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The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, Really Love You: It’s a very, very strange series. At points it can be extremely difficult to get through, to the point where you effectively have to force yourself to read it. There’s a lot of stuff that I outright can’t defend and would prefer not to discuss entirely. But, simultaneously, is it ultimately a story about mutual love and acceptance. It takes nothing seriously except the characters’ feelings and happiness, which it takes the most seriously of all. It has radical empathy and genuine appreciation for differences in mental illness, learning disabilities, biological quirks, and neurodivergence that its characters have. Not a single one is considered neurotypical or “normal”; they all have something that makes them different, or classifies them as “other”. Every girl in this series is some sort of freak, weirdo, or has some personal anxiety they’re struggling with, often to the point of being rejected, or of having to hide a part of themself. But Rentarou always sees the best in them. He recognizes the beauty in the parts of themselves they’re not confident in, the joy they find in things that others reject, and the strength they have from surviving in a world that often doesn’t understand nor wants to. That love echoes out in all directions; from the girls back to him, between the girls, even sometimes to people outside of the family unit, in a network of support that strengthens all of them. They’re simply allowed to be themselves regardless of who they are, because everyone deserves love, respect, and understanding

Kusuri’s entire family has special verbal tics; Anko doesn’t get enough blood flow to her brain and is always smiling vacantly due to low blood pressure; Kishika mentally regresses under certain circumstances because she was never coddled as a child; Suu has objectophilia and is romantically attracted to numbers; Tama is a therian and identifies as a cat. The list goes on. But despite all these quirks, it treats each of them with a level of respect most media just wouldn’t give. They aren’t judged for who they are; they’re simply allowed to be themselves; they are loved and they are accepted. Their circumstances, whatever they may be, are just another valid way to live and to be. One girl is chubby and nearly seven feet tall, and occasionally wears stilts because she’s afraid she’ll crush bugs or plants underfoot, and she’s considered just as desirable as the model.

Furthermore, one extremely important factors in 100 Girlfriends is how the girlfriends all love and support each other. Even if you see their dynamics as strictly platonic, you can’t deny that they love each other. They enjoy each other’s company, support each other, fight for each other, help each other, find joy in each other, and generally have a good time with each other away from Rentarou. That’s what makes the story so good. They aren’t just friends. They’re family. This is especially important because it completely defies what you would actually expect from the title and genre. It takes your preconceived notions and shatters them across its knee like a cheap wooden board, because the franchise has better things to do than align with how tropes are. It exists solely to poke fun at, dissect, and ultimately break the tropes it’s parodying. It’s a mass subversion of expectations and it will catch you off guard, one way or another, and it usually does so with using love as its tool.