OPINION: Is Junichiro from Tomo-chan Is a Girl! Oblivious or Cautious?
Tomo and Junichiro have a simple-looking, yet complicated relationship. They’re best buds, they fight one another, they have fun together, but Tomo seems to want something extra out of their friendship. She wants Jun to see her “as a girl” and for them to take their relationship to the next level.
Jun, on the other hand, seems oblivious to what Tomo wants. Is Jun perhaps playing coy for his own specific reasons? Or is he actually unable to see Tomo’s true feelings? There are a lot of factors at play here, so let’s examine what’s truly going on in Tomo-chan Is a Girl! in regard to Jun’s feelings.
Let’s take a look at the idea of Jun being completely oblivious. The opening scene of the series shows Tomo point blank confessing her feelings to Jun, who in response, shrugs it off as if she’s just saying she loves him as a friend would. To anyone else, this would seem like your standard love confession, but it somehow flies completely over Jun’s head. To top it off, he makes sure they fist bump because, after all, they’re best friends. What pair of friends don’t fist bump all the time?! If he’s unable to see the fact that she’s actually confessing, maybe he truly is oblivious when it comes to romantic advances.
However, this does fly in the face of what we learn later — that he previously had a brief relationship with their mutual friend, Misuzu. Jun was the one that actually initiated that relationship, so you would presume this gave him some insight into others’ feelings and how to read them.
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So let’s go with the theory I’d like to present — that he’s very cautious in what he’s doing when it comes to Tomo. It’s pretty clear he does have some sort of feelings for her. Whether or not he’s actually taken the time to sort those out remains to be seen, but it would be very curious and strange for him to react in a visceral way when Misuzu egged him on about Tomo dating someone if he didn’t have feelings for her.
In spite of how Jun might feel, this has been his de facto friendship since childhood and, in a way, Tomo is someone he looks up to as someone who has this brave, no-nonsense attitude about life and leads him on adventures he normally wouldn’t have if she wasn’t in his life. When you have a deep-seated friendship with someone that long, it’s hard to imagine it not being something that’s always been a part of you.
There’s never a guarantee when two people get together that they’ll end up lasting or that their previous relationship remains intact. Looking at it specifically through that lens, it’s easy to see that Jun might be way more apprehensive about jumping headfirst into a relationship, because what happens if things don’t work out?
Jun seems to be incredibly careful not to send any signals that he might reciprocate Tomo’s feelings. He is cognizant of the fact that the two of them sharing an umbrella can have romantic implications. He sees her in soaked clothes and bolts away because he gets embarrassed. The same thing happens when he sees her in just a skirt without her shorts because, suddenly, he’s seeing her in a different light. He also saves a video of her from when they go and do karaoke, another instance where he notes that she seemed different.
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Slowly but surely, he has to be seeing that she’s trying out all of these different tactics for him and him alone.
Do I think they’d manage to work things out if they did get together? Yeah, absolutely. Obviously, there’d be a lot of awkwardness in terms of how the dynamic of their relationship would change, but overall, they’d probably still act the same way toward each other. While Tomo might be ready to try, Jun seems to want to have his guard up on the off chance something bad would happen. That’s something I can’t fault him for doing, but at some point, they should perhaps communicate about that in order to find a solution.
I think Tomo will eventually figure out exactly how Jun feels and why he’s been so evasive toward her advances. Hopefully, he’s able to explain why he needed to be cautious in his demeanor and not jump head-first into a relationship, then maybe they can get together and be happy. After all, they are two goofballs who enjoy spending time together — sometimes in eccentric ways. If there’s one thing for certain, it’s that Jun for sure knows Tomo is, in fact, a girl.
What do you think is up with Jun and will we see these two goofballs get together this season? Let us know in the comments below!
Jared Clemons is a writer and podcaster for Seasonal Anime Checkup and author of One Shining Moment: A Critical Analysis of Love Live! Sunshine!!. He can be found on Twitter @ragbag.
