Blue Box

Episode 13

With the new year comes a new cour of Blue Box, and I can't think of a more appropriate story to ring in 2025 than one of goofy young love and spirited determination. With Chinatsu out competing at the basketball nationals, Taiki has plenty of time to ponder his resolutions - metaphorically, of course, since this show takes place in the summertime. With Karen and Haryu's story taking center stage this week, I'll bet that one of those resolutions will be something along the lines of “Try to be ever so slightly less dense in matters of the heart.”

I've always liked Haryu as the more mature and collected counterpart to Taiki, but Karen's presence in Blue Box makes me really appreciate the guy. This is partially because she reveals a new side to Haryu that makes him more likeable and an even better role model for our boy, but it's also just because I really like Karen herself. She's a romantic who also has her own goals and dreams that she refuses to give up on, and she's very clearly living more in the “adult” world already compared to her boyfriend's pals. With the way she composes herself, you'd be forgiven for wondering if Haryu was one of those kids who fell into an inappropriate relationship with an older woman.

Karen's appeal doesn't just come from the fact that she is both adorable and frank in the way she roots for Taiki and Chinatsu's own relationship (though her exasperated delivery of “Everyone's overthinking things…” could basically be the tagline for the show, at this point). What makes Karen an especially great new friend for these goofy kids is the way that she and Haryu both represent a refreshingly honest and healthy portrayal of adolescent love that will have to figure out how to work in the real grown-up world before too long. Yes, it isn't good to throw away your long-term dreams for the sake of a hot date, especially at the age when there's still so much time and potential left to take advantage of, but you also can't just sit around pining away over your crush under the pretense of prioritizing one single goal above everything else. The whole “I have to choose between my sports dream and my smooching dream” is a fundamentally childish notion, which Karen and Haryu handily prove. Just like when Haryu won Karen's heart by bringing her that silly journal to smooth over a bad day, Karen is there to cheer Haryu on and support him.

When you're a kid, love feels like something straight out of a movie, where everything rests on that one perfect gesture or impossibly romantic moment, and then the rest will just suddenly make sense and lead to the happily ever after of your dreams. Real love, though, is work, and it demands that you make active choices and sacrifices to keep it alive. Haryu and Karen can't possibly know if they're meant to last forever, and they might end up deciding that their partnership doesn't jive with where they end up going after high-school, but that's fine. They're going to make time for each other, communicate with each other, and most importantly, not overthink themselves into emotional paralysis.

This is exactly the life lesson that Taiki needs to learn right now, and I'm glad that the new cour of Blue Box is starting things off on such a positive note. If I had any real complaints, it would only be that I don't know if we needed two extended flashbacks explaining Karen and Haryu's love story back-to-back. I appreciate where it all gets us, with that wonderful scene of Haryu holding onto Karen after his game, but it's the kind of choice that feels like it probably made more sense in the manga as compared to an episode of television. Still, that's small potatoes in the grand scheme of things, and I'm happy to say that Blue Box was still able to kick off 2025 with one of its better episodes in a while.

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Blue Box is currently streaming on Netflix.

James is a writer with many thoughts and feelings about anime and other pop-culture, which can also be found on Twitter, his blog, and his podcast.