This is not what this post is about nor is it actually true.
Rather than just spit out a list of shows to then be subject to ridicule, I have decided to just take one aspect of each show on my list and talk about what I like about it. This will be an eccentric list that caters to me and my ridiculous taste. Then again, it’s my list and I’m going to talk about what I want to on this blog.
Support Networks
I Can’t Understand What My Husband is Saying (or Danna ga Nani wo Itteiru ka Wakaranai Ken or HUSBANDUNNO as I and a few other people know it) is a serious of shorts that aired first in the fall of 2014 and followed up by a second season in the spring of 2015. The story is about the daily lives of the newlywed Tsunashi couple, Kaoru; an office worker who lived a normal stressful work life prior to marriage, and her husband Hajime; an otaku who lives a stress-free life and works from home after eventually finding a job.
Before I continue with this particular post I need to say a bit about short anime in general. They are perfectly capable of telling any story or using the same amount of jokes or simply being in the same realm of healing-type as well as any other longer format show. I Can’t Understand What My Husband is Saying is definitely one of these types of shows.
I Can’t Understand What My Husband is Saying delivered some excellent episodes in its 2 season run (to date). The final episode of the first season is about Kaoru’s daily struggles before she met Hajime and definitely stayed with me emotionally. In the second season, there were episodes about Hajime pondering his own adulthood with Kaoru pregnant, and a flashback episode where he dealt with the bullying his younger brother Youta dealt with as a kid which were both fine episodes in my opinion.
This post, though, is about the people around Kaoru and Hajime that form a support network for the newlyweds. There’s Youta, who serves as a way to allow Hajime to be comfortable in the otaku world with someone he’s comfortable around (Youta is a yaoi mangaka) while being a friendly presence for Kaoru. He’s also in a relationship with Hajime’s boss which is never elaborated on, but completely accepted by everyone else in the series.
For Kaoru, she has two friends who are important to her. There’s Tanaka, a doctor who really serves as a mentor on how relationships work on an adult level beyond marriage, and Rino helps her with the more intimate aspects of marriage as a newlywed herself. In addition, they are all fully capable of having conversations between each other without husbands or men being a part of them.
That would be the sign to say that there will be lots of sex for 6 hours and Hajime will be experiencing none of it later on.
This group all comes together from time to time on different adventures or activities that they do simply because they are a big group of friends. There’s no ulterior motives behind these get together. Hell, they are even willing to spend time alone with Hajime on Christmas Eve because Kaoru is working…at least until 9pm then all bets are off. It just makes for a positive contrast between shows about people growing apart because of relationships or simply real life experience. Marriage doesn’t mean an end to forming new relationships with other people or staying close to others.
