Rent-a-Girlfriend

Really poorly developed anime in my opinion I haven’t really enjoyed it and most of the characters decisions makes nonsense. This anime makes me really angry when it should make me happy.

Ruka's efforts haven't paid off yet, but each character's development feels grounded. Their perspective is gradually shifting from professional to personal. The conflicts feel completely natural. Their combination of strength and vulnerability really moved me. Honestly, I can't wait for the next season!

Worst piece of media I have ever seen or read, I wish I never watched or read the manga till 374 chapter.

If Uzaki-Chan was this past season’s big romantic comedy anime, Rent-A-Girlfriend would be the big romantic drama or dramady anime. It’s generally an okay show, though I could see it being a real problem in subsequent seasons, depending on how it goes on. It’s part of a nice trend of anime series based around colleges instead of being around high schoolers. Rent-A-Girlfriend follows Kazuya Kinoshita, a college student whose first girlfriend, Mami Nanami, has just broken up with him after dating him for only a month or so. He’s now in a bad head space, so he goes to a rental girlfriend service to, basically, pay to have someone go on a date with him, to try to help him restore his confidence. The first “date”, with a girl named Chizuru Ichinose, goes well, though he bumps into his friends from college who think that she’s his actual girlfriend (and he doesn’t do anything to dissuade him from this), but the second one goes badly. First off his spectacular lack of self-confidence causes himself to beat himself up in public in a way that makes her look bad too. Second, after this date was interrupted by this (and then Chizuru taking him aside to chew him out for being an ass), they end up being called away to the hospital, where Kazuya’s grandmother, Nagomi, has just been hospitalized. Nagomi thinks that Chizuru is Kazuya’s actual girlfriend, and she’s thrilled to see that he’s dating such a nice girl. So thrilled that she calls in her new friend – Sayuri. Saiyuri Ichinose. Who is Chizuru’s grandmother. Chizuru’s grandmother who doesn’t know about her part time job as a Rental Girlfriend. Yeah. So, now, for the sake of their grandparents, they have to pretend to be actually dating, until they can find a time to diplomatically “break up” in a way that doesn’t upset their grandparents. And there’s a very real possibility that the two are actually falling for each other. On top of all of this is Mami. Mami is… not a nice person. She is not happy that Kazuya has seemingly bounced back so quickly after she broke up with him, and starts actively working to break Kazuya and Chizuru up. She also comes to represent some of the problems with the show – specifically how the narrative of the series handles Kazuya. Kazuya himself is generally an okay guy. He’s not perfect – his biggest flaw is his utter lack of self-confidence, and how that leads to him undermining his relationships either by giving him impostor syndrome, or pushing people away because he feels, in brief, that if he can’t like himself no-one else can like him either, so they must be faking. The problem from this comes from the fact that, over the course of the first season of Rent-A-Girlfriend, Kazuya basically gets a harem. He starts with Chizuru and Mami, with then two of Chizuru’s co-workers from the same agency basically then inserting themselves into the story. Of the women in the story – only Chizuru has a character arc that isn’t related to Kazuya in some manner, at least this season. Mami has no reason for trying to interject herself into this relationship, outside of pure spite (which isn’t something I’m saying never happens, but it’s somewhat lazy writing here). Another character, Ruka, ends up pursuing Kazuya because she’s basically declared herself Chizuru’s rival, and a fourth, Sumi, enters the equation when Chizuru sets Kazuya up with one of her co-workers on a practice date due to the fourth girl’s inexperience, and he’s nice to her. The problem is that only Chizuru and Kazuya have any sort of lives outside of each other. Chizuru is an aspiring actress, and Kazuya keeps fish – and takes a part time job at a karaoke parlor to help pay for his hobby. And that’s it. We’ve got nothing for Kazuya’s friends (not even what their majors are). We have nothing for Mami and what she does outside of sabotaging Kazuya’s relationships. We have nothing for Sumi or Ruka. That’s not great. I mean, I enjoyed Rent-A-Girlfriend, and I’ll watch the second season, but this definitely a situation where the story, if the source material is not careful, could walk right into a field of rakes.

Kazuya can' t let Mizuhara down - this is the first mission she has assigned to him! Helping out her friend and fellow rental girlfriend, Sumi, is Kazuya's top priority, leading to one of the most wholesome episodes of the season. This date will leave viewers wanting to see more of the dynamic between the two.

Mami finally starts pushing harder into Kazuya and Chizuru’s fake relationship, and you can really feel the tension building between all three of them. Mami is really annoying to me by the way.

This was one of the sweetest episodes in the season. New character is super shy but really lovable. The ending though… definitely feels like trouble is coming.

This episode felt a bit calmer. Kazuya helping Kuribayashi was wholesome.

Ruka keeps making everything more chaotic, but the family scenes actually had some decent emotional moments.

This episode shows how much Chizuru means to him beyond just the rental stuff. The Christmas scenes were surprisingly sweet too.

I can not believe he couldnt keep the words he said to Chizuru, I didnt like this end of season because Kazu is and idiot. Loved all of the points that makes this anime great

the trainee girl is really cute, they can use different strategies for the way she expess herself. Loved the confidence Kazuya is getting and now Mami appears one more time, the conflict is comming

I relly like that the friendship they have. Kuri finally get over the situation about Ruka and he start to hung up with the boys again

I think he is a lucky guy with ruka trying to get into his life.

I really got anoyed by ruka when she was trying to get the atention of the grandma of kazuya. Funny episode

Really shocking chapter, it wss really funny the final when he reslized they Will be in a trial

This time, I’m speechless! Ruka’s efforts haven’t paid off yet, but each character's development feels grounded. Their perspective is gradually shifting from professional to personal. The conflicts feel completely natural. Their combination of strength and vulnerability really moved me. Honestly, I can’t wait for the next season!

The conflict is heating up. The well structured plot highlights the interconnectedness of the stories. Mizuhara's efforts to train his junior are also commendable. The ending provides a strong enough narrative to deliver an intense climax.

Ruka is chaotic, pushy, and honestly kind of exhausting, but she also makes the story way more entertaining.

This episode was pretty entertaining. New character’s introduction instantly shakes things up.