Finally, an Anime that displays social anxiety/ASD perfectly

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I just recently decided to read the manga of Watamote, it having about 183 chapters when the anime finished around chapter 34, and I had an experience that I wanted to talk about it, looking for a place to do so, thus I picked this old discussion made about the series, although I want to talk about the manga.

Pretty much a lot changes in the series, where Tomoko moves past her problem in not being able to talk to anyone, managing to get a fairly sizable friend group at this point. But most relevant to this site and discussion, I did want to zone in one one particular character that got introduced in one of the most important arcs, the school trip at around chapter 69, Yuri Tamura.



Yuri is less socially anxious than Tomoko, she does not trip over her words in stammering to talk to people, but although not obvious at first she somewhat has even harder problems socializing. She had only one friend that she found it easy or comfortable to talk with, and seemed to if not in a socialising mood with said friend she would wear headphones to block out other people talking. Even when Tomoko becomes her friend Yuri shows a lot of trouble talking with people outside of her small friend group that she is really attached to, is not very expressive, I think has some problems picking up social cues and is very. If not obvious, I think that she too is also likely on the spectrum of ASD, where Tomoko and Yuri become friends with a shared dislike of forced on social situations that put them out of their comfort zone. And while Tomoko starts being able to talk to other easier after she has made some friends, being a little more aware of leaving impressions on people, Yuri has more trouble opening.

Like, there is this particular chapter where at a show the performer is trying to include the audience by asking their names and such, before they start singing and clapping, Yuri starts out doing almost nothing before Tomoko convinces her to try and pretend to show enthusiasm just so they would not be singled out, since Tomoko knows that she would not like being put in a spotlight. It just felt like a really good example of what it can be like on the spectrum, not just Tomoko sometimes exaggerated expressions, but one where subtle changes of expression and introverted tendencies can hide social issues that require a good eye to spot.



And there is a whole lot of other things I have enjoyed, from Tomoko's improvements after not worrying as much as she talks to others and more honest about herself, even having another otaku friend, even if they have different tastes. A delinquent friend. A girl with a secret big crush on her who actually likes Tomoko's charm. And a girl that is oddly really nice to Tomoko for her attention, who Tomoko is often blushing around and tries hard to only show good sides to, because Tomoko is totally in denial of being bisexual.

I don't know if I'd say it's by any means perfect but it certainly nails the painful awkwardness. I remember relating to her to an extent but aside from some of those traits she's kind of off her rocker and I feel that takes more of a center stage for the dark humor. So in the end I found Tomoki more relatable, simply because he's no where as warped.

Another anime that has a couple characters that display ND traits but in different was is Tonari no Kaibutsu-kun (My little Monster).

I'm diagnosed and I love anime! My big bro is my best friend and its something we always watched together as kids. I dont like the noise on the TV. So I watch most things on mute or like volume 2 with the subtitles. It wasn't until recently I found closed captioning on most things. Therefore, I started watching foreign language stuff early on. My bro and me watched marital arts movies and anime. Even as an adult I still love them both. Its also something I can always talk to my bro about even though he lives somewhere else now. We watch the same series or movie then talk about it, kinda like a book club. Lol