Well – phenomenal, obviously.  This was some extremely important material from the manga and the anime really nailed it (I only have one tiny quibble which I’ll discuss in a bit).  I just know this much – I’m going to be absolutely devastated if we don’t get at least two seasons of the anime, because there’s so much incredible material the first will never get to.  It’s all great, that’s becoming obvious even to those skeptical of the opening chapters (which doesn’t include me, I loved those too).  But the truth is it really does just keep getting better and better.

I can honestly say that in decades of reading and watching manga and anime, I’ve never encountered a series that so authentically captures the emotional rollercoaster of middle school.  BokuYaba spares us nothing, positive or negative.  Is it fearlessness or perceptiveness on Norio-sensei’s part that allows this?  Both, probably –  this series wouldn’t be what it is unless she was both.  This episode is a Star Wars credit sequence of great moments.  For starters Ichi smiling when he realizes he’s alone with Anna after they miss their train, then catching himself and being horrified.

That tiny quibble is the milk tea.  In the manga this is a huge moment because there are two extra chapters (17.1 and 23.1) where Anna says milk tea is her favorite drink.  Thus, she’s stunned when Kyou remembers.  The anime skipped those (I weep over the extras mostly not being adapted so far).  It did include the brief bit at the start of Episode 5 where Kyou hears Anna tell Chi she wants to get a milk tea from Family Mart (after Famichiki gets shot down), to set up the moment nicely.  But the weight of it is reduced a little bit by not having those extras set up said moment.

Apart from that, though – woof.  The emotional barrage is pretty much nonstop.  Anna crying over this little mishap throws Kyou off big-time, even if he’s come to realize what a childlike person she is in spite of her appearance.  Thus, the milk tea.  On the train, those little bumps, and Anna telling him that “it would be more fun to keep it a secret”.  Ichi, Ichi –  I so desperately want to be able to take him aside and explain to him what’s really going on here, that he doesn’t have to keep selling himself short.  But that’s who he is – he can’t accept that others can love him because he doesn’t yet love himself.  When he makes that “I’d be the one getting hurt” comment later in the ep, it just rips my guts out.

We get a nice little shot of Ichi-mama here (so much great parent stuff to come if we get a S2), and Onee starting to suspect something is up (Kyou being almost bubbly at the table is decidedly out of character – as is enjoying school).  That morning Yamada is waiting for him at the school gate – though of course Ichi is in complete denial about that.  This is a huge hurdle for him – it’s always a huge hurdle when one person believes they’re “not good enough” for the other.  As if to hammer home the point Anna loans Kyou “Kimi Iro Octave”, and then proceeds to spoil him about most of the plot.

That whole next library scene is pitch perfect.  The growing intimacy between them is ramping up the tension big-time, and causing even more of a disconnect between what Kyou’s senses tell him and what his mind believes is possible.  Later, at home, the true key moment of the episode – the barberpole sweats finally make their first anime appearance.  Kyou trying to figure out how Anna reads manga – before finally getting clued in by a barrage of crumbs on his face – is truly one of the most adorable moments of the entire series.  Also, Horie Shun’s line delivery (10:35) of “Are you gonna be in school tomorrow?” is phenomenal.

Not to be overshadowed, however, is that stairwell scene between Ichi and Adachi.  It’s important for many reasons, not least because it’s a reminder of how in BokuYaba there are no throwaway characters – every one of them is a whole person.  Ichi expects the worst (as usual) – “at last, the bullying starts”.  But Adachi is not a bully.  He’s not even a bad kid – just a crude, impulsive 13 year-old who doesn’t know how to be anything else.  He actually opens up to Ichi – about how he actually likes Yamada (and how he knows it), and you get the sense that Ichi has never had this sort of conversation before.

Again, this is so important.  Ichi having an actual bro conversation is a watershed for him, for starters.  It’s further evidence that the assumptions he has about people aren’t necessarily to be trusted.  And while Adachi’s reasoning for how he knows he likes Anna is pretty raunchy, it actually sets off a pretty crucial bout of confusion in Kyou.  He’s hot for Anna, there’s no denying that.  Does that means he “likes” her in the romantic sense, or that he doesn’t?  What’s the difference between physical attraction and romantic affection – do they complement each other, are they mutually exclusive?  These are huge and confusing questions for a 13 year-old just on the cusp of adolescence to try and wrestle with.

Finally, the library sign.  Anna is confused by its presence – why is it necessary to state something so obvious?  Is she making a self-referential joke (Kyou is never sure)?  Ichi is convinced that she’ll stop coming to the library, since eating snacks is the only reason she does.  Well, obviously we know he’s wrong – but it’s not like this girl is going to let a sign get between her and her almond choco anyway.  The teacher walking in on them is another of those huge watershed moments (now forever memorialized), but it’s very hard to translate this from the manga to the anime.  Why?  Well, it’s complicated.

This is why manga and anime are often so hard to interconnect.  Norio Sakurai, being the genius that she is, set up this moment for basically the entire series.  Kyou was always the “internal monologue” character, not Anna.  She gives Kyou a different font from Anna in their speech bubbles.  By using this font, she actually lets us know during the almond-choco hand moment that it’s actually Anna thinking “I like him!” – her first real internal monologue of the series.  Akagi Hiroaki has to make do with other means to communicate this, because he can’t really have Anna suddenly thinking out loud – it would be discordant.  So he has to do it with nuance (like the melted chocolate, the “go away”).

The gist of it is this.  The chapter title this time – for the first time – refers to Anna, not Ichi.  “I melted”.  It’s one of those “this is the first day of the rest of our lives” moments, of which the manga has several (fittingly, as they seem to drop about every ten minutes at this stage of adolescence).  There’s so much depth here, so much emotion, and the anime is doing a remarkable job conveying it – within the limitations of what Akagi-sensei can do.  I often talk about the elements anime brings that anime can use to expand the manga experience – something Akagi does so brilliantly with Karakai Jouzu no Takagi-san.  With BokuYaba, interestingly (because Norio-sensei is who she is) he must wrestle with the elements manga brings that anime can’t replicate directly.