This week, I felt like I needed something a change of pace and something calm to watch. Eventually, I landed on watching Sasaki and Miyano, a BL slide of life anime. The series is cute, relaxing, and easy to watch as it’s guaranteed that there’ll be a happy ending.
After stopping a fight, Sasaki meets Miyano and instantly finds him cute. They quickly build a friendship by sharing his BL novels with him. While Sasaki’s crush is obvious, it takes Miyano a while to feel comfortable with his growing feelings despite being heterosexual.
The small details count.
I gotta give props to this series’ use of details. The most noticeable ones would be the colorful triangles and circle special effects that pop up on the screen. They appear in situations that indicate when Miyano and Sasaki are developing feelings. At first, it felt too much, but I quickly adjusted. It’s a part of the series’ style. It literally looked like love was in the air, which helped shift the tone in scenes.
Other small details added to the daily routine that the characters in Sasaki and Miyano lived with. We saw the same cat in every episode, loitering around school. The conversations that were left unfinished, or informed characters, were brought full circle later as characters interacted with each other. Little information about who works where or likes sweet things helped make each character feel connected. They’re still making friends, and these scattered bits of info are essential to small moments with an acquaintance. I found it fun watching friendships form.
Other small details added to the daily routine that the characters in Sasaki and Miyano lived with. We saw the same cat in every episode, loitering around school. Conversations that left off, or informed characters, were brought full circle later as characters interacted with each other. Little information about who works where or likes sweet things helped make each character feel connected. They’re in high school, still making friends, and these scattered bits of info are essential to small moments with an acquaintance. I found it fun watching friendships form.
Gotta love the depiction of friendships.
The characters are cute and colorful. I was afraid most of these characters would blend in the background, but I was utterly wrong. After a few episodes, I started to see their unique personalities. Miyano’s friends, mostly underclassmen, are boys from the Disciplinary Committee, while Sasaki’s are upperclassmen who aren’t the brightest in school. Their similarities of obsessing over their girlfriends or the growing popularity of BL novels make it fun when Miyano and Sasaki interact with their classmates throughout the series.
The first episode is probably the only episode I struggled a bit to watch. The sequence of events and time jumping confused me because Sasaki remembers certain moments with Miyano. Still, it becomes unclear where the timeline exactly is because Sasaki keeps remembering old events. The flashbacks explain Sasaki’s reason and revelation on his attraction and feelings for Miyano, while the rest of the season is for Miyano to explore the emotions, which tracks better.
Nothing too heavy happens either.
Because this is a slice of life, if you’re looking for anything dramatic or heavy, this isn’t it. They address homophobia multiple times in the story. Still, the character’s quickly clear up misunderstandings and accept Sasaki’s obvious crush on Miyano. Some even get too much into BL afterward, which is a funny way to bring people together.
Some conflicts brought up are feelings of jealousy or uncertainty, but that doesn’t mean they’ll create a scene to express it each time they feel bad. It feels a bit like life, where you go home and cry about it, forget about it or accept it, and after a few months, you learn you misunderstood the other person all along. If you’re watching this, you’re in it for the long game, as the slow-burn romance takes its time with its thirteen episodes.
If I hadn’t read the manga to this anime before, I probably would have dropped this series during the first episode. But that hypothetical situation would have also robbed me of all the cute moments. After the first episode, Sasaki and Miyano excelled my expectations. If you need a fresh BL story that, reminds you of your first realization of love or just something cute in the background, Sasaki and Miyano will be perfect for you.
