These are the shows I've seen from your list:

•FMA: brotherhood, Natsume's book of friends, Darker than Black, Spice and Wolf. Good selection I must say.

Just curious, is the anime for Natsume's Book of Friends anywhere near as gay as the manga? Because in the manga, Natsume and Tanuma have serious subtext going on.

These are the shows I've seen from your list:

•FMA: brotherhood, Natsume's book of friends, Darker than Black, Spice and Wolf. Good selection I must say.

Just curious, is the anime for Natsume's Book of Friends anywhere near as gay as the manga? Because in the manga, Natsume and Tanuma have serious subtext going on.

This is need-to-know information. For personal research.

Kemono no Souja Erin

+1 I guess. It's on Crunchyroll as just Erin. It's got some serious overuse of flashbacks and the whole political side of the story is pretty bad but the stylized sections it used for animals doing something cool were fantastic and the core story is pretty cute.

At the moment I'm watching Chihayafuru. Sports anime with a few twists: a weird and obscure sport, a female lead, and a lot of shoujo stylings. It's on track to be my favorite sports show, though I'll probably still think Ping Pong was better-made.

These are the shows I've seen from your list:

•FMA: brotherhood, Natsume's book of friends, Darker than Black, Spice and Wolf. Good selection I must say.

Just curious, is the anime for Natsume's Book of Friends anywhere near as gay as the manga? Because in the manga, Natsume and Tanuma have serious subtext going on.

Well, I personally don't want to see anything between them because I ship Natsume with Taki but it's pretty much the same x)

last edited at May 27, 2015 11:49AM

@Nez, @OP I've only watched the anime so I don't really know how much subtext was present in the manga so I can't really compare. But I think the anime contained not-so-heavy subtext unfortunately (but yaoi fangirls/boys might say otherwise). It's really more about friendship for me though. I ship Natsume with nyanko sensei.

@Nez, @OP I've only watched the anime so I don't really know how much subtext was present in the manga so I can't really compare. But I think the anime contained not-so-heavy subtext unfortunately (but yaoi fangirls/boys might say otherwise). It's really more about friendship for me though. I ship Natsume with nyanko sensei.

The thing is that the base is one of the rare shoujo manga with a male lead character so the friendship is a lot deeper and romanticized than usual friendship in manga. It gives the same result as our very yuri subtexty anime/manga, some see it like obvious and other just don't see it at all

last edited at May 27, 2015 12:00PM

@Nez, @OP I've only watched the anime so I don't really know how much subtext was present in the manga so I can't really compare. But I think the anime contained not-so-heavy subtext unfortunately (but yaoi fangirls/boys might say otherwise). It's really more about friendship for me though. I ship Natsume with nyanko sensei.

The thing is that the base is one of the rare shoujo manga with a male lead character so the friendship is a lot deeper and romanticized than usual friendship in manga. It gives the same result as our very yuri subtexty anime/manga

As long as we're talking about friendship, can I just say how much I love that both guys' friendship with the female character without a trace of romance intruding? It's so refreshing to see neither of them getting forced into a relationship with her just because she's nearby.

Plus, Natsume on his own is just such an all-around sweet guy. He's so nice! except to Nyanko-sensei, but that's okay

last edited at May 27, 2015 12:03PM

Well, that sure is rare in a shoujo manga (or just manga in general). That show how great the author is, it is published in a magazine that contain a lot of romance when you think about it (like Ouran high school host club, vampire knight or kaichou wa maid sama)...

Must be a bother to convince that your work doesn't necessarily need to be romance focused (especially with the recurring characters)

last edited at May 27, 2015 12:51PM

Soooo, the yuri arc in Loveless was really strong. I'd give the show a 6/10, the yuri arc alone a 8/10. Definitely the most meaningful and romantic relationship in the whole show.

It's a yaoi so be careful if you like, hate yaoi I guess. Yuri happens in episodes 8 to 10.
The main relationship is a 12 year old boy x college student so going into the show I was pretty of scared that there would be an abusive relationship (based on my limited knowledge of yaoi) but it was actually pretty okay.

OriginalGengar, 12xCollege Student is still hella creepy if you ask me. O_o.. But, I may check out those episodes, thanks!

As for Natume's Book of Friends, I've never gotten any gay subtext between the two main male characters. Nadda. Just figured they're close friends. (I've done the same with female characters too.... well... before I discovered Dynasty anyways. CURE YOU YURI GOGGLES!!!)

Nezchan

As long as we're talking about friendship, can I just say how much I love that both guys' friendship with the female character without a trace of romance intruding? It's so refreshing to see neither of them getting forced into a relationship with her just because she's nearby.

YES!!! I totally agree!! I think it's great that for once, a female and male character are shown to just be friends instead of potential romantic interests. This is the same thing I said about the Avengers movies where Hawkeye and Black Widow are shown as basically siblings. It's nice to see that from time-to-time and not something akin to Mass Effect's horny universe X-D

12xCollege Student is still hella creepy if you ask me

Sure is. I was expecting the worst so not getting the worst probably made it seem okay-ish. But I also enjoyed Hoshikawa Ginza District 4 until that creepy stalker fucked everything up so I guess I don't really have a problem with questionable age gaps.