Review of given

Man, sometimes I forget how homophobic the vast majority of anime fans are, and then I do the normy thing and look at the reviews on My Anime List. Anyways, this one goes out to my fellow LGBTs who are looking for good representation, because Given is a breath of fresh air. No sexual harassment or assault, homophobia isn't completely handwaved away nor harped on for angst (a classmate outs Mafuyu at the end of one episode with kind of nasty intentions, but it's resolved very quickly.) Ritsuka has a small struggle with his sexuality but that again is resolved very quickly in one ofthe most touching scenes of the show (seeing that clip on social media is what motivated me to watch Given in the first place, actually.) Besides our main couple, the older two bandmates are bisexual men and this is treated as no big deal. All relationships are age appropriate, and the friendships between the older and younger MLM are really well done. I don't think there's any jokes at the expense of someone's sexuality or gender presentation (arguably Haruki being a hairdressing model is played off as this, but it's never a thing he's extensively made fun of for.)

And in all that, I haven't even gotten to how the show handles other themes like suicide well. It's amazing how much this show does in a single cour, so all I can really say is: watch Given. It's a sweet gay romance that doesn't waste your time with tons of plot contrivances.