The competition for romantic comedy anime for this Spring 2022 season is proving to be quite a fierce one. At first, the most obvious competitors forA Couple of Cuckoosare justKomi Can’t CommunicateandShikimori’s Not Just a Cutie. But as the season progressed, more challengers appeared on the horizon. As it turns out, action-oriented anime likeThe Rising of the Shield HeroandSpy x Familyalso have quite a solid romance baked into their story.
On the other hand, a pure RomCom anime likeA Couple of Cuckoosseems to be struggling to find its foothold. With its good first episode and bland second episode,A Couple of Cuckoosneeds a solid episode if it wants to stay within the competition. So can this third episode fulfill that crucial role?
RELATED:Spring 2022 Preview: A Couple of Cuckoos
Previously on A Couple of Cuckoos
Despite their objection, Erika Amano and Nagi Umino are betrothed by their parents. This is actually quite a clever solution, after all, they are both switched at birth, sobeing marriedwill allow them to stay with both families.
In the second episode, Erika decided to visit Nagi’s humble abode. Being the daughter of rich parents, there are a lot of things that Erika doesn’t understand about the life of a middle-class family like Nagi’s. But she genuinely wishes to know and get closer to her biological parents, so she happily accepts every new experience with an open hand.
I’ll Never Lose To You!
At the end of episode 2, Erika’s father forces her and Nagi to live in the same house. The main reason is to get them to be closer to one another. After all, in the eyes of their parents, they are still betrothed. At first, both of them hated this arrangement. However, slowly but surely, living together allowed them to spend more time with each other and eventually get to know each other better.
RELATED:A Couple of Cuckoos Episode 1 Review
Meanwhile, in school, Nagi is trying hard to get the first rank on the upcoming exam. The reason is simply that he wants to beat the current number one student, a girl named Hiro Segawa. Hiro is Nagi’s crush, so to get her to look his way, he needs to be better than her. And thus enter the second potential love interest.
Progression of the Main Characters' Relationship
As mentioned above, living together allows both of the main characters to spend more time together and therefore increase their interaction exponentially. And although they both wish to live separately at first, Nagi who forgets to bring his textbook ends up having to spend the weekend helping Erika get the best photos for her social media in exchange for borrowing her textbook.
On the other hand, Erika the tsundere also gets the chance to know more about Nagi’s personality when she helps him recover from a slight fever. She finds out how stubborn and determined Nagi actually is, and she seems to admire that part of him. Although it is still a tiny baby step, it is stilla clear indication of a progression in their relationship, and that is great news.
A Closer Look into The Second Love Interest
We were actually already introduced to Hiro Segawa back in the first episode. But it was just one scene at the end of the episode, and she only had one line. This time around, however, we get to know more about her personality and how she is viewed by other characters as well.
It is clear that Hiro will bethe second love interest in this series, so it is nice to finally get a closer look into how she is actually as a person. And to be fair, her competitive nature that makes her slip a letter into Nagi’s locker and make it seem like a love letter only for it to actually be a declaration of war is simply hilarious. It seems like we get an interesting supporting character on our hands.
Surprising and Refreshing Visual Effects
A Couple of Cuckooshas a relatively consistent visual style. It doesn’t stray away from howa conventional RomCom animeis supposed to be presented. This means the animation is pretty much heavily grounded in reality with little to no deviation in style at all.
However, this third episode presents some surprising visual effects that are used to portray Erika’s imagination when she talks about the wonder of the internet and social media. It was animated in a very loose and cartoonish way that is totally different from the rest of the series thus far. This simple and short variation in the visual style is a surprising and refreshing addition to the anime, and hopefully, we can see more of this in the future.
This is certainly one of the mostenjoyable episodes ofA Couple of Cuckoosthus far. The solid storytelling, the character development, the progression of the relationship, the occasional humor, and the shift in visual style are certainly the highlights of this episode. There’s really nothing to complain about here. Absolutely looking forward to the next episode.
More:A Couple of Cuckoos Episode 2 Review - I Won’t Marry You
