What Does it Really Mean to Lose? The Observation Deck: Too Many Losing Heroines

5 min readNov 12, 2024

Welcome, weebs, to Animated Observations

It has become its own trope now to point out how technologically connected people are while at the same time being lonelier than ever before. Parents and those of a certain generation will wag their fingers at the super-computers in kid's pockets and the growing number of various social media platforms upon which people can endlessly consume content. They aren’t exactly wrong for doing so.

However, at the heart of these issues, it feels like there is something else going on. The age of information has made us hyperaware, of the world around us, of others, of ourselves. Though it has very little to do with these concepts on the surface, A show like Makeine: Too Many Losing Heroines can only exist in this information era. It exists in the space and time when information overload forces us more than ever to categorize, to view others through archetypes. Her? Oh, she’s the girl next door. Him? He’s the silent, studious type. We are now a world defined by social frameworks.

The show in question follows Kazuhiko Nukumizu, an archetypically boring, nerdy Japanese high schooler obsessed with manga and light novels. His hobbies have yet to translate to any real-world connection, something his supportive though brutally direct sister won’t hesitate to remind him of. Not only is romance not in question, he barely has any friends on which to rest his laurels. That is, until he unintentionally witnesses a classmate of his sabotage her own potential relationship in favor of her crush’s happiness. Anna Yanami ends up ordering too much food at the diner they were both in, and Nukumizu insists on getting his money back. Here is the start of a beautiful…uh, friendship?

The Start of Something New

Nukumizu’s adversity to forming new relationships had previously kept him alone. Go to class, bury his head in notebooks and light novels, go home, repeat. The day's events were almost always perfectly lined up. The introduction of Anna, and by extension the rest of the literature club, fundamentally changes this.

Still, it isn’t exactly smooth sailing. Our hero’s lack of previous human connection, including in elementary school apparently, means that he is often use to being alone. Being with people who genuinely care for him and want him around is a new concept. As a result, much of his internal dialogue is relayed to us in terms of archetypes, both implicitly and explicitly.

Take Lemon, for example. Fans who have watched any amount of romance, slice-of-life could tell immediately that she is supposed to be the sporty type, the athlete. Her typical outfits and more androgynous presentation relay that information in a way that is typically left up to the audience to imply. So, why then does Nukumizu feel the need to say it out loud, to himself at least?

Hold that thought.

To Be Young and in Love

Something really admirable about this series is the way it fronts a lot of honesty about its story. For every high school love story in which the two who were always meant to be end up together, there are countless others where nothing happens. However, that doesn’t have to mean these girls are always sad. In fact, most of the time they are on screen are moments spent in reconciliation or peace, save for maybe Chika Komari.

Everyone in the main cast except for our male lead has been, in some form or fashion, romantically rejected. Some take it better than others, wallow a bit more in their sadness. Some even eat their feelings away and gain a couple pounds, but rather than spend the series focusing on their sadness, Too Many Losing Heroines ops instead to focus on the friendship that develop in the wake of these girls’ mutually unfortunate situations.

Anna, on account of being in the same class as both her crush and crush’s girlfriend, is constantly reminded of the one she let get away. She complains to Nukumizu over lunch, and even tries to use him as a fake boyfriend to show off to her middle school friends. Still, despite the focus on what could have been, Anna tries to move on and enjoy her high school experience.

Why’d You Have to Go and Make Things So Complicated?

High school relationships are simultaneously tenuous and also some of the strongest. They are formed at the closest point to adult while still not being an adult, so they are still Malleable. However, they are also the last point of childhood and thus remembered fondly and nostalgically. In the age of information, it is possible to form more of these relationships quickly, but it leaves them all the less personal.

Nukumizu, in a lot of ways, is overwhelmed by the amount of change he is seeing. In absolute numbers, he doesn’t have a ton more relationships than he did at the beginning. In relative terms, though, the number of relationships has changed several hundred percent over. Big numbers or not, there is still a lot to process.

Also, given that he hasn’t really had close friends before, he now has to sort out his feelings. He says towards the beginning of the series that he just wants to be Anna’s friend, but by the end their playful flirting seems to have evolved into something more. What that is exactly is left purposefully undefined.

Conclusion

Makeine: Too Many Losing Heroines is, above all else, about second-guessing ourselves. Human relationships are fluid and changing, and for someone who has had little experience in the way of friends or romance, it can be difficult. Still, even at our lowest points, it is important to pick up what few pieces are there and keep trying. Lord knows there are others just like us.

Have you all seen Makeine? What did you think? Let me know in the comments.

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