For the most part, romance in anime centers around the build-up to the relationship and not the relationship itself. While examples of stories revolving around established couples exist, the common way to write romance involves making the audience wait for the confession/kiss before ending things when things get good. So…what happens when you put an established couple…in a harem comedy?
Story:
Hashiba Junnichi is a dreamer. Despite being an ordinary student without many redeeming factors to speak of, he hopes one day that he’ll get a girlfriend and ‘graduate’ from being a virgin. So, after his idiot pervert friends pressure him into confessing to a gal named Yukana, he…gets the girl and is now dating a gal. Yeah, he actually gets the girl. Who’da thunk?
Following the original manga with a few liberties taken at the beginning in order to introduce the rest of the cast, Hajimete no Gal presents itself as a romantic high school comedy with all of the charm and delicacy of a bull in a tutu running through a china shop. The structure of the show has each episode act as a ‘test’ for our protagonist as he attempts to get closer and understand his new girlfriend, as various members of the cast get in the way and try to in loose terms, sabotage the new relationship that Junnichi has with his new girlfriend. As a result, Hajimete no Gal manages to pull off some meaningful and important growth for our main protagonist that otherwise would’ve left him as some bland protagonist without redeeming qualities.
Going back to the metaphor however, the show plagues the genuine and positive relationship that it’s trying to establish between its dual protagonists by littering as many scenes as it can with awful, perverted antics, conflicting motives, really uncomfortable moments, and many, many daydreams from Junnichi himself that often times rescinds the positive outlook that it’s trying to establish for its main character. As such, the show combats itself with what it wants to do, going back and forth trying to decide if it wants to be a genuine romance story between two unlikely candidates, or some perverted comedy without anything of value besides entertainment.
The show also leaves a lot to be desired when it comes to pacing, as everything from its character arcs and comedic timing really leaves a lot to be desired. With a runtime of ten episodes, the show managed to squeeze as much of the original manga as it could by rushing through the more prominent character arcs into one or two episodes. As a result, these ‘character arcs’ become rushed and lack impact due to how fast they go by, leaving very little emotional impact for the audience to feel. Comedic timing also seems to be this series’s weak suit, as so many of the gags and jokes the show uses become tired and old due to their frequency and the subject matter at hand. 
Ultimately, Hajimete no Gal had a story that faltered because it felt like it wanted to be a meaningful between two people in a relationship, but also really wanted to focus on explaining the glory that is having a sexy, busty girl straddle you in an uncomfortably annoying and needy fashion. Its ending tied itself up with a contrived, cliché two parter that creates a problem only to resolve it quickly and return everything back to the status quo, and any genuinely good moments that the show displayed were overshadowed by the tidal wave of garbage perverted comedy that it really wanted to exemplify.
Overview:
+ Has genuinely good moments between the two main characters
– Rushed character arcs
– Terrible comedic timing
– Confused identity
Characters:
At face value, the characters in this show really fall into two camps. You have the main couple, and then you have the other people who feel like they’re just kind of there.
The harem trope of having a bland protagonist so that the male viewer can project onto them because they lack any kind of personality really comes into play here with Junnichi. At first, all he wants to do is have sex and lose his virginity because that’s apparently so important that that needs to be your only character trait. While it’s easy to dismiss his character as that, time and time again in the show, we see Junnichi act faithful as we’re shown that unlike his male compatriots, he’s actually a genuinely sweet guy that thinks about the feelings of his girlfriend rather than having his genitals decide what should be done. It was actually refreshing to see moments of him going out of his way and try and prevent anything bad to happen to Yukana and the rest of the girls and really was a redeeming trait that I really liked.
In the same vein as that, Yukana, despite boasting the ‘trashy gal girl’ persona, is similarly a sweet girl who wants to spend time with her boyfriend. She teases him, gets close to him, and above all, genuinely seems to like him aside from the generic ‘nice’ characteristic that all bland protagonists like him seem to have. While certainly not used as much, as Junnichi’s trials and tribulations to become someone worthy of her is a far more prominent plot point, Yukana manages to be somewhat of an endearing character cause she never seems to boast any overly annoying or outlandish traits for the sake of making her another rehash of a trope.
The rest of the cast is split into the other six ‘friends’ of the main duo with an even split between both sexes. The girls themselves are the ones with ‘character arcs’, as the early episodes focus on each of them one at a time with how they react to the the main characters’ relationship and their attempt to sabotage what’s already been established. They’re not great, they’re all basically just a rehashed trope (Yuri, childhood friend, and queen bee complex respectively), and they all really could’ve used more time, but they’re at least tolerable and add SOMETHING to the individual characters. The guys on the other hand…
There’s something to be said when the entirety of your male side cast is comprised of nothing but a trio of scumbags who want nothing more than to get into a girl’s pants by ANY means, going so far as to force them do stuff via the King Game in one episode. The latter half of the show has these jackasses act as the major obstacle for Junnichi’s success in his relationship with his girlfriend. And if that wasn’t bad enough, they even established one of them being a straight up pedophile who does nothing but talk about how great grade school girls are. Why was this allowed?! Who thought this was a good idea?!
Overview:
+ Relatively good main duo
– Female side cast could’ve used a lot more time
– Absolutely god awful male side cast
Art:
Made by NAZ, Hajimete no Gal’s art is standard fare with very few outstanding qualities. Colors are bright, the animation’s fluid enough to convey what’s going on, and the comedic aspects of the show are filled with your typical exaggerated expressions in order to better give off the perverted comedy that the show’s trying to convey.
However what is outstanding is the show lack of shame when it comes to gratuitous fanservice. While the designs for the girls are quite overdone with sexual traits, Nene in particular just exudes problematic character design, as she is a four foot girl with breasts so large that they’re three times the size of her head EACH. It’s really uncomfortable to look at, it’s not attractive, why would you do this?
Additionally, the show will on a dime, pad out the runtime with scenes involving the females in various poses and articles of clothing in order to accentuate their womanly aspects. There’re at least thirty or so flashbacks/transitions into Junnichi’s raunchy fantasies/inner turmoil, all of them involving Yukana in some way ‘taking the lead’. Again, it’s just gratuitous, and honestly really doesn’t have any value.
Overview:
+ Decent art
– Far too much gratuitous fanservice
– Some problematic character designs
Sound:
In terms of sound, both “Hajimete no SEASON” and “GAL-tic Love“, the show’s OP and ED respectively, sound remarkably similar with the only difference being that the ED has a more rock-based tune compared to the OP’s cheerful and upbeat tune. I’d say they’re pretty average, so they’re not really a song worth pointing out.
Personal Enjoyment:
Having read the original manga, I could see a lot of carryover with a heaping dose of gratuitous fanservice in order to pad out the show’s runtime cause apparently, they didn’t have enough source material to fill up a runtime shorter than most anime. In the end however, I can’t really note the show as something I really enjoyed. I didn’t hate it, but it wasn’t great.
Did I enjoy this anime?
In terms of actual enjoyment, the relationship between Junnichi and Yukana was definitely one of if not the only highlight this show had. There actually seemed to be something between the two of them, and that was an aspect of the show that I really appreciated cause it gave some value to what would otherwise just be some trashy show.
What didn’t I like about this anime?
Fuck you, Minoru. Like actually, fuck you. Pedophile characters aren’t great, but when the show actively tries to establish a character having a map of all of the houses of where little girls live, get hot and heavy just thinking about them, consistently say “Grade schoolers are the best”, choose to go to the men’s side of the hot springs for the sole purpose of seeing little girls naked, and going up and talking to them just to say how much he loves them, THEN YOU HAVE A FUCKING PROBLEM. It’s not funny, it’s super uncomfortable, oh my god why the hell would you think this is a good idea?
Would I recommend this anime?
Honestly…the show is not worth it. Despite me claiming that it actually has a decent romantic relationship between the two main characters, I would highly advise against watching this show. Its good traits are overshadowed so much by its less desirable and downright uncomfortable aspects that it actively becomes a burden just to see the glimmer of quality development that the show has. And seriously, why the hell would you make one of your characters a godforsaken child predator for the sake of comedy? I cannot stress why that is such a terrible idea.
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