Yeah, I think it helps that they're all so distinct, character-wise. It's not just a bunch of suits. You've got Murakami, a big bruiser with a dog, a bartender, and Nightclub Houjou (where my SHF, Bandai). There's also someone we haven't met yet, and that's a very cool detail to drop in on a group's first appearance. Like, here's the group, and there's one last mystery member. Smart!

So happy!

I think it's more that they haven't immediately traded phone numbers or email addresses. For two young people in the early-2000s, that's the part that feels unbelievable. Keitaro wears his phone around his neck in this episode, and has been in the midst of by-email romance since the first time we saw him.

But, you know, maybe Keitaro's working up to it. He's been professional (it's inappropriate to hit on a customer) and distracted (Yuka sprints away from him when they met on the street), so it's fair that they haven't gotten personal details out yet. And, they're on a date in this one, so they don't really need to trade numbers or emails. But, man, they need to deal with that point pretty soon.

I'm just going to say this upfront: I honestly don't consider it that unreasonable that a milksop pushover and an emotionally battered victim of abuse aren't in a rush to swap digits with each other.

Like, I'm not sure how invested I am in defending this plot point, but I can at least see where the show is coming from.

Something I wanna say actually while this topic is brought up? As someone who doesn't like Faiz, I've never really agreed with the "if only these people would just talk normally and stop having so many ~misunderstandings~" argument against it.

Because for me, that's just a basis of drama. I think it's fine that these people don't communicate well with each other because that can be interesting, and there's a lot of realism in there since none of these people have ever even met each other before.

Fair enough. I'm not all beat up about it, but it's a bit of a contrivance for me.

As a counterpoint, though, these two managed to get an online relationship going, so they must be okay putting themselves out there to some degree.

And, man, I don't know that I'd call Keitaro a milksop pushover in general, and he specifically doesn't come off that way in a dating context. He's a romantic! He went on one date with a girl who seems emotionally hollowed out and he's convinced he's in love with her! Dude only feels capital letter Feelings!

Sure! Like I said originally, Complicated Romance is a pretty standard story to tell when it comes to the superhero genre, so any objections are more of the Minor Quibble variety. I really liked the Keitaro/Yuka story!

Like, if there's anywhere in drama/melodrama where you want a decent amount of obfuscation and confusion to keep things humming, it's a star-crossed lovers storyline. It is dramatically appropriate for them to still not know each other's identities!

Then what's the other reason for it? Because yeah, majority, if not all the people who dislikes this has that as a reason.

Why didn't I like it? I just... didn't enjoy it.

I think I said in my first post on this thread, but I feel Faiz is a very, very marmite show. Either the characters and the drama work well for you and is exactly what you want, or it really, really isn't. For me I just don't like these characters and I don't like the cynicism. That's not necessarily saying it's bad - I have the same feelings about Ryuki, and I think that's amazingly well made - it's just not for me.

I do have some actual issues later on, but those issues imo are minor compared to if you're invested in these characters and their relationships. That's the core of the show, and everything else is gravy.

Yeah... I mean, that description is probably overselling it a bit, which is why I'm not sure how invested I am in defending the plotting here. I guess the thing I am sure about is that, at the very least, you can make a legitimate enough argument both ways.

Also, counterpoint to your counterpoint: people who aren't totally comfortable expressing themselves probably feel a lot more comfortable doing that when it isn't face-to-face. See? You can even spin that as evidence in two totally different directions!

Now, this, I won't ever stop defending. Put simply, my stance on Faiz's drama has always been, and will always be, that these characters can't talk normally because they aren't normal. Faiz is a show about broken people! You can still argue it goes too far in places, but I've never seen it as particularly fair to write off the entire show basically just for having that style at all. Faiz can be soapy and serious for the same reason Fourze is allowed to be energetic and goofy. That's just the kind of series they were making.

I guess (and I'm sorry to keep talking about this, but I like thinking about these characters) my read on Keitaro at this point in the series is that he's a very Putting Himself Out There character. Like, he invites two people, one prickly and the other objectively terrible, to live in his home after knowing them for maybe two days. He starts a business that's half dry cleaning, half butting into people's lives to solve personal problems. He's a guy that, to me, is totally comfortable blowing off work for a day to cheer up a girl he doesn't even know the full name of. He's the weirdo outcast of the six main characters because he understands and expresses his emotional needs.

None of this is about the numbers/email thing, that's incidental to the story they're telling, but I really like thinking about these characters. Hope this wasn't a nuisance!

So Faiz is basically a commentary about Fear & Irony of New Technology, where you have more ways to communicate but less things to say than ever :v

(*I think my issue was less about why they're not telling each other directly, but more about the show itself dangling the entire thing in obnoxious "ooh they cross each other's path again, will it be revealed this time?? .... of course not" way. But yea, at this point it can still be, ahem, justified.)

This is like, at least 50% of what these threads are about, right? I think you're fine.

Also, I guess the way I see it is once again, a different take on the same facts. Keitarou, he loves helping people out. He loves getting to know them and talking about their problems. He's easily excitable that way, and he's definitely sociable, but to me, none of that is the same thing as being able to express his more deep-down, personal feelings. He's not Takumi, obviously, but I feel like, I don't know, he'd just be the kind of guy to get uncomfortable when a conversation turns to him.

Wait, I just remembered! The annoying sighing! Remember that? How he refused to just tell Mari and Takumi what he wanted to talk about, got upset with them for not asking, and then, when Mari asks, immediately backs down from actually talking about it? That's exactly the kind of behavior I'm talking about.