I continue to enjoy Watashi ga Motenai no wa Dou Kangaetemo Omaera ga Warui!, aka No Matter How I Look At It, It’s Your Guys’ Fault I’m Not Popular!, shortened to WataMote to make it easier to remember. It’s the story of poor Tomoko, a socially awkward fujoshi (female otaku) who’s so into manga and romance-simulation games that has trouble making friends at school…and for Tomoko, there’s no Light Music Club or Genshiken to help her find lifelong soulmates to connect with. She tries everything she can to turn her social situation around, hatching one crazy plot after another in order to become popular, but her plans always seem to backfire. Though the cruel situations she finds herself in make the show physically painful to watch at times, both as a former high school nerd from the days when the concept of “nerd pride” didn’t exist and also as the father of an otaku daughter today, it’s definitely a fun show. What I like best about it is how it might possibly affect some viewers in a positive way. Though Tomoko would love to blame her unpopularity on others, for example the “bitches” in her class who have boyfriends, in reality she has to take a large part of the blame for her social problems herself. Perhaps the show can be therapeutic to girls (and guys) who are battling the same kinds of social issues, if nothing else then by showing them they’re not alone.
Poor Tomoko from WataMote can’t catch a break.
