His and Her Circumstances

Review Time! Kyoko Miyazawa is the model student at everything: poised, proper, friendly, is top of her class and everyone adores her. The truth, however, is far more interesting: all of it is a front! She is actually scheming, petty, a slob and is just getting good grades for the praise of other people! When she enters High School, however, her world is thrown for a loop when a young man named Soichiro Arima quickly supplants her as the top student and takes all of the praise she had wanted for herself! Miyazawa vows revenges, but it gets complicated after Arima confesses to her (who she shoots down ruthlessly) and then he discovers how she really is at home (which then prompts him to blackmail her, showing that he isn’t quite the model student either)! The two set aside their differences, and become friends, then more-than-friends-but-not-yet-a-couple, and finally boyfriend and girlfriend! But while Miyazawa’s real self was easy to discern, Arima’s is far more secretive, as his mask hides something darker, that could poison the love that he has cultivated with Miyazawa. Isn’t it better (and easier on everyone) just to be yourself?! His and Her Circumstances is an often funny, occasionally heartfelt and sometimes very honest look at love in High School. Miyazawa is fun to watch, especially when she does something VERY un-MC like, with her cunning nature and often times humorously nasty temper. She is definitely no Tohru! Arima himself is an interesting character study, as his past trauma makes things difficult for himself and his relationship with Miyazawa, and at least once he was rough with her. However, the two do share a lot of care for each other, and you want the two to work it out. The show itself has some issues, as the main writer and director (Anno of Evangelion fame!) left partway through, and budget cuts made several episodes, especially near the end, very phoned in. It also has way too many recaps, which eat up episodes that could’ve been better used to flesh out the characters. All in all, though, it is a solid series that is worth watching.