During the summer of her freshman year of high school, Yuzu Aihara's mother remarried, forcing her to transfer to a new school. To a fashionable socialite like Yuzu, this inconvenient event is just another opportunity to make new friends, fall in love, and finally experience a first kiss. Unfortunately, Yuzu's dreams and style do not conform with her new ultrastrict, all-girls school, filled with obedient shut-ins and overachieving grade-skippers. Her gaudy appearance manages to grab the attention of Mei Aihara, the beautiful and imposing student council president, who immediately proceeds to sensually caress Yuzu's body in an effort to confiscate her cellphone.
Thoroughly exhausted from her first day, Yuzu arrives home and discovers a shocking truth—Mei is actually her new step-sister! Though Yuzu initially tries to be friendly with her, Mei's cold shoulder routine forces Yuzu to begin teasing her. But before Yuzu can finish her sentence, Mei forces her to the ground and kisses her, with Yuzu desperately trying to break free. Once done, Mei storms out of the room, leaving Yuzu to ponder the true nature of her first kiss, and the secrets behind the tortured expression in the eyes of her new sister.
[Written by MAL Rewrite]
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AltoRoark
Citrus is a series that is tragically misunderstood; a story with far more substance and depth than word of mouth would lead you to believe. Not long after this show started airing, it’s become easy for people to write off any element in the story as a means to arbitrarily wring out some voyeuristic lesbian action, rather than stopping to think of the purpose it actually holds for the narrative. When a sexual assault occurs, viewers assume that it’s romanticizing such an action and therefore condones it. When an emotional barrier props up, it’s assumed to be nothing more than a way of piling onmore drama. These premature assessments are commonly made when shows like this are perceived as simple fetish material, framed as horribly misplaced criticisms that leave Citrus in an undeservedly contemptuous light; as a guilty pleasure unworthy of further analysis or appraisal. Citrus is not mere fetish material, does not promote or romanticize sexual assault, and provides layered and well-developed characters whose actions are realistically influenced by both internal and external conflicts. A bittersweet feeling perpetuates as we follow naive teenagers consistently characterized as those who are lost and confused, behaving in ways that are less than ideal, but are hurdles along the way of a gripping and emotionally compelling tale that is certainly rough around the edges, but well worth the ride.
There’s a common conjecture about Citrus saying that it treats sexual assault as a form of love and the blossoming romance is in the form of Stockholm syndrome, neither of which are true in the slightest. Firstly, while the actions of Mei Aihara undeniably walk on the borderline of sexual assault, none of these instances are framed as romantic or mutual in any way. The first of these depicts Yuzu struggling while Mei lashes out her aggression. Following this is a low shot with Mei, spitefully uttering “that’s what it felt like” in response to Yuzu’s innocent curiosity about Mei’s romantic affair. Nothing about this is painted in a positive, approving light. Subsequent events like this are blatantly shown to be a byproduct of Mei’s misconception of how relationships work, or a means to vent her frustration. The sheer discomfort is emphasized through both the cinematography and the expressions of the characters involved. This does not mean nefarious actions like these are excused, as the story never does. Yuzu always retaliates to these actions once she regains control over herself during these events. Depiction and endorsement are not the same thing, a fact that should always be considered with regards to a story like this. Another thing to address is this: the assaults are by no means the foundation of the leads’ romance, and that is a myth that should have passed long after this show had aired. Yuzu develops feelings for Mei long before the first assault occurs, which is most evident during the scene where she is lost in thought about witnessing Mei being kissed by Amamiya. Her focus is squarely on Mei’s behavior and what kissing must feel like for her, with Yuzu’s own attraction to Mei not even apparent to her. Overall, when proper attention is brought to the characters’ actions as well as the framing, it becomes clear that the criticism of Citrus romanticizing assault holds no truth whatsoever. I'd like to make a point here that not all opinions are equal, and opinions on Citrus based on the conception that it romanticizes or normalizes assault and abuse are invalid and therefore wrong. A valid opinion doesn't require high intelligence or sophisticated taste or anything like that. It requires a correct interpretation of the content, one that is often not taken through first impressions or face value.
Citrus and its content is highly reliant on context and characterization. Just as these confused adolescents struggle to understand each other and themselves, wondering who and what to believe, viewers are left on their own to base judgement on characters’ behavior and what they say, save for some frequent monologuing by Yuzu. And even then, her own thoughts aren’t always reliable. Content that comes off as questionable or discomforting to certain viewers is perfectly explainable through indirect characterization, a method of storytelling that challenges the brain beyond just relying on narration and monologues to provide answers without viewer effort. Viewers share frustration and confusion with the characters themselves, and the payoff is all the more rewarding because of this. The character Mei Aihara exemplifies this most of all, as she is a person whose subtle mannerisms bring light to a personality misshapen by the worst of circumstances, and very applicable to reality.
Mei is a character with practically no conception of right and wrong, let alone the idea of consent, and has never been shown, or had any experience of, what a true romantic relationship is like. The only proper relationship she has ever had in life was with her father. After he left, Mei felt as if she was being abandoned by the only one she was ever truly close to. It’s clear that prior to where the main story begins, Mei has had no emotional support ever since her father’s absence. She is used and neglected by her grandfather, is constantly taken advantage of by her fiancée, and is under perpetual social pressure to follow her duties accordingly for days on end.
As a result, Mei’s attitude towards romantic and sexual relationships is completely distorted. Her one and only understanding of love relationships is through physical contact, of which she uses to control people just as she has been controlled herself. This is symptomatic of being in a sexually abusive relationship like she had with her first fiancée; she doesn’t value her own body and is incapable of interacting with people normally. In many situations, whether it's a love relationship or otherwise, Mei passively accepts everything that is piled on her with no concern for her own well being, a trait that is consistently apparent over the course of the story. On the other end, her way of taking control of situations is her sexual advances towards Yuzu, who understandably objects to these actions. The main point is that Mei only acts in the way she knows how. This conflict of hers isn’t a singular matter, but numerous elements about her past and how she was raised which come together creating the version of Mei we see throughout the story. Mei is depraved, misguided, and some could even say mentally ill. And again, none of these elements are used to justify Mei's behavior. It's merely a case of cause and effect, one which leaves morality out of the question entirely.
Being so used to her strict upbringing, Mei frames every scenario as a bargain or exchange rather than a desire, even if she doesn't necessarily intend it. Her feeling obligated to follow in the footsteps of her father to gain his affection encapsulates this quite well. Having received no unconditional love since her father’s disappearance, this is the way of thinking which governs almost all of the decisions she makes. For this reason, she’s perplexed as to why Yuzu bothers to do all these unconditional favors. The answer to this is simple: Yuzu cares about Mei. Unconditional love is a foreign concept to Mei, and this trait continues to subconsciously affect her even long after she has experienced the true virtues of a genuine human relationship. (*cue the beginning of episode 10*)
The psychology of Mei is one of the main things which the story lives through, and is one of Citrus' most fascinating aspects. As frustrating as her actions can be at times, the consistency of her character and the relatability of her plight makes her highly sympathetic, and as such Yuzu’s efforts to make things right for her, however reckless and brash, are very admirable. When you consider everything I've previously stated, it turns out that Mei has every reason to act and behave the way she does. Her attitude and behavior are both realistic and morbidly consistent when acknowledging this perpetual turmoil she lives through.
Mei’s problematic, manipulative behavior is not only addressed as such, but is also a conflict in itself. Discomforting scenes that people insist to be mere sleaze and titillation always leaves a negative effect on characters involved. Mei’s first assault turned Yuzu’s pending lust for and curiosity of Mei into a maelstrom of confusion and hysteria. Repetition of these acts behind the scenes gave us Mei Aihara as we know her. A certain character who does this to another results in the victim avoiding that character extensively.
The way Mei gradually becomes more open to Yuzu about her feelings and personal issues, is a cathartic and satisfying affair in and of itself, and it’s kept at natural pace throughout. Not only this, her behavior changes for the better the longer she spends time with Yuzu. Little by little she displays improvement and development as she makes decisions of her own, acting beyond her mental protocol. It’s rather easy to see why Yuzu is in love with Mei, besides her beauty and status. Hiding behind this cold exterior is a frightened and lonely young girl that Yuzu wishes to nurture and protect.
What’s truly commendable, however, is how many instances of her development are deliberately presented for us to infer on our own, rather than being told directly and explicitly. Here’s one particular example of this:
**SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 7 AND 8 BEGIN HERE**
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The moment Mei truly develops romantic feelings for Yuzu is at the end of episode 6, and the exact moment she realizes these feelings is episode 7 when Matsuri forcibly kisses Yuzu out in the open. This is all indicated through her sudden change in behavior compared to before. She is now less grim in her expressions around Yuzu, and looks slightly more sentimental. Her actions convey this even further, such as the way she compliments Yuzu for the meal that was made. The day after that, Matsuri is shown to be envious of Mei continually deriving attention from Yuzu at the expense of Matsuri’s, causing her to shove off. This causes Mei to feel guilty, having created distance between Yuzu and one of her closest friends. This is where she first experiences the baggage that comes from being in love.
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**SPOILERS END HERE**
The reason this works in service to the narrative is so viewers are put into the perspective of Yuzu herself. She struggles to understand Mei, using signs in her behavior to understand what she feels. Mei is deliberately presented just as enigmatically as she is to everyone else.
With so much about Mei already covered, it’s only fair that the other heroine, Yuzu, is given the same treatment. Yuzu at the start has an idealistic view of the life that lies before her. She acts with unrelenting confidence in almost all occasions, expecting everything to go smoothly and perfectly in line with what she envisions. I think I speak for most people when I say that when we were young teenagers, our ways of thinking were hardly any different. We’ve had strong ambitions of our own, believing we could achieve them all without entirely knowing the reality of certain situations. Of course, like most teenagers, the decisions that Yuzu makes are not always wise. Quite rarely so, in fact. She often does things, with or without good intentions, unperturbed by any potential consequences they could raise. Her greeting with the chairman is a particularly good example of this. Having become a new addition to his family, she approaches him expecting to be welcomed with open arms. Instead she’s scolded for her meddlesome behavior and unruly fashion choices.
On the flipside, while she makes unwise decisions, Yuzu is not completely unintelligent. She shows a degree of rational thinking alongside her impulsive behavior, which is an important distinction from a character who is near hopeless in their stupidity. Yuzu eventually does mature past her idealism yet retains an optimistic outlook which drives her to do better in her more realistic pursuits. Yuzu is shown throughout the story to be a very capable individual thrusted into situations she’s unprepared for, often falling back to impulses or superficial goals. Despite this, she’s quick to bounce back and make things right through the best of her abilities, learning from past mistakes and focusing on what matters most in the long run.
One of Yuzu’s strongest and most prominent traits is how empathetic she is. While she’s often self-absorbed in her appearance and overall image, she’s quick to understand others and wants to be on good terms with those around her. She’s the type of friend who would listen to your problems, forgive you for whatever quarrel you had with her, and be willing to keep any reasonable promise you ask of her. Amidst a locale of people’s misdeeds and the oppressive dominion that is her school, Yuzu is someone who is incredibly easy to root for and would be an overall great person to hang out with. It’s easy to see why Harumin became friends with her so quickly, and also why Mei eventually fell for her.
While Yuzu is a highly good-hearted individual, to say she’s only ever kind and generous sells her personality woefully short. She can be irritable, snarky, jealous, and is overall more insecure than she lets on, using Harumin as an emotional crutch when she finds herself in a quandary. She often lets these emotions get the better of her, as teens typically do. The bubbly, boisterous personality of Yuzu, while oftentimes funny and endearing, can also come off as irksome and frustrating. Rather than being portrayed as an all-loving angel, Yuzu is a lovably flawed individual with a good heart and poor self-control. Compiling all these traits together results in one of the most compelling, lovable, sympathetic, and relatable main leads I’ve come across in all media.
As for her relationship with Mei, Yuzu is on a constant struggle to comprehend her feelings. She knows that something is amiss about Mei, invoking a feeling of concern. At other times, she wonders if what she does hurts Mei more than it helps. This confusion is a result of their inability to communicate with each other effectively and coherently, mimicking typical romance between teenagers more than people seem to realize. Yuzu doesn’t understand Mei, and by extension doesn’t know how to act around her. The two of them had been raised in completely different conditions, and thus operate and communicate differently from one another.
It’s obvious that Yuzu has an unfaltering love for Mei, but one obstacle she must overcome is resisting the urge to give in to her superficial desires, and pursuing what is realistically best for Mei in the long run. At one point her only choice is to put her love for Mei aside and to treat her as a sister. Although she does all these things selflessly she still has a degree of self-preservation, in stark contrast to Mei. What Citrus does well is distinguishing the superficial aspects of love from the emotional aspects. Crushes aren’t developed through logic, and our own real life experiences prove as much. What this series explores is the multitude of consequences that come with loving someone. In this case, it’s dealing with the complications of being in a love relationship with your step-sister.
Differentiating perceptions of love are what pervade a majority of the cast in Citrus. The students at Aihara Academy all knowingly grew up in an environment where sexual experimentation is a normality. Of course I can’t speak from experience, but to my knowledge this mimics reality in Japan. Referred to as Class S, it’s common for girls in school to have crushes on other female classmates, forming bonds with them. These bonds could be described as romantic, but the sexual aspect of the attraction is out of the equation entirely, assuming they’re straight. It’s telling that a Japanese audience would have a far better understanding of this kind of story, and the positive reception of Citrus in Japan compared to the west is evidence of this.
Harumin really emulates this concept more than the others. She is essentially a direct foil to Yuzu in how sexual relationships are perceived. For Harumin, particular actions between couples are a source of curiosity. By contrast, Yuzu thinks about what these actions mean for the relationship. The most obvious example is arguably when the two eavesdrop on Amamiya’s phone call. However, one other particular moment drives this home more than any other. Harumin discovers the yuri incest manga Yuzu was reading. Fascinated, she puts herself in a scissoring position with Yuzu. She’s so confident in her heterosexuality that doing this means nothing to her. Yuzu on the other hand recognizes this as an expression of love, and thus is highly discomforted by this scenario. This is largely presented as a comedy moment, but it does a lot to signify the differences in their characterization. It also benefits in a way from being depicted in such an over-the-top manner.
Harumin acts as a companion to Yuzu all the way through to the end, but in reality she isn’t able to truly understand what Yuzu is going through, regardless of how much she thinks she does. This is also the reason Yuzu decides to take on these tasks by herself, because she’s the only one who truly understands. We can also assume that she keeps it to herself in fear that Harumin wouldn’t accept her for being in such a taboo relationship. After all, this is why she keeps it a secret to Matsuri and anyone else outside the school campus.
Moving on from the characters, I bear no hesitation saying that the plot of Citrus is undoubtedly its weakest aspect. Although the events it strings together can catch viewers off-guard, maintaining a dash of unpredictability in the whole adventure, it all too often relies on contrivances. Coincidences in fictional stories aren’t inherently a bad thing. The coincidental reveal of Mei as Yuzu’s new sister is rather far-fetched, but it's tolerable enough to leave investment unimpeded. However, the numerous contrivances beyond this point become harder and harder to swallow as they come by. The way that some situations are arbitrarily resolved through circumstance, rather than on behalf of a character, doesn’t do the plot much favors either.
A widely-used, yet reasonable, complaint about Citrus is its continuous introduction of characters to move the plot along. The way I see it, this is at least as much a problem with the pacing than the actual inclusion of these characters. When these subplots are coupled with Yuzu and Mei’s progressing relationship, then focus becomes a problem here. Tone shifts are frequent and occasionally jarring as a result of having to constantly switch priorities. The interpersonal affairs between Yuzu and Mei are heartfelt and down to earth, whereas dramatic confrontations with outsiders are tense, frantic, and somewhat theatrical. When meaningful interaction between Yuzu and Mei is abruptly followed by these sideplots, that can challenge one’s ability to stay invested in either plot.
However, while pacing and tone is certainly an issue here, to say that these subplots serve no purpose is untrue. Each story arc in Citrus presents a barrier in Mei’s psyche which is resolved with every passing conclusion. Every resolve is satisfying in its own right as it brings Mei further out of her shell whilst bringing her and Yuzu closer together. It’s apparent that new characters are introduced to fill a certain role in these affairs, but the focus on Yuzu and Mei is unrelenting and the characters serve their purpose quite well. To start with, Himeko "Twindrills" Momokino at first appears to be quite the villain, but she actually shares traits with both Yuzu and Mei, and even has strikingly similar motivations. Like Yuzu, she has an unfaltering love for Mei, arguably in a “romantic friendship” sort of way as opposed to sexual attraction, and goes to great lengths to claim her affection. Like Mei, she is both dedicated to her job and remarkably strict with school regulations. Her intentions are what make her a rival to Yuzu, and then later bring them to a resolve. They wish the best for Mei, but are oblivious to her true feelings. Matsuri is a character acting as a parallel to Mei. Only instead of closing herself off, she seeks attention. In the worst ways. Her rebellious nature and sinister antics make her a worthy addition to the cast. It’s not done just for the sake of it though. It’s a situation where Mei sees her own self and is willing to make amends for someone Yuzu is close to.
The arc with the Tachibana sisters is considered by many to be the weakest arc in the series, and I am no exception. While it serves its purpose well and the payoff is rewarding, it isn’t put together nearly as well as the others. I think what it sets out to do doesn’t warrant new characters to be introduced into the middle of the whole dilemma where their intrusion can be seen as more frustrating than serviceable, especially when those characters lack depth. The situation between Mei and Yuzu at this point is already complicated as it is, so piling more characters on top of these complications is more of an annoyance than anything else. I think other less irritating methods would have served the function of this arc quite well without having to bring the sisters into the mix. It also doesn’t help that in this arc, conveniences pile up even more than in any other, even attempting to sidestep this with “fate” and “destiny.”
As I said before though, the payoff is largely worth it in the end. It’s not necessarily a case where the abundant problems in this arc can be forgotten, but rather forgiven. This arc is an unfortunate blemish on an otherwise great story overall.
The dialogue of Citrus is also worth commenting on. It’s no Shakespearean writing, but it feels natural and works in service to whatever is going on. The characters’ lines are filled with personality and subtext which makes conversations feel alive. Characters are also quick to point out irony in another’s lines, making the exchanges even more human. Certain moments in dialogue are quite significant and memorable for how expressive they are and how it piles emotion into the situation. The scene where Mei and Yuzu are on a bench on a cold winter day is a good example.
With all that said, I think it’s finally time to traverse into how Citrus fares in the audio/visual department. Regarding the visual front of the Citrus anime adaptation, it’s an overall solid effort, albeit with a moderate amount to be desired. Obviously it would be unreasonable to expect the level of quality in the manga’s art to be fully translated into a costly animated product, especially with a studio like Passione. To compensate for this, the adaptation uses character models that are simplified versions of the exquisitely drawn renditions in the manga, and does so successfully. These character models would’ve been a satisfactory page-to-screen translation if not for one caveat: one of the main things which I believe gave the manga so much of its charm and made it so appealing to many, was how expressive the characters are. Characters, especially Yuzu, would regularly emote and make different facial expressions for many situations. This also happens to the anime to some degree, but not frequently enough to where it captures the manga’s original charm. It’s much rarer in the anime for characters to deviate from their default expressions, making the experience somewhat more sterile. Perhaps this was to cut down on budget costs, or it was a design choice on behalf of the director. Whatever the case, it’s a compromise which I can only feel detracts from the viewing experience. Manga and anime are different mediums, so of course compromises should be expected. But various scenes only stood to lose by omitting so much of the vibrance the characters displayed. Even the many chibi moments in the manga wouldn’t need to be adapted, as simply varying the facial expressions of the characters would be enough. Anime-only viewers probably won’t see this as a huge problem, as it’s rarely a sheer detriment to the visuals (save for a few lamentable instances). Scenes between characters are delivered well and there is plenty of emotion to be found in the visuals. The problem is that the adaptation, by not harnessing the kind of quality seen in the manga, wastes its potential as an adaptation and as an animated product. As it stands, it could be a hell of a lot worse, but it also could have been a lot better.
Additionally, the animation quality is a department that ranges between average to well above average. There are various moments where I was very impressed by the animation, such as certain comedy moments, intimate scenes, emotional engagements, and characters’ body language. But there are also a select few times where I was dumbfounded by just how low the quality could really get. Overall it’s a pretty decently animated show with some flukes here and there, and thankfully it can only improve with the BDs. One of the fronts I was most impressed by in this adaption was the soundtrack. It genuinely surprised me with how good the music was in this adaptation. Using a mixture of graceful orchestral performances with vivacious electronic beats, the music of Citrus is vibrant, diverse, and well-suited for the exuberant and bittersweet tones that the story delivers.
What’s lacking most of all in the visuals is the background art, a case where access to technology seems to have expended a team’s creativity. Several shots will display setpieces with little to no detail or texturing. Perfect cuboids and stainless steel populate much of this world. This is most prevalent in Yuzu’s own house, with walls that are solid colors and doors looking less like wood and more like metal. The school grounds also display a disgustingly high amount of textureless objects, falling short of selling this environment as something that could exist in the real world. This is not even mentioning the many issues with lighting, of which environments are either evenly lit or disregard physics altogether. One shot in particular takes place under a night sky with a lamp post in the left, yet with shadows directly underneath every object. What’s frustrating is that this shot looks great in about every other aspect, from coloring to composition, and falls short of perfection thanks to the team not willing to amend such a simple yet glaring issue.
This also extends to background characters, which often consist of CG models walking awkwardly and robotically. Once this is noticed, it’s impossible to ignore, and immersion struggles to stay in tact. All of this is the mark of a bare minimum effort on the part of Passione, and fans of the source material aren’t nearly as scrutinous of this as they damn well should be. Incompetent decisions like these are one of the main reasons we as anime fans are so desperate for ideal adaptations of the manga and novels we dearly love.
Fortunately, the shoddy effort in the backgrounds is alleviated through great shot composition and luscious color directing, for which we have director Takeo Takahashi to thank. This is a director who excels at visual storytelling and framing, emphasizing certain moods when applicable. Climactic scenes are sold effectively through this as well as character animations which, as previously stated, are well-done when they really need to be. This adaptation of Citrus is overall very well-directed, save for the aforementioned faults in production which Takeo should have been more mindful of. In an ideal world, the production of Citrus would be on par with Hanasaku Iroha, a show that I hold as a high standard for animated melodrama. The end result here is not without its faults, but is a satisfactory effort all things considered.
So that concludes my review of Citrus. The story at large is quite rough around the edges with its frequent use of coincidences. It’s also arguably flawed in how many things are framed as a formulaic routine. With a new girl continually intruding on the situation, it’s admittedly easy to feel some degree of frustration. The core story however, with the two main leads, remains very strong. Various facets of their character are explored well and brought to a satisfying resolve. That said, there are many loose ends in the story yet to be tied up, in which case I can only hope a second season will be made eventually to adapt the rest of the source material to complement the anime-viewing experience. All things considered, however, Citrus is a great anime overall. One of the things which motivated me to write this review was to address the criticisms this show had been receiving. If you have already seen this anime, and anything I’ve said gave you something to think about, then perhaps it deserves a second viewing. For a show so widely shunned as being a lesbian fanservice show, the story of Citrus is one that anyone, gay or straight, male or female, can relate to on any level.
ZephSilver
Tinseltown has been coming under fire as of late. Celebrities' misdeeds are being exposed publicly on a weekly basis like a new sporting event. The #MeToo movement giving a platform to voice sex scandals that have gone unnoticed for far too long. Scrolling through your timeline, plastered on the TV screen, announced over the radio during daily commutes, the subject matter of countless memes, the focal point of water-cooler conversations; no matter where you turn, there it is. Accusation after accusation. Transforming popular figures into pervert pariahs overnight. Harvey Weinstein, Kevin Spacey, Bill Cosby, Louis C.K., Dustin Hoffman, Brett Ratner, James Woods, Bryan Singer, CaseyAffleck; an endless potpourri of bigwigs—the 21st Century witch hunt in full swing. No one is safe.
And while all of this is going on, halfway across the globe, there's Citrus, minding its own business as it idly trolls along turning sexual assault into a provocative byproduct of step-sisters "bickering." While people are pooling together with torches and pitchforks in hand, shining a light on any sexual misconduct occurring in the dark recesses of the entertainment industry, Studio Passione persists with the biggest "whatever bro" shoulder shrug. What the rest of the world concerns itself with isn't going to stop them from showing girls casually molesting each other on their scheduled programming. It's actually pretty impressive. Fucked up, but impressive nonetheless. I guess you could extend that sentiment to Japan in general. Creating "fucked up shit" in a carefree manner has become something like their calling card:
Has mass shootings and domestic terrorism been a hot-button issue? Well here, have some Inuyashiki. Concerned with gender politics? Don't worry, we got you covered with Skirt no Naka wa Kedamono Deshita. "If you want it, we got it." seems to be the motto, as they peddle anything and everything in the endless pursuit of creative freedom. Which brings us to the latest foray into the "fucked up shit" unofficial canon, Citrus.
From the land that gave us distinct high-school dramas like Orange, we're handed Citrus, the undesirable fruit.
The anime tells the tale of– oh, who are we kidding? It's about sexy-time with female characters. It's all lip service unless it "services the lips" of the females involved.
It's pretty average-looking too, the ugly kind of average-looking.
Hoards of CGI models in green linen jackets. Flat buildings without detail, walls bare of personality. Real-life-inspired locations washed of any distinct features. Stainless steel structures, straight shapes stretching on endlessly without purpose, without care. Floorboards and walkways copied and pasted into an endless loop of lethargic worldbuilding. A kind of artificial sheen to everything. Devoid of human touch, the undeniable look of computer-generated polish. Clinically sterile and evenly lit. The feeling of being done to the bare minimum. Uninspired. Uncaring. Unconcerned with anything unless it's "sexy-time," and even then, it's barely a passing grade.
Everyone has dark hair and moves forward in a unified step as if puppets to their boring world. A lifeless march towards an all-girl school, a place where our Yuzu would be attending. Yuzu Aihara is the rowdy rebel, our ball of "life" in a world lacking it, and unfortunately our main lead as well. The unlikable side character in any other show given a chance to take center stage to problematic results. Makeup caked on, strawberry blonde hair puffed up, cleavage out in the sun, skirt hacked up, buttermilk tan, all manner of frilly things, school outfit altered beyond recognition, a personality as loud as her appearance; a self-proclaimed gyaru and a shameless attention-seeker at that—this is "much deep" cuz spunky gurl in a world of conformists.
And standing as her polar opposite, there's Mei Aihara, a soon-to-be molester dressed up as a Mary Sue. She suffers heavily from PerfectGirl-syndrome: honor-role pupil, top of her class, student council president, poised, admired by everyone, the chairman's granddaughter, built like a walkway model, good at literally everything she does. She probably farts out Chanel No. 5 too. You get the drill, she's as interesting as wallpaper. Perfect to a sickening degree. Well, that's all before she decided to turn her new step-sister, Ms. Rowdy Rebel, into her personal play-thing.
And who better to bring this together than Takeo Takahashi, a man that's equally known for his hentai contributions as he is his "safe for work" content.
Citrus certainly has that kind of attribute to it. That sort of sleazy undercurrent that flows throughout every moment, well-intention or otherwise. Camera-panning that ogles the female form without concern for respecting boundaries. Narrative threads meant to help audiences relate to the cast quickly expedited to get to the next sexual encounter. Endless monologues for every characters' dilemma—subtlety isn't allowed in this universe. A sense of objectification, even if it's in regards to actions expressed with consent. Nothing is ever pure. Everything smeared with the fingerprints of hedonistic high-gloss.
Even smut like 2017's Scum's Wish, at the very least, had small spurts of respect displayed for its cast, occasionally loosening its vice grip to allow a chance to express feelings openly. By comparison, everything in Citrus feels bought off. An act of slave-like procurement over the characters' bodies that's too readily apparent to ignore. Awkward half-chubs spurred on by involuntary stimuli. In a meta-sense, we're also made victims of visual misconduct (go figure). It's the kind of eroticism that arrives quickly and leaves you feeling dirty.
An anime that will have a heated shower scene where non-consensual groping occurs, then follow it up with this dialogue exchange:
"No!"–Yuzu pushes away in abject horror– "Why are you doing this!?"–her eyes closed, as she stands there naked and vulnerable.
Mei innocently answers back without hesitation, a tone of motherly matter-of-factness:
"Because you looked like you wanted me to touch you."
The scene ends, never to properly address the disturbing exchange again.
As long as the money shot was secured and a few man-tents were pitched, nothing else matters.
This is the kind of "feeling dirty" I'm referring to.
I love perverted content as much as the next guy, but sometimes, what Citrus attempts to do is genuinely off-putting. Sexual harassment shouldn't be confused with love. And if it is, a level of accountability needs to be put in place to avoid idealistic handwaving. But this is a show that thinks that if it holds a "this is wrong" PSA after it indulges in sexual misconduct, that it's suddenly not culpable of wrongdoing. An anime that sells Stockholm syndrome as a shot of Cupid's arrow. Where fighting sexual harassment with sexual harassment is treated as an actual solution. Serious issues trivialized to create marketable eroticism and comedic gags.
Any act of earnestness is completely lost in a title devoid of finesse. After a while, you sort of just roll with it. Jokes at the expense of serious issues. Illogical reasoning made by characters to justify their actions. You might even buy into the lack of audiovisual effort as a part of the "theme" to contrast everything against Yuzu's personality. Of course, you'll be wrong, as even her living quarters and look has been rendered flaccid, lacking in any sense of creative vitality or noticeable effort. It's all very surface-level. Pedestrian sleaze that isn't arousing enough to keep the Kleenex nearby nor respectful enough to genuinely stimulate discussions regarding the content on display.
And that's perhaps this show's biggest downfall in a nutshell: it's vanilla, but a souring type of vanilla.
A type of middling existence occupied by works of far more distinction than itself. If you're interested in the taboo themes that this anime addresses, there's no need to compromise with inferior goods to get your fix. There are better alternatives out there for those actually seeking integrity (Koi Kaze) or far more titillating eye-candy (Scum's Wish). Why settle for vanilla in a world full of flavor just waiting to be discovered? Is Citrus entertaining? Sure, at times. But when 17-minutes of content is glazed over just for 3-minutes of "sexy-time," and the "sexy-time" itself is neither well-animated or concerned with addressing the elephant in the room that surrounds its content; at that point, what you're left with is a show whose sole purpose for existing is left dead in the water from the moment it dives in.
Pipe
Some spectators consider themselves sophisticated, modern and avant-garde. However, when they become aware of some social taboos, they change their mind and create a disapproval towards some topics. One example, the lesbian romance. Citrus has potential but fails with some distasteful scenes as described below. The Ugly: The story mistake love with rape and forces affection from a lame sexual assault. In this world, Weinstein’s behavior would be considered romantic and not the act of a sick predator. The Good: As the plot progress you can observe the protagonists’ insecurity, problems, and feelings. The Bad: Unrealistic begin. Some characters are not well developed because the timeis not enough to let them grow.
Citrus introduces a homosexual storyline where we can see a lesbian nexus, yet you don’t need to fear it. No matter your gender, you can enjoy some parts of the narrative. The plot isn’t as bad as some writers want us to believe, but it’s not surprising either. Besides, the series begins with some weird and awkward moments that sink the possibility of a good romance, and I consider them fictional and unrealistic. On the other hand, Citrus emphasize the inexperience and the doubts in a relationship and tries to establish a link between the protagonists. In some scenes, you can sense the character’s feelings. Sadly, in this modern era the taboo persists, perhaps for a woman, it is easier to tolerate this type of bond. Finally, Citrus is a Yuri anime, if you cannot bear this kind of affinity, it is better to stand aside and ignore the adaptation, or you might end up disappointed.
The story
The story isn’t as marvelous as you can expect, the author sometimes mistakes rape with love, though. Also, the only way explored to conceive the romance is through the physical force. For example, it is ridiculous comparing intimacy with a sexual assault under the diplomatic motto “since I love you, I can obligate you to adore me.” In a real world, this concept will be judged as rude and out of place, it will generate repulsion, a restriction order and could end with a visit to the jail. Those actions could lead the spectator to misinterpret the characters’ feelings and leaves the personal problems, fears, doubts, the lack of experience, and psychological aspects in the missing objects box. In the case of Yuzu, she does not know how to approach Mei, so the storyteller merely throws her over Mei literally, and the latter doesn’t hesitate to assault Yuzu. Can you accept it as a romance? Furthermore, this keeps happening during all the adaptation. If you read the manga, those scenes aren’t intrusive, you can pass them faster but in the anime the director focus and prolong them. Call it fanservice, hentai or sexual harassment; it does not fit the feeling setting momentum.
In addition, this erroneous idea creates a false meaning of a lesbian link. From my perspective, a lesbian is like a straight; the relationship rules are alike. Why does the author use a weird and a wrong approach to initiate the attraction? Thus far, the plot fails on producing a good start for the romantic connection, it just leads the characters to a forced rape, deceiving the spectators with a cheap and fake drama.
Nevertheless, the narration improves as it advances. I am not considering Citrus as a masterpiece, but the progression is acceptable. As the series continues, we can observe the inexperience of a usual acquaintance, the doubts, the pain, the suffering of the protagonists delivering the audience a better development and a different perspective. While the story picks up, it still has some defects such as the recurrent fanservice. If the social taboos do not slant the viewer, you could enjoy Citrus, though.
Unfortunately, the lack of sense at the beginning ruins the possibility of a more vibrant narrative, a palpable romance and leads to the audience’s boredom. Going further, you can notice some pacing problems. You need to be honest with yourself because some characters were just placed to fill a scene. The casual spectator will only watch the first episodes and decide if skipping the show. Since the issues appear from the start, Citrus will be readily considered a bit grotesque, a raw passion and a potential drop.
Finally, the overused sexual assault as a “comedy” (for some) or as a “romance” change the plot and the enjoyment. If you can survive those scenes, you can see the character’s authentic feelings. Honestly, I like Citrus manga, but the anime has been highly criticized by some unpleasant development that leads to a different meaning. In conclusion, you cannot compare intimacy with ravishment, and you cannot exploit the sexual assault to propel a romantic or comedic moment. For some viewers that scenes show affection, for others is a rape. In my case, SOME are sexual abuse and unnecessary. Lastly, the twelve episodes present a portion of the story and not all the published material and the most significant parts of the series still on the source.
The characters
Yuzu. In the beginning, she displays some atypical feelings for Mei. Since she has no experience in love or relationships, she could fool the viewers with her naivety, show an emptiness and a similarity with a mundane generic girl. However, as the story progresses, we can see her emotions, problems and real doubts.
Mei. Some can judge her as a cold and expressionless robot. Since she is the school president, she might look strong. Nevertheless, inside she is baffled and seeks to follow her dad’s steps. She will give up everything to keep alive her family legacy and traditions. Also, she cannot communicate her emotions and has vast inexperience in the relationship area. Thus, always leads her to mistake love with sexual assault or perhaps she just enjoys doing that.
Matsuri. I consider her introduction misplaced. From nowhere she arrives and creates some problems just because Mei needs an opponent. Her feelings for Yuzu are vaguely explained.
Sara: Added in a similar way to Matsuri but her nature is the opposite. She is Yuzu’s rival, and her sentiments appear almost instantly.
The rest of the characters help the narrative progression such as Harumi and Himeko.
The art and sound
Technically speaking, Citrus has a beautiful animation, clean and fluid with excellent drawings catching your attention. Despite the plot issues, you will enjoy it. The camera angles and planes blend well with the narrative and the emotions; they focus on the details. One negative aspect, the unnecessary fanservice scenes. You could misinterpret them and will sink the real story.
The series has good sound. They give us a remarkable OP and ED. Honestly, I like the OP, the tune and rhythm combined with the lyrics create a fabulous composition.
Enjoyment
Citrus isn’t an anime for all tastes. The social taboo may make the observer indispose from the beginning. However, after some episodes, the story improves, and you can feel some character’s emotions. I like some aspects of the plot. It isn’t perfect and has a weird unrealistic start letting you with a big question mark, “is it going to be worth my time?” Thus, in combination with the “sexual assault” scenes could lead your apathetic side and make you drop the series. Finally, the manga is superior. It shows a significant evolution with better pacing. I understand, sometimes most of the spectators avoid this genre, but if you reached this point of my review, perhaps you could watch the anime and read the source to feel Yuzu’s emotions in a more desirable approach. I wanted to give Citrus a high score my conviction prevents me. I cannot accept the constant use of a sexual assault as a romantic or comedic filler that impacts the plot negatively. As I said, Citrus isn’t for all the tastes.
Lastly and talking in general, you need to be broad-minded and don’t bury a show just for a sexual preference. You can criticize but don’t stigmatize the lesbian topic. If you dislike the story, skip it.
Stark700
If I got a dollar every time this show featured a kiss scene, I’d probably be filthy rich now. No, not really but you have to admit, there’s almost an absurd amount of kissing in this show known as “Citrus”. To me, this show is a modern example of a trashy soap opera made with the intention of cash grab. Adapted by the manga of the same name, Citrus is one of the few series in recent years that decided to take on the idea of lesbianism and turn it into a modern day drama. In anime form, it’s defined more as yuri/shoujo-ai. As someonewho has read parts of the manga, Citrus focuses on the concept of female relationships. Unfortunately, I can’t really express any hope after reading the manga. This anime adaptation set off red flags from the start and isn’t able to fix them. It’s a shame really.
Diving into this show may feel a little uncomfortable at first if you’re not used to this type of genre. The first few episodes makes it clear that there’s more going on between main characters Yuzu and Mei. Although they don’t have similar personalities, it’s shown that Yuzu feels an uneasy attraction towards Mei after getting into some compromising positions with her. Throughout the show, the both of them engage in many activities that adheres to lesbianism. The anime doesn’t hide the fact that there’s seems to be mutual attraction as each episode ventures on. Other characters gets involved in their story but the main focus is on this pair. And to be honest, it feels pretty embarrassing to watch. The show tries to be a love story but instead filled with laughably bad dialogue and clichés. I also can’t remember the number of times I shook my head at how their relationship developed. That’s actually what holds the show back a lot. Relationship dynamics in Citrus dances with an immense amount of teenage feelings and attempts to make it seem complicated. However, it ends up being washed up with little value and doesn’t seem to know what to make of its characters.
Individually, Yuzu and Mei aren’t actually bad characters. At least from a realistic point of view, Yuzu is a normal girl who wants to explore romance and grow up. She’s also a bit of a daredevil and isn’t afraid to speak her mind or help others when in need. On the other hand, there’s Mei with a personality as cold as the snow. My impression of Mei is someone who would be incredibly difficult to be friends with. Her values are high standard and she never seems to let people get close to her, with perhaps the exception of Yuzu. We also get some background story about the two characters in later episodes to make viewers understand them more. However, that’s pretty much the extent of it. Yuzu and Mei are basically carrying this show while other characters are hardly worth talking about. I mean, there’s Yuzu’s best friend Himeko but she gets annoying every time her mouth opens. Harumi Taniguchi’s borderline obsession with Mei is incredibly obnoxious to watch. Oh and who can forget about Matsuri? It seems the show tries to make the audience hate her as much as possible. The Tachibana sisters introduced in later episodes are hardly likable either with their oddball personalities. The point is, most of these characters are one dimensional and hardly develops. In fact, I would say the characterization in this show really shoots itself in the foot with how certain episodes conclude. And that’s too bad really.
Besides the characters and story, it seems Citrus loves to service the fans. While it’s not as explicit as some scenes in the manga, there’s quite a bit of kissing in the show. If you fancy make out scenes and yuri fan service, then this might be the type of show for you. I’m not going to lie though, it can be a bit of guilty pleasure at times. However, it gets tedious fast and after you’ve seen it a dozen times, it almost feels senseless. That being said, Citrus does do what it’s intended to do: bring out teenage feelings from characters and making a trite soap opera out of it.
If there’s one thing to smile upon Citrus, it would definitely be the visual quality. To put it simply, the show is vibrant, colorful, and is full of life. The character designs are attractive and really enhances the feminine charms of the cast such as Yuzu and the Tachibana sisters. The way characters expresses their emotions is also highlighted through the choreography that’s hard to ignore. In many ways, the technical quality of Citrus is a sight for eyes to feast on. Whether it’s the fan service or characters themselves, it’s definitely there to impress.
There’s not too much to go on about soundtrack as both theme songs gets its point across with the teenage drama style performance. However, the character voice mannerism is what makes some of the characters feel consistent with their roles. Yuzu is the most prominent example as she often speaks her mind and has a voice to match with her personality. Mei has a much colder voice tone that reflects her reserved persona. However, there’s also other characters that I can hardly stand whenever they speak. In particular, Matsuri’s voice sounds like she’s a 12 year old. Get ready for the ear plugs…
By the time I finished Citrus, I had to question myself why the anime is even called that. The literal definition of Citrus is a type of fruit that has somewhat of a sweet and bitter flavor. Does that stand as a personification of the show’s themes? Who knows but I honestly find this show more than just bittersweet. What could have been a chance to make monumental history turned into a sour experience.
Shingster
Please note this review is intended for those that have already finished watching Citrus and while care has been taken to minimise story related spoilers there may still be spoilers within character analysis. You have been warned. When sisters meet unexpected sparks fly and an unlikely romance blossoms Based off a popular manga series of the same name Citrus is a Shoujo and romance anime that takes place within a school setting and gives us the opportunity to see what will happen if you not only find yourself welcoming in a stepsister into your family from your mothers new marriage but also the actions thatcan happen if you were to fall in love with the stepsister that you just welcomed into your family. While Shoujo animes aren’t usually a genre that I'm really interested in when looking at the premise as well as the background source material that it makes use of I felt that the series itself certainly sounded interesting. Interesting enough in that I decided to give the series a chance. The first episode of the series I felt did a great job of introducing both the setting of the series which is the school and of the two main characters Yuzu and Mei. In particular, I felt that the sense of rivalry that developed between them from that moment was interesting considering how later events would play out. Looking back, I'm glad that I decided to give this series a chance as the series was one that I really enjoyed.
The overall story of the series takes place at a famous and popular all-girls school situated in Tokyo that is well known for is strictness and conservative nature and follows the life of Yuzu Aihara a newly transferred student that moved to the city to join her recently remarried mother. As Yuzu, a fashionable and fun-loving girl transfers to the school and encounters the conservative and strict nature of the school she encounters the schools beautiful but strict student council president Mei Aihara who whether through fate or destiny is also Yuzu’s new stepsister. While clashing with Mei both in school and at home Yuzu soon learns that attraction and hatred just like love and hate are two sides of the same coin. As Yuzu and Mei clash with each other they also start to learn more about each other and slowly but surely the two start to bond and get closer with each other and slowly cross the line that divides the sisters and become something more. While slowly bonding with her new stepsister Yuzu as she gets used to both the school and the city also meets and makes a number of new friends while also encountering ones from her past. These include the arrogant but understanding student council vice president Himeko, the cunning and deceptive Junior high school student Matsuri and the Tachibana sisters Sara and Nina who while having differing personalities also have a close and loving bond between them. The overall story of the series covers roughly the first four volumes of the source material.
Yuzu
Yuzu Aihara played by veteran seiyuu singer Ayana Taketatsu of Sao and Youkoso fame is one of the main characters of the series and is the main protagonist of the series. A bright, fashionable and fun-loving girl by nature Yuzu at the beginning of the series was a newly transferred student that had just moved to the area to live with her mother who had remarried. While carefree and positive Yuzu was also someone that had a lot of self-confidence but did not let that make her arrogant and instead was something of a free spirit being both positive and friendly to everyone that she meets. As a result of these traits Yuzu was someone that was able to make friends easily and in this, it can be seen that she’s someone that’s very loyal to her friends and would work hard to help them and support them when they need help while hating it when she is unable to help them. While relaxed and carefree by nature it can be seen that Yuzu is also someone that can get serious at times especially with regards to helping her friends with their problems a side of her that I felt was a great contrast to her relaxed nature and fitted well with the two sides concepts that the series makes use off. In line with Yuzu’s carefree and free spirit type personality Yuzu is also someone that is noted to hate being constrained by rules especially those that restrict in how she should dress. This stems mainly from the fact that Yuzu is someone that believes that it’s the right of high school girls to be able to dress and act the way that they want in order to take advantage of their youth and any rules that prevent that will only be a bad thing for them. In line with this aspect of her personality Yuzu while mostly being someone that prefers to not stand out is also someone that’s also bold enough to make her views on subjects that concern her known even if she was to face censure when doing so.
As the series goes on and as Yuzu gets to both know Mei better and encounter and befriend more characters in the school Yuzu’s personality gradually starts to change as she finds her life becoming more intertwined with that of Mei. At the beginning of the series Yuzu while carefree was also someone that was rather stubborn with her beliefs and often had arguments with people that had different views to her. As the series progresses this side of her personality gradually changes, and Yuzu begins to show more consideration to others while trying to rein in her more brash behaviour and try to think of the consequences of an action before doing them. This change is best shown in Yuzu’s willingness to admit her own mistakes and attempts to take responsibly for her actions and any effects that it had whether on the school or her friends. At the beginning of the series, Yuzu and Mei did not have the best of relationships or the best of first encounters and it can be said that their first feelings on meeting each other as sisters for the first time was hated and dislike rather than happiness and joy that would be the expected. Unlike Yuzu’s carefree and freethinking nature that values independence Mei’s personality, in the beginning, was the complete opposite being rule-bound, and strict which Yuzu applied to both Mei and her family. As the series goes on and they get to know each other more this feeling of antagonism gradually softens, and Yuzu starts seeing and treating Mei as family. As the series goes and Yuzu gets to see and understand the pain that exists within Mei she becomes somewhat determined to break through the shell of sadness that Mei has erected around herself fighting hard to get through to the real Mei that was behind it in a determined attempt to give her what she had craved the most in her life which was love and a place where she can belong too. As a result of this journey, the bond between the two gradually grows deeper as Mei slowly opens herself up to Yuzu’s determined attempts to help her and in the process creating a deeper relationship between the two that Yuzu never expected. The character of Yuzu I felt was an interesting one that was both well designed and developed as the series went on. Its been a while since I had seen Ayana Taketatsu in a lead role, but I felt that she did an excellent job of portraying the character of Yuzu.
Mei
Mei Aihara voiced by veteran seiyuu Minami Tsuda of Guilty Crown fame is one of the main characters of the series. The new stepsister to Yuzu Mei’s personality and attitude is markedly different from Yuzu in more ways than one. An attractive and intelligent girl by nature Mei is the very image of a cool beauty that deals with every situation with calm and logical solutions that hint at her level-headed nature. A quiet and composed girl Mei is someone that believes fervently that rules are the very pillars of society and that without it society would only be in chaos. This is a belief that Mei believes greatly and tries to inspire the students of her school in her capacity as student council president. While a quiet girl by nature Mei, however, is not unsociable and indeed while most people assume that she’s rather aloof the truth of the matter is that Mei can also be friendly to those that she has befriended and can be surprisingly understanding of others while being courteous and polite to those that she doesn’t yet know. From the beginning of the series, it can be seen that Mei is someone that’s very hardworking and takes her duty as student council president seriously. Indeed, she is the type of person that would try to do everything by herself and be unwilling to bother others with it even if it was their role to help in the first place which shows her dutiful and determined nature. To many of the students that she manages Mei is someone that is cool, level-headed and efficient that makes it hard for them to approach however the reality of this is that Mei while certainly cool and efficient is also someone that remembers those that have helped her in some way a side of her that I really liked.
As the series goes on and more of Mei’s personality is revealed beneath the calm and composed attitude that she projects to her fellow students Mei is, in fact, someone that lives in constant pain and isolation and is someone that doesn’t trust others easily. Rather it can be seen that Mei is someone that tries to push those that try to know her away. As a result of having lived alone for much of her life in the beginning of the series it can be seen that Mei like Yuzu needed time to get used to the fact that they now had a much larger family than before and while the relationship between Mei and Yuzu and her mother was somewhat distant at first this gradually changed as the series went on in line with the deepening bond that is forged between them. While hinted on in the beginning as the series progressed it become apparent that Mei’s relationship with her family was rather strained and while she feels indebted to her grandfather who had raised her this also acted as a constraint for her life as well as it limited the freedom that she could have within her life. However arguably the main issue that had caused Mei’s heart to be constrained was, without doubt, the strained relationship that she had with her father which caused her to work fiercely to protect the school even to the point of causing her life to become nothing more than a set of performances. After making peace with her father and fixing this Mei’s attitude gradually began to soften and she begins to break out of her shell and not just be more open with her feelings but also learn to place her trust in others more. At the beginning of the series, Mei’s relationship with Yuzu was that of wariness which was somewhat understandable and kept her distance from her. But as the series progressed on and she gets to see and understand Yuzu’s personality a bit more this began to change. After overcoming many challenges together Mei’s attitude towards Yuzu begins to change becoming more positive and open-minded and less formal in her dealings with Yuzu showing the improving bond between them. While still retaining some of her aloof nature Mei’s personality gradually begins to thaw and begins showing her more honest and warmer feelings towards Yuzu openly unlike before. The character of Mei was an interesting one as her personality while contrasting greatly with that of Yuzu was the result of problems that was caused by family-related issues that ended up constraining her life which I felt was appropriate as it matched well with the theme of family and bonding by breaking through the wall that someone has erected to protect and hide them. I felt that her seiyuu Minami Tsuda did an excellent job in portraying the character of Mei.
Matsuri
Matsuri Mizusawa voiced by veteran seiyuu Shiori Izawa of Asterisk wars fame is one of the main support characters of the series and is an old friend of Yuzu. A 2nd-year junior high school student Matsuri at the beginning of the series behaved somewhat like an old friend to Yuzu being overly attached to her while still maintaining an innocent charm that was unique to her. On the surface, Matsuri was a kind, caring and polite person that seemed to value friendships and bonds.
As the series goes on and more of Matsuri’s personality is revealed it can be seen that beneath this surface Matsuri’s personality is very different. Beneath her surface personality, it can be seen that Matsuri is someone that is cunning, manipulative, and deceitful and will use every available means to get ahead of others as long as victory is hers. In addition, Matsuri has also shown to be rather possessive of things that are considered dear to her such as her role as Yuzu’s little sister. At the beginning of the series, Matsuri was shown to have a rather warped view of what friendships and indeed what a relationship is as she took neither of them seriously and viewed them as something akin to a game. In this, she treated both as something that she can take advantage off to allow her to survive in society while at the same time pushing away things like love and warmth that is a result of the relationships that can form between friends. In a way, Matsuri’s personality, in the beginning, was very much like what Mei had been experiencing at the beginning of the series. As the series progresses and Matsuri see’s the depth of the relationship that exists between Yuzu and Mei and after seeing the truth of what she was missing Matsuri’s personality gradually starts to change becoming friendlier and more open with her feelings while trying to understand what real friendship is by forming her first real friendships with others.
Himeko
Himeko Momokino voiced by veteran seiyuu Yurika Kobo of Youkoso and Seiren fame is one of the main support characters of the series. A member of an upper-class family on account of her impressive and elegant hairstyle and the shops that she frequents Himeko true to her status is a self-confident, determined and somewhat stubborn person by nature that serves as one of the school’s vice presidents and as a result assists Mei in her duties as student council president. A childhood of Mei Himeko is someone that while arrogant is also someone that believes in rules and order and would often pursue rule breakers with vengeance which is often used for comical effort within the series. While arrogant and confident in herself Himeko is also someone that cares deeply about her friends and can be quite perceptive when it comes to sensing when something is bothering them.
At the beginning of the series, Himeko had an antagonist like relationship with Yuzu as the latter seemed to enjoy breaking the very same rules that Himeko see’s as important to both the school and herself. As the series goes on and Himeko’s personality is gradually revealed it can be seen that Himeko’s feelings towards Mei go beyond that of what can be considered a simple friendship. In fact, it can be seen that Himeko has a lot of pride in serving as not just Mei’s vice president but also her oldest friend as well something she uses often when she and Yuzu face off. While Yuzu and Himeko remain rivals for Mei’s affections as the series goes on it can be seen that both share the same concern for Mei as each other and indeed when it comes to Mei’s well being it can be seen that both would drop their rivalry to help her when needed something that I felt was nicely done.
Nina
Nina Tachibana voiced by Rei Matsuzaki is one of the main support characters of the series and one of Yuzu’s friends that she encounters while on a school excursion to Kyoto. A high school girl from another area Nina is the younger among the Tachibana sisters and very different in attitude to her sister. A kind, caring and intelligent girl Nina unlike her sister has a rather laid-back personality and is the kind of person that will not worry needlessly about things that have already happened. True to her laid-back personality Nina is also someone that is really forgetful as well. Nina’s most prominent trait is without a doubt her tall physical height which I find to be pretty surprising for a high school girl. Despite Nina’s laid-back personality, it can be seen that Nina has a very deep bond with her sister and is very loyal to her to the point that she’s willing to act as the villain if it means that her sister is able to have happiness.
Sara
Sara Tachibana voiced by veteran seiyuu Hisako Kanemoto of Food Wars and Gate fame is one of the main support characters of the series and is one of Yuzu’s friends having met and befriended her when they met in Kyoto. A high school girl from another high school Sara is the elder of the Tachibana sisters. A cheerful, positive and considerate person by nature Sara is someone that unlike her sister Nina is someone that prefers to not waste time pondering on something and prefers to strike it out in one-go kinda like a boxer and as a result is also a bold, brave and determined person. While bold and daring Sara is also someone that’s perceptive of others feelings and is the kind of person that will let go of something if it would help others despite the pain that she will feel showing off her good nature. Because of this, however, Sara Is shown to have a dislike for people that give up too easily as she feels that if you don’t go all the way then all you did was take half steps that ended up creating nothing.
AMV
The animation for the series I felt was pretty well done with both the school and the uniforms for it being both well designed and detailed. The character designs for the series main characters I felt were also well done and were faithful to the source material to which I'm thankful. Music wise the series OST as well as the opening and ending themes I felt were excellent and did a great job at conveying the different emotions and feelings that each scene featured. Voice acting wise I felt that the main cast did an excellent job of portraying their respective characters. In particular, I felt that Ayana Taketatsu, Minami Tsuda, and Yurika Kubo did a fantastic job of portraying their respective characters.
Overall conclusion
Overall Citrus was an anime that I really enjoyed watching and I felt that its main strong points were its premise, story, characters, animation and voice acting and its unique use of romantic relationships to heal the hole that had formed within someone’s heart. The main premise of the show naturally is the encounter between Yuzu and Mei after Yuzu moves to the city and the subsequent escalating relationship that they forge between them. The decision to make an all-girls school as the series main setting I thought was an interesting move as though increasingly rare in this day and age single gender girls have the ability to create unique environments that can have the effect of both providing an effective place for students to learn and progress but at the same time trap them beneath layers of responsibility. One of the main themes that the story makes use off is that of the relationships that a family can have and the effect that this can have on members of that family. The decision to make use of the stepsister concept an idea unique to parents that have remarried I felt was a move well done as it not only gave the pretence for Yuzu to move to Tokyo to join her mother but also meet her new stepsister Mei as well. While Yuzu and Mei may not have had the best of first encounters watching the two of them try and come to terms with one another’s existence within their lives was interesting as until they met each other each had thought that they were alone within the family. This gradual process of getting used to being sisters contrasted well with the romantic aspect of the show. The romantic aspect of the show I felt also did a great job at making use of this theme of family as while developing feelings for each other Yuzu and Mei also in the process started to explore the many wishes, desires and restrictions and responsibilities that lay within them that stopped them from achieving the things that they desire. This exchange of feelings as with everything is two sides of the same coin and just as Mei is able to see the hesitation that lay within Yuzu she too is able to see the many problems that Mei hides within her heart problems caused by both a carefree father and an overbearing grandfather that when combined with the school almost suffocates Mei in responsibility and trapping her real feelings in a place where few can reach. The desire of Yuzu to both understand and open up Mei’s closed off heart and expose her true feelings I thought was a great use of the family theme as it provided the perfect key to open up Mei’s closed off heart and provide her with the very thing that she was missing in her life which was that of family warmth.
Overall Citrus was an interesting anime that made use of an interesting premise and a unique way of forging a romantic relationship that can be used to open someone’s closed off heart while simultaneously reminding us that while society can be a harsh place trying to take too much responsibility by yourself and not letting others see your true feelings can be a bad thing. Sometimes its worth it to maybe stop one day and have one long talk with someone that you trust and not hide them anymore. In terms of final score, I think Citrus certainly deserves a score of 10/10.
paskatiimi
Peak fiction, complete masterpiece, best thing I have seen in years. After getting through over 1000 episodes of mid piece filler I finally watched a real anime and im never going back. 12 episodes of pure action and drama. Gave me chills every minute. Characters are insanely well written and so is the story. I hope everyone gets to know the feeling of finally getting home to watch Citrus after 8 hours of physical work at car part factory. It made everything so worth it. k??? r????? omnia palmia pappa vessassa kuremiko mcdonalds 1337 s1lent dead canary san quentin the chair
DigiCat
This story would've worked exellently as a dark psychological drama, as a romance though, it is an abomination, and the relationship between the two leads will tell you exactly why Let's start with Mei Mei is an abuser, plain and simple, we can analyze why she becomes the way she is, and we will in a moment, but nothing excuses her appaling treatment of Yuzu Now why is Mei the way she is? The most likely catalyst is her being put in an abusive situation with her arranged engagement, on top of the already toxic family enviroment. Mei's abusive behaviour is driven by anger, anger towards her fiancé who'ss******* abusing her, anger towards her grandpa for putting her in that situation by arranging the engagement, anger towards her dad whom she feels abandoned by, all of which she projects onto Yuzu as she becomes everything she most loathed, this is what's called redirected aggression
Yuzu on the other hand is the classic empath
Always putting others needs above her own, even at her own expence, always trying to fix people, and always taking on all the blame whenever things go wrong. She has also previously been in a toxic platonic relationship, making her a that much easier target for falling into a toxic romantic relationship
One scene where Yuzu is wearing a backpack with the word "provide" written on it is very telling of her character, as she's always providing emotional support for others while never accepting it for herself
Everything written up there would've made for an extreamly riveting exploration of the human psyche, but it is in no way behaviour that should be romanticized, which is unfortunately the direction this series takes things
pomegranit
Not a lot can be said of this anime except that it was literally written to fetishize lesbian women. To begin with, the story is basically 100% trash. There's nothing really redeemable about it. It's about a girl who basically sexually assaults her step-sister. After a while, her step-sister thinks it's love. That's pretty much it. NOTHING ELSE HAPPENS. Even as someone who indulges in shoujo, I really hate the sexual assault tropes that they try to normalize. The art is the only part I have no complaint about. Everyone is gorgeous and the backgrounds are so well done that I wished I could justwatch it on mute half the time. Not to mention that all the characters' eyes were simply breathtaking.
The sound could have been better. The opening and closing theme were a little annoying and they just got on my nerves. The voices of the characters were alright.
Oh god, the characters. There is no development. Whatsoever. The characters are stagnant, fetishized stereotypes of lesbian women (or pan, as it seems in Sara's case) and there's nothing beyond that. After watching this, I feel uncomfortable knowing it probably served as something for people with a lesbian fetish to jerk off to and nothing else. There is no plot or characters pretty much-- this anime exists purely for those who looks for lesbian smut and nothing else.
I didn't enjoy this. I dreaded watching the episode every weekend as it came out. It was terrible. I watched a lot of airing anime this year (which I usually don't do) and this was always the worst part of my weekend, spent banging my head against a wall and going "why?". As one of those OCD people who has to finish all the shows I start, this was torture for me.
I would recommend this if you: like lesbian smut for the sake of having girlxgirl in it, like the classic sexual assault trope, like the pretty art
I would NOT recommend this if you: are big on consent, were looking for real romance, wanted real plot, wanted real characters/character development, hate fetishism of sexuality
I wish I had read an honest review about this before I started watching. Anyways, have a great day everyone!
Yangtze12
WARNING: THIS REVIEW CONTAIN SPOILERS Citrus is a Girls Love story where we learn about Yuzu and the development of her romance with Mei, at least this is what the premise tells us. Unfortunately, this show quickly lost all the attributes that could have made it different from others Girls Love stories. Let's analyze the main problems that this program presented: 1. Yuzu's development: During the first episode, we saw her enrolling to a new institute becuause of her mother's new engagement. The rules of this place were strict and very conservative and this constrasted with Yuzu's personality. To this point the story sounded cool beacuse therewas a lot of potential with how Yuzu can adapt to this new lifestyle in the institute and, of course, with the new members of her family. Well, this potential was thrown away in the same episode. Despite that she was warned about her current clothing, she continued going to the institute with the same clothes making a contradiction of the rules of the "strict" institute. We saw her being a carefree girl when she spoke about her priorities at her new institute. We saw, also, this attitude reflected with her interactions with her classmates and the student council director. Later, Mei was introduced and she decided to touch some parts of Yuzu's body and this characterization started to fade away. It is revealed to us, later, that Mei would be Yuzu's new stepsister, yes, fucking convenient and, after that, Mei decided kiss Yuzu and, from now on, Yuzu was rewritten as an one dimensional girl in love who only want to bed with Mei and a fan service source. Are you seriously going to tell me that by a kiss all of Yuzu's characterization was modified? Couldn't she ask herself, in the first instance, her doubts about his sexual inclination and, progressively, fall in love with Mei as in any real life romance, especially if it is this type of GL romance? No fucking idea. In adittion, the show clearly indicated that Yuzu was a straight girl seeing her bad reaction to knowing that she was going to an all-girls institute, so the fact that she fell in love with and obsessed with Mei for a simple kiss, without rethinking her sexual orientation for even a few minutes, makes things even worse.
2.Conflict avoidance: This show, I don't know why, tried to avoid any type of conflict that can have lead to a good character development and, instead, made worse the quality of the same. For example, Mei's grandfather was introduced as a character who strongly opposed a possible relationship between Yuzu and Mei during the second episode, however, minutes later in the same episode, he simply forgave her by lifting the penalty she had received and this conflict ended. The worst thing is that, after this, the grandfather had no relevance to the plot. This formula was repeated during the next episodes. A new random character was introduced in order to interfere with the relationship between Yuzu and Mei, the conflict was resolved in the way that suited the script best and Yuzu and Mei ended up without making any progress in their relationship, even, in many cases, it seemed that they ended up hating each other even more. Also, the random character introduced disappear from the scene permanently and the cycle repeats.
3. Mei: She's just a manipulative edge girl that tried to torture Yuzu because her dark past with the abandon of her father. This doesn't have any type of sense. To begin with, Yuzu is a person she has just met, there is no need to escape her anger and repression with her, did she not think of going to a psychologist for professional help? Mystery. Mei's family had a lot of money, so paying for a professional shouldn't have suppose a problem if you ask me. This show, also, gave us a terrible message about toxic relationships because while Mei treated Yuzu worse, the second, for some illogical and stupid reason unknown to me, falls more in love and gets more horny for her. It is not that the series tries to criticize or point out this type of relationship as something negative since it focuses more on the fanservice scenes and that the viewer inserts himself into the character of Mei in this case, telling us that while we treat the couple badly and we give him/her a simple kiss, he/she will fall in love and he/she will be much more faithful to us. Terrible.
Another aspect that I really disliked about her is the fact that Yuzu always apologize to her for... nothing, because most of the time the problems are Mei's fault by not doing anything for the relationship unless a third person was involved, so yes, she had no real interest in Yuzu. It's an one side romance that didn't go anywhere thanks to the inexistent character development from both sides to this point.
4. Ending?: After the first episode, the show limited to be an episodic one with the formula presented in the second point, trying to force the viewer to watch the manga to see if they are finally established as a couple in one point, aka, cliffhanger. The worst part is that none of them had any significant development, Yuzu kept making the same mistakes without learning from them (like dressing inappropriately at the institute), Mei was still an edgy girl who tried to justify her behavior with her past. So, it's very hard to find hope that the manga (in case you haven't seen), will be able to solve this basic flaws in the characterization.
CONCLUSION
It's a terrible anime that wasted all the potential that it had after the first episode focusing more in the fanservice and the cheap melodrama instead of make a proper character and romance development.
ShinyEevee133
I find it sad this Citrus is the most popular (not exactly in a good way) Girl love anime. It’s a terrible depiction of any sort of romance. Frankly I’m just disappointed the manga is just as bad if not worse. But as I’m on a goal to watch all the yuri anime (and this was my first stop) I must try my best to not turn this review into an angry rant. Romance 1/10 For people who want Yuri recommandations (or just a good romance recommendation) and are wondering if this is a good GL series, I can say with confidence that it is not.Pretty much all the romantic scenes are clear fetishization of a lesbian relationship (if you can even call it that) Sexual assault is treated as something that’s meant to be arousing and the relationship development between the two main characters is laughably bad. The one good point for the romance category is that there is actual physical intimacy (consensual or not) such as kissing and handholding and it’s well animated.
Story 4/10
In its 12 episodes, Citrus manages to fetishize every relationship going as far as to depict scenes that are clearly sexual assault as something that’s acceptable and even romantic/arousing. I don’t even want to start about the incest (which is one of the least offensive parts) It layers on so many coats of drama that it just becomes a hilariously terrible watch. The story does develop at an alright pace for all that that’s worth. Overall the story is nothing remarkable, it’s a bad slice of life when stripped to its core.
Characters 5/10
The main character Yuzu is your typical gyaru character who just wants to have a good high school life until she is basically sexually assaulted by the student council president Mei, later to revealed as Yuzu’s step sister. The two main characters have ok personalities, fleshed up well enough for them being thrown into such a plot. Their interactions (outside of the sexual ones) are realistic enough. The side characters are more there to add to the drama than anything else. If they’re not part of it they really aren’t that all memorable.
Animation/Sound/Voice Acting 6/10
The animation is arguably the best part of this anime (not really saying much though) not in terms of what they are animating but just in general. The sound design is very forgettable. The Voice acting was well done, props to the voice actors for actually wanting (and doing a good job) to voice in this shit show.
Enjoyment 3/10
If you want to watch a train crash in 12 episodes (with most of them being unimportant) go for it. If you’re looking for a good girls love series that covers LGBTQ+ topics well forget about this series and go watch bloom into you or something.
Tomm01p
Being a fan of yuri is hard, atleast when it comes to anime. The list of all yuri shows is very, very short, and most of them suck real bad. And so every new show that resolves around such themes always gets a lot of attention. With Citrus, the expectations were big. But sadly enough, it didn't fullfil many of them. For what made Citrus so interesting to begin with is that it's the first full-on yuri show without the element of moe in a long time. Now that's not saying that I don't like moe, actually it's the complete opposite, but seeing a show thattries to add a bit of drama and reality into it's greater themes really did lit up the fire of expectations, for both, the fanservice and the story. And the story, for the most part, is the main reason Citrus as an anime completely failed in what it tried to do.
It resolves around the relationship of new step-sisters, Yuzu and Mei, who don't get along very well at the start. It's just a matter of time before Yuzu, the more lively out of the two, gets kinda obsessed with her sister and after sharing their first kiss, falls in love with her. However, Mei has a lot more admireres than Yuzu thinks and that is soon to be revealed... While the story doesn't try to be very complicated, you can't but feel that not much thought had been put into it. It it completely shallow, without a clear original idea and even though the promised drama is kinda there, it is actually the thing pushing the whole anime down. The way story develops is also very questionable, as instead of focusing on it's main couple, the anime constantly brings-up weird and non-relevant characters that somehow manage to create a fuss between the girls.
Propably the best way to describe the character cast would be saying that they're just not very impressive. Starting with the better, Yuzu is not a terrible main lead. She has this outgoing and dumb personality which I was never a really big fan of, but since it's so common in RomComs I kinda got used to it at this point. There are not many positive things that I could mention about her but she's just the kind of girl that is hard to really hate. Unlike some of the other characters. For example the second main lead, Mei. Who is, by any means, a bad character as a whole. Her melancholic attitude, her bitchy assertiveness and even her forgettable design all forge a very uninteresting character whom I couldn't care less about. The way she makes the biggest poor soul out of herself while constantly mentioning her somehow depressing past, which is by the way not depressing at all, is also not a very good way of making such a shallow character look better.
While the supportive cast was supposed to have positive impact on the growing relationship of Yuzu and Mei, by throwing some dramatic moments into their faces, they didn't really deliver either. There is Himeko, who started off as the biggest and most annoying Tsundere ever while also being a student coucil vice pres which is great combination indeed (sarcasm). Then there is Matsuri, who is supposed to be one of those bitch-ass characters. The problem with her is that her bitchiness is on the complete wrong side of things. I mean, comparing her to Akane from Kuzu no Honkai for example, Matsuri losses that battle on every line. She, unlike Akane, uses pretty lame tactics to get attention, her reasons to do so are not really valid and overall she just acts like a total kid. I mean, she doesn't just act, she literally is a kid. There is hope tho, and that is Harumin. Thank god for once atleast a little likeable character that saved many episodes purely by showing her friendly and funny attitude. There are also those two twin sisters who appear towards the end of the show, but since their addition worked only as another reason for Mei and Yuzu to argue and then make-up, they were pretty much completely irrelevant.
I mentioned drama, right? Yes, I did. On the scale of forcing Drama, Citrus would propably rank somewhere around the likes of Kuzu no Honkai, which I mentioned already I know please don't kill me for it. Which in itself wouldn't be such a problem, if the drama was the show's only goal. The mentioned Kuzu no Honkai, for example, was undoubtedly a very over-dramatized show. However, because the drama (and sex, but these two were related) was the show's only intention from the start, it was able to take it's sweet time with it and actually make it good. Which is the main problem of Citrus. It doesn't take it's time with anything. The jumps between comedy, drama and kissing are way too damn fast and unlogical to the point where you'll never even take the dramatic moments seriously, because they were literally trying to make you laugh like half minute ago. The cycle of every episode is almost always the same too. Starts off lightly, then something occurs, then Mei gets mad, then Yuzu cries for whatever reason, then she saves the day and then they kiss. And it's like that for the majority of the show.
Another area in which Citrus does terribly at is building relationship, which is something RomComs should be all about. Seeing your favourite couple coming from a blushing duo to full-on lovers mode is an important development aspect to this kind of anime. Citrus however, does it all wrong. Instead of resolving the whole story around Yuzu and Mei and giving them the time to fully develop their relatioship by themselves, the show constantly introduces new random characters that create some love drama through which then tries to continue the story. Not only this kind of appoach won't work because the ones pushing the story are not those who should, it also takes away any kind of satisfaction the moment they actually end up together, because outside of some rare moments, they just haven't had any remarkable time to set-up this kind of ending.
Credit where credit is due tho. What I really liked for example are the personal changes of some characters. Himeko in particular. You see, she starts off as the biggest and loudest Tsundere ever, but as soon as she gets rejected, she redeems herself and becomes a fairly respectable character for the rest of the show. Which is a good change compared to other harem-like animes when even the characters who get harsly rejected never actually stop with their sexual intentions. I also already mentioned that Harumin was a very likeable character herself and I loved whenever she appreated on the screen.
The whole yuri fanservice also wasn't very bad. Once I started ignoring the complete unlogicalness of the kissing situations, I got to enjoy them quite a lot. Though it's needles to say that there is almost no way of fucking up this sort of thing. Two girls kissing each other will always be hot. I still feel like they could've pushed the whole fanservice a bit further tho, and it's also a shame that Harumin never got any.
The overall art was good, but not anything breathtaking. The scenes look polished and clean, but little is actually animated and almost every background is just a static image. I should also add that the character desings weren't very appealing to my eyes. They were either forgettable or just not very well looking. The fact that a lot of characters were using earrings, which is a thing I hate in and outside of anime, didn't help the whole art situation either. And the sound was.. okay, I guess? I don't really know. The voice-acting wasn't the worse but I can't even remember if the show had an OST, which means it had but it was just very shallow and beyond forgettable.
----
Citrus had a tough task coming into anime. There are tons of yuri fans, but only a handful of yuri anime. And having to adapt one of the more popular yuri manga didn't lower the expectations either. Even though however, Citrus as an anime fails at almost everything it tries to do. It's drama is not good, it's comedy is not funny and it's characters didn't hit the spot either. It still somehow manages to make the thing we all want, that being girls kissing each other, but that is just not enough.
So is the closure of Citrus, an anime that tried to bring drama into the world of only moe yuri, but failed miserably at it's quest along the way.
ELD_WITCH
I have never, in my life, felt this compelled to write a review about an anime. I was on board with citrus for the first 75% of the anime, I really was, before I realized why I'd had this weird tinge in the back of my brain that made me ultimately uncomfortable with the entire anime. It's not the stepcest, it's not the pushing each other around and pulling at each others clothes although it's still pathetic how yuri and sexual assault go hand in hand in anime. No, it was the fact that the main character, Aihara Yuzu, is the classic abusive relationship victim. She's notthe perfect protagonist, and she makes her mistakes, but she without a DOUBT, makes solid leaps and bounds early on in character progression. She sees her mistakes, she sees her faults, and she actively works on herself in an effort to appease and comfort Mei.
In turn, Mei rewards her by treating her like garbage at almost every step. What is once seen as being shy, or reserved, turns into full mental and verbal abuse towards Yuzu. Every time Mei seems to make some sort of character progression, she undermines herself by reverting back to being terrible towards Yuzu who is always, actively, trying to help create some sort of peace.
Even the near psychopathic side loli character ends up being more redeemable than Aihara Mei.
Yuzu does NOT know when to stop, and give up. In my opinion, that should've been very early on in the anime. It's almost uncomfortable to watch her be consumed almost obsessively by this love for Mei that Mei doesn't really shoot down. Yuzu is being led on and taken advantage of for a large portion of this anime.
I'd say watch this anime, if only you want to learn more about what abusive relationships look like so you can better see signs of it in your day to day life and try to help anyone suffering in an abusive relationship.
veritable
*spoilers, language* trigger warning: sexual assault, incest, and harmful stereotypes of lesbians Let’s talk about problematicism. This isn’t a word, but if it was, let’s go ahead and slap it on Citrus. That’s what this show is, problematic in every way but its core. Let’s slap dreadful and sickening on there as well. Citrus, at the surface, is a simple show that could go to many places narratively. We then meet the MC. Yuzu Aihara just stepped out of an 80s movie/ poorly written Episode story (props to you if you know what those are) and has entered a new, private all-girls school. Her mother wasrecently divorced and remarried to the son of the Chairmen of the School, whose daughter is the student council president. So we’ve got a typical start of a romance school anime, nothing out of the ordinary here.
However, not ten minutes in, after an OP that sounds like it has been pulled out of the bucket of standard anime OPs and riddled with incestuous hints at what’s to come (aren’t you just so excited?), is a scene where Yuzu, as she is arriving on the school campus, and in many violations of this school’s strict dress code, is explicitly touched sexually, without consent, mind you, by the student council president, whose name we later learn to be Mei. Mei’s hands are everywhere a stranger’s hands shouldn't be, and Yuzu has repeatedly said “stop, leave me alone”. That probably just took you off guard since, you know, her stepsister just sexually assaulted her. And she just walks away like it was nothing.
I wish I had counted how many times a character sexually assaulted another character in this show. I am positive I couldn’t count it, on one hand, let alone two. And it’s not just the occasional throw of the skirt or grope, it’s full-on, I’m ripping off your shirt and trying to kiss you while having an emotional break down by BOTH of the MCs, Yuzu and Mei alike. And this continuously happens throughout this excruciating series. None of the characters get any sort of punishment, chastisement, NOTHING to even point out that their behavior is predatory and wrong by any of the other characters, mostly because the two who are doing it to each other are stepsisters and have come to terms with the fact that is just a part of their sisterly relationship. But the point still stands, sexual assault should not occur this often in anime where it is glossed over and used as a plot point to further the story.
But I digress, and I shall continue to my next qualm with this anime. Due to this show’s status as a romance anime, it is, naturally, going to be character-driven. Character-driven shows usually aren’t hard to pin down. As a writer myself, I find it much easier to create character-based stories, especially if I am writing romance. But the characters, in a character-driven story, need to, you know, have character. Firstly, let’s discuss Mei Aihara, the chairman’s biological granddaughter and, to put it simply, the most fucked-up character of this show. In the first episode, she kisses Yuzu without explanation after it is revealed that they are going to be living together because of her mather’s remarriage to Mei’s father, and Yuzu confronts her about her romantic relationship with their teacher that she witnessed. Mei claims she is clueless because she has not been kissed, so she shuts her up with a big ole, unconsented smooch, leaving Yuzu writhing in confusion, but also arousal as it is portrayed. But this doesn’t stop here. Oh no, there is still more incest to come. At the end of the third episode, Yuzu visits Mei after she has been taken away by her grandmother due to Yuzu’s embarrassment of the family name, and while they are having just sisterly “come back home” talks, Mei throws Yuzu on the bed and rips her top open, beginning to cry as she attempts to make physical contact with her stepsister. And then, more simple things, she calls her father “professor” because he teaches her so much, she can’t make up her mind about what she wants to be with Yuzu. She never shows emotions and is constantly leading the characters in this show on, just to throw them off when push comes to shove. Mei Aihara needs HELP, this character is irredeemable. The only redeemable character, to be frank, is Yuzu’s best friend who has to put up with all these character’s bullshit, props to her.
For my final point, I’m going to touch on something that this anime contributes to on a wider scale, harmful LGBTQ+ stereotypes, especially towards women who are attracted to women. For simplicity’s sake, I’ll say lesbian. Lesbians are constantly suffering from the stereotype of being called predatory, promiscuous, or just sick and messed up in the head. So for this show to just come out of the water with lesbians who are sexually assaulting their stepsister is frankly appalling. As a member of the LGBTQ+ community myself, this show genuinely makes me sick at my stomach because the people who watch this without being aware of those stereotypes are going to take it at face value and think all lesbians are like the girls in Citrus. This show is hurtful and harmful to lesbian representation in anime, and the folks over at Studio Passione need to learn from their mistakes.
Was there anything good about this anime? Other than the animation, I can’t think of any. The pure idiotic writing of this show sucks the life out of you as you watch it. I binged it, and I can honestly say, do not binge this show. If you want to watch it and get it out to the way to laugh how bad it is, then do it, but take caution cause this show is downright awful in so many ways. I hope to see this show in the dictionary definition of these words: problematic, dreadful, sickening. That’s what this show is.
Namajamaa
To be fair, you have to have a very high IQ to understand Citrus. The humour is extremely subtle, and without a solid grasp of Class S Romance most of the jokes will go over a typical viewer's head. There's also Yuzu's gyaru outlook, which is deftly woven into her characterisation- her personal philosophy draws heavily from Adrienne Rich's lesbian continuum, for instance. The fans understand this stuff; they have the intellectual capacity to truly appreciate the depths of these jokes, to realise that they're not just funny- they say something deep about LIFE. As a consequence people who dislike Citrus truly ARE idiots- ofcourse they wouldn't appreciate, for instance, the humour in Yuzu's queer feminist catchphrase "If I want to do something, then I will," which itself is a cryptic reference to Sartre's French drama No Exit. I'm smirking right now just imagining one of those addlepated simpletons scratching their heads in confusion as Saburouta's genius wit unfolds itself on their screens. What fools.. how I pity them. 😂
And yes, by the way, i DO have a Citrus tattoo. And no, you cannot see it. It's for the ladies' eyes only- and even then they have to demonstrate that they're within 5 IQ points of my own (preferably lower) beforehand. Nothin personnel kid 😎
Florete
Let me tell you a story. Back in high school, I had a group of four friends. Myself, Florete (yes, that's my actual name), Danielle, Annie, and Melanie. One day we were at a restaurant together and while we had ordered different foods, we all ended up with mashed potatoes as a side. However, we all ate them differently. Danielle, who doesn't like flavor, had them plain. Annie liked pepper, but not salt. Melanie didn't like pepper, but loved salt. I loved salt AND pepper. After we were done eating, I turned to Melanie and gave her a sweet kiss, with tongue. You see, Melanie was mygirlfriend, and she's also my sister. Danielle and Annie rolled their eyes at us, the whole "this again" thing, as we had our fun. You see, salt strengthens us, so when we eat salt, we kiss, and it magnifies our power. We're also super gay lesbians, so combining salt with yuri is an astounding combo.
Years later, Melanie - who is my sister and wife (sometimes I call her "Wifester." She doesn't like it) - and I, Florete, were lounging around the house being gay when we discovered this anime called Citrus. It starred lesbian sisters similar to us and was generating mountains of salt all across the internet. Loads of yuri and a mountain of salt? We've never felt stronger!
Yuzu is like me. We're go-getters, the older sibling, the troublemaker. We know what we want but sometimes we're too stupid to know how to go about getting it, so we just do something random and things somehow turn out alright in the end, maybe. But that's why our sister loves us so much.
Mei and Melanie are also fairly similar. They're on the quiet side, but also smart and calculating. It took them some time to realize their love, but when they did, they knew how to accept it. You'd expect them to be on the receiving end of affection more often, but when in the bedroom, they can be surprisingly aggressive. Melanie hasn't assaulted me, though. Yet. Sigh.
Also, like Mei, Melanie is basically a walking lesbian magnet. We can just be walking down the street and girls will just start gravitating towards her, on their phone or checking their make-up, without even realizing what's happening. Sometimes the girls don't even yet realize that they're gay, and I swear she's turned a few straight girls gay by now. It's crazy and awesome. But it is annoying sometimes, because some will actually go after her for real, and then I have to tell them to go find their own sister to love because this one is mine and mine alone. One rival is kind of charming, the next is a little awkward, but by the time the third comes along I'm getting a bit sick of this nonsense. I get it, she's attractive, can we move on now?
What about our other friends? Well, Danielle was closer to me, and Annie was closer to Melanie. Danielle was a great bff, pretty much always there whenever I needed someone to hang with or talk to without Melanie, although I never quite understood just why she was so attached to me. Annie, well, she was my first love rival for Melanie. Charming in its own way, that "Wow, my sister-lover is desired, that makes me feel good that she chose me instead" feeling. We got past it.
Real talk now.
I get it. By its very nature, our story is a bit squeamish, awkward, uncomfortable. Some people out there will be disgusted by the mere thought of it, others will try to have an open mind but be turned away when they see what it took for us to get there, some of the things we did. But there are others, those who will appreciate, those who will understand what we went through, those who aren't looking for an average rom-com, those who will follow and enjoy our story BECAUSE it's like this, because there really is a lot to love here. There are happy times. There are sad times. Good decisions and bad decisions.
We don't care what anyone else thinks. We're in love.
FAQ
Q. Is your name really Florete?
A. Of course it is.
Q. Are you and Melanie blood-related?
A. Hmmm...perhaps.
Q. Did you actually review Citrus?
A. Didn't I, darling? Didn't I?
Q. But you didn't say anything about animation or acting and such!
A. Sigh...Must I really?
Q. Yes.
A. Fine. It was good. Decent. If you're not a stickler for the technicalities you won't notice anything (Mei's English dub voice is really perfect, though). If you are...well, I'm not, so I can't help you there. Watch the trailer, or something.
Q. I have no further questions.
A. Thank you, internet voice.
ktulu007
Citrus is a yuri romance manga that started in late 2012 and just recently ended. Although it looks like a second manga called Citrus Plus is planned. I don't know if it's going to follow the same characters nor have I read the manga. Early this year the studio Passione, also behind Rokka no Yuusha, aired a twelve episode adaptation to cover the first part of the story. So, let's see how that went. Story: Aihara Yuzu finds her life turned topsy turvy when her mother suddenly remarries and the pair relocate, forcing her to enter a new school. Things turn awkward immediately when she unknowingly breaksthe rules and finds herself afoul of the young student council president. She returns home for a surprise, she has a new step-sister and it's the same student council president she met earlier, Aihara Mei. To make matters even more awkward, she finds Mei really attractive.
Let's start with the problems with the series. There are two major ones. The first is that, like Love Stage, it doesn't have a great first impression. I will say, to Citrus's credit, it isn't nearly as bad since the initial encounter between Yuzu & Mei involves a stolen kiss and not attempted rape but it's still not a great way to begin a romance. The big one, however, is more reminiscent of the bad episode from Sasameki Koto. In that episode, we had a young girl act deplorably only to be instantly forgiven with no real consequences and her behaviour was never mentioned again.
Citrus has the same type of thing with a character named Matsuri except her actions are even worse and they span a couple episodes. She's introduced about halfway into the series and decides to try and seduce Yuzu. But first she needs to deal with Mei, which is where the deplorableness comes in. Now, I'm not opposed to having an antagonistic character who's absolutely atrocious as a person but the problem here, and in the aforementioned Sasameki Koto, is that they try to treat the characters as sympathetic. And that doesn't work when you have characters act this horribly. Not without a lot of time and effort put into redeeming them. Which neither series does. Their plots end and they basically say they're sorry and get told not to do it again and that's it.
Moving on to the positives, I'll give Citrus credit for having romantic content between siblings in a way that's only mildly sleazy, and that's entirely based on the stolen kisses early on. Because it makes sense for two high school kids who are suddenly tossed together as step-siblings to still be attracted to one another. The series also does feature some strong scenes. Some of them are quite funny, and usually involve Yuzu making an ass of herself. While others have a bit of an awkward tension betwixt Mei & Yuzu with enough positivity to make them kind of sweet little moments. The best part, by far, is the whole arc with the twin sisters, Sara & Nina. Those three episodes are where the series gets elevated to fantastic. It's funny because it goes from the low point of the series, with Matsuri the sociopath, to the high point with the twins and it's kind of hard to believe these were written by the same person.
Characters:
I've already covered the basics of what's wrong with Matsuri's character and the handling thereof. Needless to say, she's the worst character in the series by a wide margin. As for the other characters, there are aspects of Yuzu, Mei and their budding relationship I really like. The awkwardness has verisimilitude. Yuzu's conflicting feelings of wanting to be a good sister but also being greatly attracted to her new step-sister is compelling. Mei's desire to be needed and her drive for exceptionalism versus her uncertainty over how to proceed is also good stuff. But then there's the way things are initiated betwixt them and the way it gives a poor first impression. Harumi is a fun character. Sara is a sweetheart. I also really like what little we get of Mei's relationship with her wandering father. So, quite a strong cast with one very notable exception.
Art:
Here's one area where I have to give Passione a lot of credit, their artwork is really great. The characters are well drawn. The backgrounds and various world objects look good. The animation flows smoothly. It is a good looking series.
Sound:
Our main heroines are voiced by Taketatsu Ayana & Tsuda Minami, two strong actresses who deliver fantastic performances. We've also got Kubo Yurika, Kanemoto Hisako, Fuji Yukiyo, Matsuzaki Rei and some others who are really good at what they do. Even Izawa Shiori, voice of the worst part of the series, doesn't perform badly. She just got stuck with a shit character. Takahashi Ryo put together a strong soundtrack for the series.
Ho-yay:
In addition to the obvious budding relationship betwixt Yuzu & Mei, Mei's childhood friend blatantly has feelings for her. Yuzu has some kind of flirtatious moments with Harumi but a lot of that is Harumi teasing Yuzu after seeing her yuri manga. Sara's whole arc revolves around her developing a crush on Mei who she refers to as "her destiny." In short, this is one of those series where the only important straight character seems to be Yuzu's mum. And I wouldn't exactly be surprised if the latter part of the manga introduces her female "friend" who seems to always visit while her husband's away. Which he always is.
Final Thoughts:
There are plenty of things to like about this series. The last arc especially. Unfortunately, it's really weakened by those three episodes heavily featuring Matsuri & by having the relationship begin in a poor way. Would I watch a second series? Well, yes. This may well be like Sasameki Koto where the manga gets past the point that made up the seventh episode of the anime and it just stays consistently fantastic afterwards. In which case, the bad part's out of the way. But, by the same token, this isn't a good yuri series thus far. It manages to average out to being decent but there are plenty of better ones out there. I'll give the first series a 6/10. If they do come out with a second one I'll give it a go but I'm not really going to go out of my way to go through the manga or anything like that.
ItzToxic
As a manga reader, there’s many things that must be addressed. For one, since it was 12 episodes long, I knew it would end in the shittiest arc possible. I hated it in the manga, I hate it here as well. Second, the adaptation was close to perfect, unfortunately the presentation of certain scenes were overly expressed more than it needed to be. With the 90% Rape and the 10% Consent, I felt a need, a need to think about this again. Let me get this straight, as of right now, I enjoy the manga. The latest chapters started spicing things up. However, since the animeadapted such a crappy arc in the first place, there comes no surprise to when I say that I hated the second half of the anime.
Citrus is a Yuri manga that decided to show up after a long time since its announcement. It’s one of those series where you say “fuck it, there’s yuri.”
When I first made my review, I gave it an 8, simply for the fact that I’m biased towards yuri and am basically obligated to watch it for such a reason. But knowing the fact that it goes downhill once the second half begins, just enjoying it for the “yuri” doesn’t become something I say often.
The first half is what you call exceptional, a girl goes to an all-girls school where her mom remarries and her step sister turns out to be someone of important. Thus the encounter captivates her and gives her the green-light to pursue such a love. But can such a love succeed when all Mei can do is use her hands for anything but love. I understand her situation, I get that her only way of communication can be through sexual acts, but when this continues for a long time with little to no change throughout the series, it makes it harder to take her seriously each time.
I appreciate the mature-ish tone that the anime decided to take, but each time they try to make it “impactful,” the actual effect decreases each time they attempt this. I also disliked the fact that they try to drag out the story but putting *ahem* “antagonists.” The first time Matsuri showed up, I was pissed, but thankfully later on she redeemed herself a little bit and became more tolerable. Now when Nana and Sara showed up, oh boy I was attempted to drop the manga there and then. Even though Sara and Nana didn’t stay within the main focus for too long, I just disliked the fact that they’re practically insert characters to prolong the conflict as long as possible.
But of course, not everything about Citrus is bad. The art for the anime looks just about the same as Uta’s drawings, which I do appreciate. The voice acting was superb, each seiyuu fulfilled the role perfectly and captured the feelings no matter the circumstance or situation. The music and opening song were fantastic since I appreciate the stuff nano.RIPE makes. The animation was fine but the CGI near the start of the series was really off-putting. Thankfully, this occurs less as it goes on. Those were really my two cents of the series. I didn’t hate everything about it, but boy did it get annoying to watch later on.
Citrus as an adaptation did well. It followed the panels and it showed almost every detail. Unfortunately they extended scenes that were not needed. Even if it didn’t drive off from the original source, there are things that must not be added. It was quite a shame that it ended off at one of the worst arcs possible, however if you do have the time to read past where the anime ended, then I suggest you would. The manga does get somewhat better, but don’t expect it to be amazing. I am enjoying it thus far now. I do have one pet peeve however, I hated, and I mean hated the way they adapted chapter 8’s kiss scene (out of love). That kiss was one of the best in the manga, and it looked awkward and weird on the anime. That’s just me being picky though.
Citrus succeeded in terms of adaptation, but failed in all other aspects. Although it falls flat, I must say that Saburo Uta did one thing right…
Making Harumin one of the hottest characters in existence.
Moomochi
Out of 100 Nobles watching... 42 were impressed. 35 got sick of the durdling plot. 15 just want characters in shows to be humans acting like humans doing human things instead of weird aliens acting like what their science division determined what they think humans WOULD act like. 8 would like Yuzu to have more lines of dialogue than just "Mei!" Straight to the point. Citrus presented an interesting concept for a romance story. Our Gyaru protagonist (woo!) Yuzu falls in love with her new-to-the-family slightly younger step sister. The show sets up a plot that would have this couple face the problems that come with this sort ofrelationship as well as Mei's (the younger step sister) obligations to her biological family. If the show stuck to this it could have been something really powerful and probably had a lasting impression on me. The show didn't keep things simple though. Instead the story fell back on the worst kinds of romance tropes with each arc introducing some new character to throw a wrench in the protagonists relationship.
Instead of focusing on a story that was well grounded in reality we delve into strange melodramatic tropes and reasoning's for character actions and it just comes off feeling hollow. Something every romance must do is balance the conflict in it's story. If things get too heavy or absurd than the suspension of disbelief allowed for immersion is broken, or the viewer will get frustrated at characters not acting like sane human beings. Citrus absolutely failed in this regard.
The OP and ED was fairly typical and nothing to write home about and the same few tracks were recycled for the entire show. The art style had a really indistinguishable shoujo look. With a bland visual aspect the story needed to carry this one but the relationships exampled in this story were just plain toxic with the exception of Harumi Taniguchi who was a pretty legit friend in all honesty.
Citrus was like a waiter carrying a platter with a fresh and interesting Yuri romance to my table, but on their way over they kept stopping at other people's tables, forgetting what order was mine and bringing me the wrong thing. I only have so much patience and Citrus really tested it. I completed the meal, but have no intention to come back for more.
NextUniverse
(TLDR Review below, as always, thanks for reading) There is a distorted mindset in every corner when it comes to Citrus. It is an anime that simultaneously holds titles of being lowbrow fetish bait for those looking for none other to satisfy their lust for girls' love, there is also a minority who will dismiss such perspectives as a mere defect of the cognitive thought of analysing an anime (lol). I stand between the two pillars of the bridge, or one could say that I don't even stand on the bridge at all, for in my eyes, Citrus is none other the same as any romance animeissued to the public, the only difference is that it uses a more niche GL as a premise than the otherwise standard heterosexual relationships which usually dominates mainstream romance anime.
I'm not one to entwine the ability of anime directors to supposed S-tier literature writers of the past such as Dumas and Dickens, however, I do believe that any piece of media can assume to the realm of subtle intellectual ideas ranging from a wide variety of field of studies, though, human irrationality is very much a thing that cannot be cured, and we have a tendency to think up nonsense that amasses to something that didn't exist in the first place, or such ideas that if some entity references parables and the likes it must suddenly mean said piece of fiction of the acme in a means of "intelligent thinking". It is one of the reasons I am not entirely impressed with anime such as NGE because the motives of each individual can be aligned with many pieces of media of today. The only weight it holds is a class act, which, I will admit, is very praiseworthy. Maybe it is that of the subconscious seeking the enjoyment maxima, I wouldn't know, I am no psychologist.
This idea to take prey for minuscule detail is one of the reasons why I didn't find any reason to "overpraise" Citrus as I thought I would. I did initially come into this thinking it would be a nice challenge of the mind, but as time continued, there was simply no reason for me to excessively hound down on literally oxygen particles in an attempt to praise it like some Victorian doctor receiving new evidence debunking ghosts. There just wasn't that kind of impact. However, on the flip side, as stated in the early paragraph, Citrus was bound to not only some irrational praise, but also bound to inconsistent hate, this idea that an anime can be automatically bad based on the very same premise it was proposing. I've never liked this idea because it denies the basic creation of art rights, to limit something just because someone else may not like it. It is against creative freedom if anything. The fact that no one will take the time to look at "pointless kisu-kisu scenes" and then brush them off as some negative factor of the anime is nothing short of absurdity and a little hypocritical to concurrently say said thing has no value in the anime, but has value in the analysis, considering these scenes happens frequently, you'd think that there is some meaning to it rather than it being there just for the "fanservice".
And so, with that, I bring forward what is it about Citrus that should share its place amongst the crowd as just another one of those series that comes and goes.
What I really like about Citrus, and what differentiates it from the rest to give it its own name rather than solely being generic, is the idea it uses consistently. It is a tidy mess of things around this anime, with more factors being more praiseworthy than the others, but overall the writing and the presentation of such is pretty damn good. What Citrus does is that it presents different kinds of emotional conflicts between individuals in a basic, but splendid manner. Sisters being conflicted on what one thinks about the other, linearly increases acts of sexual conduct falling under forbidden acts among sisters, connections between different individuals who quake the relationship in hand. There is a lot of emotional play here, and it is written to a substantial degree. There is more intricate stuff like the kissing and what else goes on that are very interesting to understand too. As stated, I don't think it falls under zenith quality levels of works, but it is still somewhat a clever idea, which I believe falls into how one undergo the feeling of love. It is not all sunflowers, but instead, a thorny rose, if anything, it is a believable aspect, especially when going into a more controversial topic. This idea is that love is not always a walk in the park, rather, a fight against the many obstacles in the way of whomever it is one desire, a fight within oneself too. The dangerous thorns must be overcome for one to reach their glory, it is a reminiscence of the sweet, sour, and bitter tastes of the past. It is. Citrus. It is a clever idea for sure, all in all. However, one thing that annoyed me with Citrus was the layout.
Now I know teenagers aren't the brightest of the bunch, we cringe at ourselves when we look back to the times of being one of the "cool kidz", or how the world hated us and everything was their fault, or just actual stupid nonsense (some of which was fun to be fair). So I find no reason to dislike any of the characters here doing dumb stuff, such is a part of life. My problem is the frequency of these characters, those who come and go only exist to push the main two to the ending everyone already knows will happen. Sure, as individuals, they are cool, generic yes but that doesn't make them bad, though they cannot have a reason to exist if it wasn't for the main two. It kills humanity to them, killing any and every standalone feature, thus not having the believability in range to make them more loveable characters, one can only assess their behaviour, but otherwise, there is nothing more to them than to otherwise be the spice in the plot necessary to forward the duo to the desired outcome. I suppose that may be the role of a side character, though I've seen side characters elsewhere who are certified for positions in making themselves their own anime because they have that kind of good character to themselves, so there is no real excuse here, in dramas at that too.
I should speak of the main characters before moving to the next section too. Starting off with Yuzu, I personally enjoyed a lot about Yuzu, and I thought to myself, when the anime had ended, that she is a great character in what she does. She is a dumb teenager, who gets dragged into the perplexing pinball world of emotions, trying to find out exactly what it is she needs to do to satisfy herself, or her emotion of love. She doesn't go through the most grandiose development, but I don't think that is a means to deny her any praise, for her strength is journey altogether. Yes, nothing really changes, but actually seeing her visibly trying to understand what it is she needs to do is nothing short of a good motion in direction. She does very questionable things, but also tries to behave in a sane manner to actually understand herself, you know, the talking to others and what have you, all the while putting in the effort necessary to maintain who she is as a person, being a kind and upbeat girl. There is none of this disjointed development that literally makes zero sense. She is a character I managed to look back only positively, I really mean it, her growth isn't entirely visible, but I seriously liked it when looking at the long term.
Mei is a more interesting one, who is in the very same position as Yuzu, they are both coherent to one another, the only difference with Mei is that she is influential, her impact on others is part of the reason why this series is what it is, for that, she plays her role well. There isn't a lot to go on about the girl, she is closed about herself and tends to not be the most expressive, her troubles, however, are quite the interesting ones, and despite how she is presented, she can boil down to how others behave too, she just took a route she thought was best for her in life, which is a lot different to others, but that is not her core at heart. Even though she is very much human, Mei is presented as a very lost girl, she is disturbed of what it is love should be due to lack of experience on her behalf, it is seen countless times that her conduct simply isn't the right way to behave, yet she only does so because she doesn't know better. It is a simple detail, but it makes her more human and something maybe others can relate to, just not as dramatically. I wouldn't imagine there is more to her than that misguided life, for she isn't some kind of ridiculous enigma too. I suppose I enjoyed Mei's presence, and although it seems like she is an emotionless enticing individual with nothing more to her than some horniess, one must not forget what she has gone through in the anime.
All in all, Citrus is very good at its narrative. It doesn't have the strongest or most bewildering elements to show off, but it is certainly not one that falls into the general consensus of it being hated for reasons I cannot fully commit myself to. It is a little deep, but plausible, and it is something I quite enjoyed the themes of. Many will be quick to call it uncomfortable as a means to dislike what it is that is presented, but that kind of narrow-minded behaviour doesn't allow for one to heed the thoughts behind in the first place. It is sad, but such happens. I suppose Citrus is a little citric to all that taste it then. As it should be ironically enough.
For a Winter 2018 anime, it is just about hitting the bullseye of "good" production. The values here are as clean as the key visual at hand. Polished characters, good animation, you can see the effort has taken place where effort would otherwise be discarded generally. There weren't too many moments where a scene looked half-hearted, all around, everything was really good. I suppose the actual design of the characters wasn't unique, but that is the only criticism I can think of if you can even call it that. Nothing wrong with stagnated standards, you just need to ornament or go all out if you wish. Truth be told, for the audio side of Citrus, there wasn't much of value. Sometimes it would feel like a remix of the main theme would play over some scenes, other moments would fly right over as audio I could not possibly hope to have a lasting impact on me. Seiyuus did as well, as they should, so there isn't too much to comment on that. If I really wanted to, they managed to leave a good idea of the tone of Yuzu and Mei, but that was about it. Nothing else to speak of.
So, I enjoyed Citrus, chances are you probably won't, but I made this review because making reviews are somewhat interesting as well as maybe it could provide some insight as to why this anime isn't as bad as people make it out to be, it is also nothing I would consider to be something only intelligent people can understand. Really and truly, it is an average romance SoL anime with some very believable and interesting main characters, so not enjoying this would be a little strange, even if presented a little different, assuming you are a fan of SoL romance. Most of what they did can have an enjoyable effect in that participating in the journey with them is entirely worth the while for sure. There are also some wholesome scenes that happen here amongst the chaos.
I don't have any universal guide for the ranking of absolute enjoyment, but I advise one to look at Citrus not in a way that brings forward offensive content, but in a way that is actually trying to understand what it is and why it is people do such "unbelievable" facts, overstepping the boundary of thought is also not advised.
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TLDR Review:
Story - 8: A great idea and clever way of representing such ideas presented, the direction, however, especially with characters, are a bit undermining, otherwise it is really good.
Visuals - 7: Actual absolute good visuals for its time. Clean characters and everything had some effort into it.
Audio - 6: Not exactly the best, stale and forgettable at times, but nothing actually bad. Seiyuus can leave an impression on Yuzu and Mei tho.
Characters - 8: Very good characters who are very believable, they go through some questionable phases but it is all an understanding process. Side characters aren't the most interesting themselves tho.
Enjoyment - 7: Quite enjoyable. The idea was nice and everything was really well thought out, enough to look back in a positive manner. Probably not enjoyable if you have a closed mind.
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A long overdue finish in watching this, but I got there in the end. Citrus is pretty good stuff. I tend not to dislike a ton of anime anyway. It was pretty obvious as to why this was hated, but I have an open mind. Have to say, it is much better than Bloom into You tho, and I am saying that as a person who, as of this review, has read the superior version of the more acclaimed series compared to watching the inferior version of the more criticized series.
Both are still *sometimes* wholesome tho. Anyways, would recommend this, it is good for what it aims to present but it is a little disconnected in the ideas presented, for it is just an everyday romance story slightly derailing against the norm. A story based on a matter of understanding as well as a story of girls' love.
Also, watch Candy Boy if you like Citrus.
Overall - 7.43 (7)
