Domestic Girlfriend

Episode 3

It's a bumpy ride for everybody this week on Domestic Girlfriend, and I'm not just talking about the quality of the episode itself, though it's certainly a step down from the show's first two outings. Rather, the real turbulence this week comes from the rapid escalation of Natsuo and Hina's physical relationship, which is bound to have lasting consequences for all three of the Fujii-Tachibana siblings.

Things start innocuously enough, with Natsuo trying to gather his thoughts about Hina's tumultuous love life by blowing off some steam at the bar where his buddy Fumiya works. It's obvious to everyone that Natsuo's life is quickly devolving into a soapy melodrama, and Natsuo, Fumiya, and Masaki (Fumiya's boss) end up acting out a hodgepodge of romance clichés to make light of the situation. It's an endearing scene, and moments like these are what make Natsuo and his friends much more relatable than many similar anime protagonists, although I did cringe at Masaki's stereotypical portrayal as a queer character.

On his way home, Natsuo spies Hina departing from a clandestine meeting with the lover that's been causing her so much heartache, and he figures out that she's participating in an affair. Now, despite his honest but inappropriate feelings for his step-sister sensei, it should be obvious that Natsuo is the last person in the world who should be butting into Hina's love life, because all of his actions are at least partially motivated by his desire to replace the man in Hina's life. Alas, Domestic Girlfriend is not the kind of anime you watch to enjoy the cast's healthy decision-making, and thus we get a great number of red flags in quick succession:

• Red Flag #1: Natsuo decides to just waltz into Hina's room and ask her straight-up if she's involved in an affair.
• Red Flag #2: After Hina rightfully tells Natsuo off for meddling in her private business, Natsuo basically forces a kiss on her, presumably in an effort to demonstrate that he's acting out of love and his feelings are "real."
• Red Flags #3, #4, and #5: Hina slaps Natsuo for being an aggressive creep—and then immediately kisses him back. Then things really go off the deep end when Hina proceeds to play tonsil hockey with Natsuo, all while she shoves him down on the bed, mounts him, and tears his shirt open. Hina then kicks Natsuo out, collapsing to the floor in shame, while Natsuo spends the next week sinking into a malaise of confusion and depression.

Since Hina is the adult engaging with a minor in this situation, the moment she decided to kiss Natsuo back is the moment she forfeited any moral high ground. Since Domestic Girlfriend is clearly embracing the seediness of its premise, I won't bother harping on this point week after week, but I would like to make sure I distinguish between Hina and Rui's roles in this love triangle. Rui's angle is playing up the taboo but more sympathetic fantasy of consensual non-blood-related incest. Hina fills that role too, but she's also just sexually propositioned a minor who happens to be her student. This is infinitely harder to play off in terms of its consequences.

That being said, my main issue with this episode doesn't actually come from Hina's actions – it's clear that Natsuo and Hina recognize that they both royally screwed up, so acknowledging the wrongness of the situation provides enough incentive for me to at least entertain Domestic Girlfriend's less palatable indulgences. My bigger issue is how poorly directed and flat this episode comes across. The first two episodes weren't cinematic masterpieces by any means, but episode three really struggles with the basic flow and framing of its scenes. The comedy moments between Natsuo and Fumiya are awkwardly paced, and the sequence in Hina's bedroom is nowhere near as tense or sexually charged as it's trying to be. Late in the episode, when Natsuo and Rui return home after crashing with Fumiya for a few days, both Hina and the parents are overcome with relief and confusion over the pair's disappearance. It's supposed to be the emotional climax of the episode, but the staging and animation is so clunky that the scene falls entirely flat.

On top of that, too much of the material before and after the Natsuo/Hina confrontation feels like the show spinning its wheels until the next dramatic bombshell can drop. The saving grace for the plot comes when Rui reveals that she learned about her sister's affair a while ago, and Hina's accusation that Rui had no idea what it was like to “be held by someone she cares about” actually led to Rui sleeping with Natsuo in the first place. It's a strong character moment that's nearly ruined when Fumiya awkwardly spells out the implications of the scene.

This all leads up to Natsuo and Rui's newfound mission to split Hina up from her lover. I don't think I'm too off-base in assuming that this can only end badly for everyone involved, and I'm sure future episodes will relish in complicating things even further for our protagonists. After all, one of this series' key selling points is getting to watch this twenty-car pileup of tangled emotions and sibling make-out sessions from the safe distance of a television screen. This episode might not have given us Domestic Girlfriend at its best, but I haven't looked away from the wreckage yet, so the show is clearly doing something right.

Rating: B-

Domestic Girlfriend is currently streaming on HIDIVE.

James is an English teacher who has loved anime his entire life, and he spends way too much time on Twitter and his blog.