the two. Kousuke Misaki, her karate team captain, says he thinks Tomo is a great girl, which really makes her day. As for the girls who like Misaki, they go from being jealous of Tomo to asking her for advice. Tomo’s starting to get what she wants and that’s just to be treated like a girl.

We also see a lot of Misuzu Gundou in this episode. She’s Tomo’s friend, but she doesn’t get along well with Jun. Misuzu does try to help Tomo transition into a more romantic relationship with Jun, but she also tends to cause trouble. Not to mention, she can be frightening at times. I like her personality a lot. She’s the caring meddling friend who also likes to get under peoples’ skin. She has a couple of funny interactions with Jun where she says something to him and does something petty. For example, he pushes her into the rain and throws her scrunchie. I got a kick out of small things like that and I’m hoping to see more of this in future episodes.

There are plenty of great interactions between the these three and other side characters as well. The main characters have a lot of personality and most of the side characters do too, so it makes for a fun episode.

This episode is a great introduction to this series. It gives us a glimpse of Jun’s and Tomo’s friendship up to this point and it explains what Tomo wants. It also establishes that both characters have feelings for one another. Finally, it’s a lot of fun. There is a chance that the jokes this show tells could get old, but I hope it progresses the relationship along enough to strengthen the foundation. Regardless, we’re off to a good start and I’m looking forward to see what comes next.