If You Love Cute Anime Girls, Watch the ‘Do It Yourself!!’ Anime!

I love the way anime can always manage to surprise us. When I went to check out the currently airing Do It Yourself!! anime, I thought it would be a cute-girls-doing-cute-things show, probably with episodes that were three minutes long. To my surprise, it’s a full-length series with much more complex and interesting characters than I expected. Keep reading if you’re looking for a wonky, kawaii anime about girls building DIY projects and finding friendships!

Why is Do It Yourself!! the Cute-Girls-Doing-Cute-Things Anime You Should Watch?

This is quite an anime season for anime about cute moe girls. Between the new season of Yama no Susume, an isekai about a cute catgirl and a sword, and a surprisingly relaxing fan service-heavy fantasy RPG anime, there are many options for fans who want to watch anime and chill. Another show I am enjoying is the Do It Yourself!! anime, a weird but delightful show about cute girls finding friendships through DIY projects.

We first meet Yua Serufu. We know she will be the show’s main character because her name is literally in the show’s title. She’s a dojikko, a clumsy girl, who hurts herself repeatedly over the course of each episode.

When Yua’s feisty senpai Rei shanghais her into the school’s DIY club, Yua dreams of making a bench so she can sit with her childhood friend Miku (nickname “Pudding”) like they did when they were young.  But Miku/Pudding attends the elite Yuyu Girls’ Vocational High School for Technology where she learns cutting-edge science, and she thinks that building things by hand is stupid. Can Yua show Miku the errors of her ways and rebuild their lost friendship?

Besides Serufu-chan, the other club members are:

• Shy but aesthetically talented Takumi Hikage (日蔭 匠), whose kanji mean “skillfully building projects in the shadows.” This describes her perfectly.
• Club president Rei Yasuku (矢差暮 礼), whose name comes from yasagure, meaning someone who lives life in a sloppy manner without caring about the opinions of others (just like me, according to Mrs. J-List). Her parents run a hardware store, which is why she’s so good at using tools.

• A genius savant from overseas with the ridiculous name of Juliet Queen Elizabeth VIII. She acquires the nickname Job-ko, from her habit of saying “Good job!”
• A princess from an unnamed south seas country named Kokoro Kouki (幸希 心), whose name phonetically means “a curious heart.” Like Job-ko, she’s obsessed with ninjas.
• Miku Suride (須理出 未来), the former childhood friend of Yua-chan, attends a high-tech high school. To show viewers how into cutting-edge technology she is, her family name comes from “3D [printer]” and her given name means “future.” Will Miku learn the simple pleasures of working with her hands? And more important, how hard will fans ship Yua and Miku together?

The Do It Yourself!! anime is an original story being animated by Pine Jam, known for other unorthodox works like Gleipnir and the first season of Tawawa on Monday. It’s being partially funded by Sanjo City in Niigata Prefecture, which is the setting of the anime, and tool maker Takagi, who wouldn’t mind if you purchased their tools for your future DIY projects.

Is the Do It Yourself!! Anime a Bad Show?

Researching the characters of this anime, I landed on the My Anime List page for the show and was surprised to see some reviews on that platform positively trashing the show. The reviewers compared Do It Yourself!! to Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken (which I positively loved) and called it generic and “one of the most disappointing anime of this season.” I humbly disagree and think that a show can be perfectly fun to watch, even if it makes use of existing anime tropes, and isn’t necessarily the most original concept ever.

Thanks for reading this blog post on the Do It Yourself!! anime. Got any opinions on the show or on the cute-girls-doing-cute-things genre in general? Post them below, or chat with us on Twitter!