How often does anime make you laugh out loud? Last night I was working through the new shows of the current season and started watching Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai (“Kagura-sama Wants to Make Him Confess First,” official English title Kaguya-sama: Love is War), and found myself laughing so loudly I woke Mrs. J-List up, sleeping on the sofa. So I moved to the main TV and showed her the anime, and soon we were both laughing ourselves silly.
It’s the story of two students in the prestigious Shuchiin Academy. Kaguya is a super rich and elegant girl, daughter of one of Japan’s top zaibatsu cartels, and Miyuki is a highly intelligent student of more common means who serves as the student body president for the school. Both students are head-over-heels in love with each other, but since “love is war,” neither wants to be the first to confess their feeling to the other. What ensues is an endless game in which both set traps to try to trick the other into confessing first. The pride of each person is so great that they let six months pass by without either making the first romantic move. Each segment is positively hilarious, and the voice acting (especially by rich girl Kaguya) really makes it enjoyable.
In one scene, Miyuki and another student exchange IDs for the popular social media platform LINE, which causes drama because Kaguya at first refuses to be the first to ask Miyuki for his Line ID due to her stubbornness, they can’t in the end because she’s using a hilariously outdated clamshell phone which can’t use social media apps. My wife and I laughed again because this is the kind of phone my wife still uses today. LINE is a fun app for connecting with classmates, friends, and co-workers, but it’s also become a social issue, with virtually everyone feeling pressure to get a Line ID or feel cut off from society at large. My wife regularly expresses thanks that we had our kids before the rise of social media, since mothers all connect with each other via LINE, and since she doesn’t use it, she’d feel left out.
Will you be watching Kaguya-sama: Love is War? We hope so!
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