I'm gonna be straight with you people...I almost didn't watch this show because of the beard. Like...it's not even a normal beard it's a weird flat clump of sparse bristles stuck to the underside of dude's chin. I dig a good beard, but the style of this one is pretty repulsive. So imagine my surprise and delight when the beard became the focus of so many episodes! I felt righteously justified when Yumi hated it too, and was super happy whenever it got axed.

It's sort of a weird dichotomy to be rooting for the removal of something that was clearly important to the dude, when in my own life I strive to almost never force my own preferences on another person (except long nose hairs, like IDC who you are if you're coming at me with spider legs sliding along the outside edge of your nostrils you gonna hear about it). Like normally I would be annoyed at the female character for wanting to force the dude to change himself to fit her preference...but that beard was so unflattering.

ANYHOW, beard aside, going into this I was also pretty skeptical of the cartoon and live action combination. There's something probably broken in my brain, I really don't enjoy cartoons. However, now that it's over I have to say they did a pretty good job. They really made the little cartoon cells part of the story in a way that amplified the messages they were trying to get across. It was nice to see the cells so accurately depict the inner struggles we all go through, and it was interesting how differently the two leads' cells were represented. Some of the maddening choices people make in these dramas (and often IRL too) are difficult for me to accept and understand, but the cells helped bridge that gap and made it so I could understand where each person was coming from and why they made the choices they made. I definitely think the inclusion of the cartoon cells benefitted this production immensely.

One other thing I should note...the OST and the sound team did an exceptional job in this show. The scene at the end with almost every sound muted but the fountain was so well done. Other scenes had similar effects, the audio choices really resonated with the emotions in the scene in a way I've rarely seen anyone pull off successfully. The DRAMA in a soundscape isn't an easy thing to pull off, but they put so much care and effort into making the background sounds a part of the story that it was noticeably masterful.

All of that said, I think this is an exceptionally well done show and definitely worth a watch. There was comedy, feels, and just enough mystery to keep the thing going episode after episode. It wasn't epic, but it was pretty darn good. To be fair, relationship struggle dramas rate generally pretty low for me, so 7.5 is actually a really good score!