GANBARE! NAKAMURA-KUN!!

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MANGA ComedyGanbare! Nakamura-kun!!
MANGA ComedyMotto Ganbare! Nakamura-kun!!

REVIEWS

• 

  phodotudo

  98/100
  Instantly my favorite BL. Pure tender perfection. My heart never stood a chance.

  Oh.
  My God.
  My Tender Heart. It BURNS!

  This is, to me, the closest BL has ever gotten to perfection.
  There's no hiding behind ambiguity, no bullshit here.

  This is not one of those stories where two male characters stare at each other intensely for an entire season while the narrative refuses to say what either of them actually feels. It is not romance written in a way that lets people pretend it is not. It is not queerness treated like a secret the audience is allowed to notice but the story is too afraid to name.

  Nakamura is gay. He says it. He knows it. He is completely, painfully, adorably in love with another boy.

  And that matters. So much.

  His anxiety does not come from the story being afraid of his queerness. It comes from the terrifyingly normal experience of liking someone without knowing if they could ever like you back. That is a completely different kind of vulnerability. He is not ashamed of what he feels. He is just a teenage boy with a crush so intense it basically turns his entire nervous system into soup.

  From the very beginning, what stood out to me was not just the romance itself, but the feeling around it. The anime captures that very specific kind of adolescent nervousness where liking someone feels magical, terrifying and deeply embarrassing all at once. Every small interaction matters too much. Every glance feels dramatic. Every chance to speak becomes an emotional life-or-death situation.

  And honestly? That is exactly what having a crush felt like.

  Nakamura is such a sweetheart.

  At first, I did think he was almost too shy, to the point where it could have become frustrating. But the more I watched, the more that became part of his charm. His anxiety, hesitation and constant gay panic feel very tied to adolescence and coming of age. I may not relate to that exact stage of life in the same way anymore, but I absolutely understood the feeling.

  He is awkward, dramatic, overwhelmed by his own emotions, constantly fighting for his life internally because Hirose smiled or looked cute for half a second.

  And I loved him for it, because he is, at the end of the day, still learning what it means to fall in love.

  The only thing missing for me was seeing Nakamura and Hirose actually end up together clearly. I wanted the story to take that final step. Not because what we got did not work, but because I cared about them so much by the end that I wanted that happiness for them. I wanted the simple, mutual, openly happy ending that queer coming-of-age stories make you crave.

  Still, the post-credits suggest that there might be a sequel. As far as I know, the anime seems to have adapted most, if not all, of the existing manga material, so I do not know how realistic a continuation is. But emotionally? I am absolutely choosing to believe there is still more.

  When Hirose starts dating a girl, Nakamura’s sadness gives the anime a much heavier emotional edge. That part genuinely hurt because it captures something very real about being a gay boy who likes someone without knowing if that person could ever like him back. It is not just fear of rejection. It is the fear that the possibility was never even real in the first place.

  That is why this worked for me as more than just “cute boys being cute.”

  It is cute, obviously. Painfully cute. Dangerously cute. Medically concerning levels of cute. But the cuteness has feeling behind it.

  The comedy also worked for me. I never found it repetitive or annoying. It matched the tone of the story and made Nakamura’s internal chaos even more lovable. His reactions are exaggerated, but the emotion underneath them feels real.

  One thing I think many people will feel, even if they do not immediately put it into words, is the impact of the visual style. It is a HUGE part of why the anime works.

  The retro aesthetic is NOT just a cute detail. It is essential. The art style, the colors, the whole presentation, give the story this warm, nostalgic feeling that perfectly fits with what it is showing. Even though it is recent and polished to perfection, it feels like a memory. Like looking back at youth, maybe not exactly as it was, but as it felt.

  That nostalgia and vibe made everything sweeter.

  Some of my favorite moments were the ones where Nakamura simply looks at Hirose and the world basically stops. Hirose does something cute without even trying, and Nakamura just melts internally. Those scenes were honestly adorable because they capture something so simple and so real: the way someone can do the smallest thing and suddenly become the center of the universe for a second.

  Compared to other BL or queer coming-of-age stories, this instantly became my favorite.

  If I have a criticism, it is mostly that I wanted more.

  Not because it felt shallow. Not because the simplicity did not work. It absolutely did. I just wanted more time with these characters. More moments. More development. More certainty. More of Nakamura and Hirose slowly becoming something undeniable.

  By the end, I was not disappointed.

  I was attached.

  I wanted to keep watching them. I wanted them to grow closer. I wanted them to understand each other. I wanted them to have the happy ending they deserve.

  The anime is soft, nostalgic, funny and almost aggressively adorable. It captures the feeling of being young, queer and completely destroyed by someone’s smile.

  And yes.

  My tender heart burns.

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• 

  HidamariSeashore

  84/100
  A cute BL anime that may get you to root for its protagonist.

  There are few things quite as embarrassing as a high school crush. In an effort to get close to the object of your affections, you may end up doing things that you'll think back on years later and cringe at your younger self; plus, you'll feel all sorts of messy emotions, which get worse with puberty in the mix. I'm sure that straight people and members of the LGBTQ+ community alike will attest to that; at the very least, I know of one particular gay anime character who is very likely to agree with me. Said anime character stars in a series that is adapted from a manga that started being released in 2014; my curiosity about this manga was what led to me watching its anime adaptation. Ultimately, I'm glad that I did, as "Ganbare! Nakamura-kun!!" is a very charming series that would have been a contender for Anime of the Season if not for some issues it has.

  Ganbare Nakamura-kun, known in English as "Go For It, Nakamura-kun!!", focuses on the titular Okuto Nakamura, a shy and gay high school student. On the first day of school, he experiences love at first sight when he sees one of his new classmates, Aiki Hirose. From then on, Nakamura has one goal: become friends with Hirose. Too bad Nakamura's a complete nervous wreck around Hirose! As he tries to close the distance between him and the boy of his dreams, Nakamura gets into all sorts of wacky shenanigans, alongside a cast of supporting characters who may remind you of characters from manga that were being released in the 1980's! (Personality- and design-wise, I mean, but we're getting ahead of ourselves.)

  The story of Ganbare Nakamura-kun isn't a bad one, per se. It's a pretty typical slice-of-life comedy, but there is significant progress made in Nakamura and Hirose's relationship as it goes on. Not as much progress as a fujoshi watching this might want, but they are a lot closer by the last episode compared to the first, at least. It doesn't end on a very satisfying note, and yet, it does, if that makes any sense. Ultimately, though, Ganbare Nakamura-kun is more of a character-driven anime than a story-driven one, so if you don't like the characters - especially not Nakamura - you aren't going to like the story.

  Luckily, the cast of Ganbare Nakamura-kun is charming enough. Nakamura himself is a very fun protagonist to follow; his awkwardness is both adorable and relatable, it's fun to see him get excited about things he likes, and while he does have some questionable moments surrounding his crush on Hirose, he does genuinely care about him, which is sweet. Hirose himself doesn't start off as the most interesting character, but he turns out to have a fun personality and a surprising amount of depth to his character; this allowed me to more genuinely root for Nakamura in his attempts to get closer to him. Most of the supporting cast, while not always important to the overall narrative, can also be fun to watch; a couple of stand-outs are Hifumi Kawamura, an artistic fujoshi who absolutely deserves the world, and Reiko Aokiyama, the Occult Horror Research Club president who I think would fit right in with the kooky characters of a Rumiko Takahashi manga or something similar to that. The one character I'd say I have a major problem with is Kousei Matsumura; his debut episode is easily the worst in the series, and it's because of his creepy behavior regarding Hirose and how he sort of brought out Nakamura's worst side in the process. He does show a pretty kind side later on, so there's that, I guess.

  Syundei, the creator of the original manga, has a style that seems to be reminiscent of older manga like Urusei Yatsura, and character designer(/director/scriptwriter) Aoi Umeki faithfully replicates it for the anime. That, combined with colorful and fluid animation from Drive, makes for a unique and appealing visual style. The oldies influence continues with a fantastic selection of 12 different ending themes that can most likely be found in a 1980's Japanese city-pop playlist; heck, I recognized episode 5's ending theme, Yasuha's "Fly-day Chinatown", from such a playlist! Of course, the opening theme - "Shunpatsu-teki ni Koishiyou" by Yasuyuki Okamura and Kento Nakajima - is also a great song; it's just so bouncy and catchy! Even the voice acting is top-notch; Chiaki Kobayashi, in particular, breathes so much life into Nakamura and makes already-funny scenes even funnier with his line deliveries!

  Overall, I really liked Ganbare Nakamura-kun, even if Matsumura and some other things kept me from really loving it. Still, I highly recommend it if you want a BL anime that you can likely watch within the remaining days of Pride Month this year. It may even get you to say, "Go for it, Nakamura-kun!"

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• 

  Deus1oVult

  75/100
  A heartwarming retro anime with a beautiful 90s art style, but held back by its choppy, fragmented pacing.

  Ganbare! Nakamura-kun!! is a very special production that breaks away from the monotony of modern digital art in today's anime world and takes us straight into the warm, analog world of the 80s and 90s. Choosing a retro art style was absolutely a perfect decision. If it had the visual presentation of other classic modern anime within its circle, it probably wouldn’t be this intriguing and unique. This wonderful visual choice infuses a completely different soul into the anime, and experiencing that old, missed retro atmosphere after such a long time truly makes one's heart feel incredibly soft and fluffy. The character designs and the naturalness of their relationships also flawlessly support this warm atmosphere.

  Nakamura’s platonic love and extreme shyness, which are the heart of the anime, evoke complex yet equally adorable emotions in the viewer. As sweet as it is to watch his antics, it is just as inevitable to feel the urge to shout at the screen, “Don’t be so shy, Nakamura! Just do what you’re thinking and everything will be solved already!” Nakamura's inner world and his excessive timidity occasionally suffocate and frustrate the viewer a bit, yet the unique sincerity and sweetness of the production never fade for a single moment. Still, the same wish keeps crossing our minds throughout the story: If only you could have gathered a little courage and confessed, Nakamura!

  The comedic elements and the pacing of the work generally follow a highly successful line. Even though the story creates a feeling of repeating itself towards the end, this situation definitely doesn't bore the audience. Although the high tempo at the beginning drops slightly in the middle, the narrative manages to maintain its energy until the very end and does not neglect to push that tempo to its peak in the final episode.

  However, alongside all these beauties, the biggest downside of the production that kills the mood is that the story feels like it's progressing in a very choppy and fragmented way due to the manga source. Especially the fact that we barely get to see Nakamura's face after he gets his hair cut, and that his initial reactions upon seeing Hikaru at school along with subsequent developments are rushed past, is a major loss for the story. Even if the original manga progresses this way, it would have created a much more satisfying finale if the studio had taken the initiative to insert extra scenes into these disconnected moments and offer a smoother flow to the viewer. (Because let's be honest, we really wanted to see much more of that short-haired version, Nakamura! ??)

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