English Dub Review: Watari-kun’s XX Is About to Collapse “Showing and Been Seen”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

Naoto prepares for a school trip to the beach while also trying to disprove any rumors that he and Satsuki are dating.

OUR TAKE

Beach episodes, just about every high school anime has got them and they can range from a fun and vibrant day for characters to cut loose to a very thinly disguised opportunity to indulge in the author’s fetishes. Well, based on what we have seen of this series in particular so far, you know they were just chomping at the bit to get to this as soon as possible. As has been the case, Satsuki continues to just be around whenever Naoto needs to do something and since she’s the only girl his sister Suzushiro likes, Satsuki is along for the ride and also uses that opportunity to borderline sexually harass Naoto at every turn, and since he’s a confused and hormonal teenage boy, said hormones are overriding all of the blaring red alerts all over this girl. And things are only made worse by the fact that these incidents have caused a rumor to spread that the two of them are dating, which is bad news for Naoto since he actually wants to date Ishihara, who herself has a male friend who is crushing on her like Satsuki is for Naoto, but is willing to play matchmaker for her own happiness. Unfortunately, since this story seems hellbent on getting Naoto together with Satsuki, at least Ishihara will have a backup in case things go south.

Ishihara herself is naturally curious if these rumors are true, but because characters can’t just talk to each other until a certain narrative threshold is met, she has to stumble through a bunch of misunderstandings, some caused by Satsuki, before she comes to her conclusions that they ARE dating, even when Naoto very clearly has to tell her that’s not the case. But she doesn’t trust him, probably because of that kiss Satsuki forced on him, so at least she tries cleaning up her own mess by saying that kissing is just something she’s casual about culturally and helps to clear the air. Even though she should be the much less trustworthy of the two, but whatever. Finally it seems like these two can start on a better foot, but then Ishihara’s ex Fujioka shows up and makes a mess of things again (and apparently will continue to do so into the next episode). So, I think we are sufficiently stocked up on drama from this series for this week, now let’s recharge our batteries and get ready for next time.