Alya Sometimes Hides Her Feelings in Russian

Episode 6

The pacing of the show is legitimately awful. We are halfway through the season, and I am struggling to find something to latch onto. The show seems to go out of its way to either reinforce something that probably doesn't need it or create scenes whose sole purpose is to have me ask questions. I like shows that generate intrigue, but I'm not asking questions because I'm desperately itching to find the answers. Instead, I'm asking questions because some scenes only work because I don't have vital information that the show is explicitly withholding from me.

I don't know why it took Alya so many episodes to confront Yuki about her relationship with her brother. You can maybe make an argument that it's not her place to judge that stuff, but the more I think about it, it's bold of Alya to kiss Kuze and indirectly confess to him when there was room for her to assume that he might already be in a relationship with somebody. I'm glad she at least is trying to confront the issue and figure out their relationship after catching them on a date four episodes ago. Yuki responded exactly how I figured she would, using vague words to imply a different relationship than what was there for the sake of trolling, and Kuze was just kind of direct on the issue. I hope the show reveals that there is a legitimate reason why they're keeping this dynamic such a well-guarded secret because if it turns out that nothing was holding either of these two back from just telling Alya that they are siblings, I'm going to be pissed.

I don't know what the show wants me to think about Alya, but I can assure you that almost none of my thoughts are positive. When I finished episode two, I wasn't expecting to dislike this character as much as I do right now, but even within the framing of the show itself, I don't know what I'm supposed to latch onto. We already established that she doesn't have the skills to be a student council president, and Kuze explicitly breaks down to her that Alya doesn't have the support of the school to win an election. At first, I thought the show was laying the groundwork for an underdog story, which ironically was what Kuze was saying Alya needed to do to connect with the student body. But then we get Alya's internal monologue, and she spends a good chunk of time just thinking about how Kuze isn't nervous enough about being out on a date with her. Excuse me, how seriously are you taking this upcoming election that you are in no way, shape, or form prepared for? Why am I supposed to be on this girl's side if her priorities are this twisted?

There's a lot of flavor text and a lot of setup for the upcoming student council elections. We are on episode six and yet we are still just in the planning stages. It genuinely feels like we could've gotten a lot of this information in the last episode, and I hope this drawn-out feeling isn't going to last the entire season. The only thing that legitimately intrigued me about this episode was the last 30 seconds of it with the introduction of a new character who seems to have explicit connections to Kuze and Yuki. If I had to guess, she's probably a maid or something that used to work at their house, seeing how she addresses Kuze with the sama honorific. If we have somebody who could bridge the family drama with what's going on at school, then maybe we can get some interesting things going on.

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Alya Sometimes Hides Her Feelings in Russian is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.