Citrus: Nuanced Mediocrity

If you haven’t heard of Citrus, the anime and manga series, I greatly envy you. Ever since the day I was cursed with the knowledge of its existence, I haven’t been able to get it out of my mind because frankly not only do I have too much to say but also, I don’t know how to feel about it.

Without directly interacting with the community, it’s a little difficult to understand how truely polarising this series actually is. Before doing research into it, I had previously held the assumption that most believed it to be a good anime or at the very least thought of it in some positive manner. But after looking through so many myanimelist reviews and finding critic scores from a number point of view it’s generally agreed to be mediocre. Which is extremely fascinating!

When you take a look at the plot, it’s easy to become deterred by its premise. Actually, I take that back. If you look up the synopsis and take that as your expectation into watching or reading the series, then you might want to have your cursor over the close tab button because you’re going to be in for an unpleasant surprise.

To put it simply: Our protagonist, Yuzu, a fashionable and outgoing girl is transferred to an all girls school after her mother remarries to another man. After an absolutely horrible first day, she finds out that the student council president, Mei Aihara, has become her stepsister. This leads to a troubling series of events that include “stepcest”, approximately too many lewd scenes, and so many non-consensual acts. Strap in everyone, this is going to be a long one.

From that explanation and my general vibe up until now, you’re probably expecting yet another negative review for this series. However, you couldn’t be more wrong. Well, you could but that’s not the point. I don’t want to sit here and tell you to avoid it completely because of its problematic nature. And I certainly don’t want to put it up on a pedestal and make it the new face of the yuri community like many have already done either. When you have a series like Citrus, it’s important to approach it with a certain degree of critical thinking to truly understand its nuances without condoning the actions made by the characters.

You’re probably wondering how a manga with that plotline would ever get greenlit for an anime series and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t thinking the same. At the same time however, I understand why they made it. Basically, it was a move to fix whatever trainwreck the manga had made.

Starting with the elephant in the room, that being all the more questionable scenes and events throughout the narrative. This series tells you exactly what to expect from the beginning, with Mei forcing herself onto Yuzu within the first few chapters of the manga and within the first few minutes of the anime. This is an aspect where I think the anime was a mistake. When this scene occurs in the manga it is conveyed through the use of a singular panel, you flip to the next page and you’re done. In reading a manga, you choose how fast or slow you want to progress. You set the pacing of the story to a certain extent. Translating this scene over to the anime removes that choice entirely. Instead, you have to sit through an excruciating long scene, watching Yuzu kick and flail uncomfortably as she struggles beneath Mei. I would go as far as to call it horrifying. Forget horror movies, this is where it’s at.

It’s unclear whether the anime (or the manga for that matter) uses scenes like this as shock value or fanservice. It’s from scenes like this that creates the controversy surrounding the series. When you watch anything within the romance genre, you expect to follow a relationship that is filled with love, not one that is founded on assault. There are other mentionable scenes like the one where Mei’s best friend “crosses the line” with Mei after getting increasingly jealous over the closeness that the pair had developed. This scene is less explicit (if anything in this series can even be described as such). We never get to know what happens and much of it is left for the audience to fill in the blanks. It’s mentioned once after and then because Mei doesn’t want to talk about it, it’s swept under the rug. Much like most of the decisions made by the characters.

Another very questionable event occurs later in the series where they introduce a girl, Matsuri, that Yuzu used to babysit. This girl is much younger but despite that she’s probably the most scandalous. Her actions are more extreme when compared to Mei. Mei is more quantity than quality (if we for some reason want to go with that analogy). She does “small” negative actions that stack up overtime whereas Matsuri just goes straight to what can only be described as sexual exploitation of minors. I wish I was joking. Her whole introductory arc is about her blackmailing Mei into going on dates with creepy dudes who she definitely knows will “cross the line”.

Citrus is often labelled for its “romanticisation of sexual abuse”. And honestly? Who can blame anyone for thinking that. But I think there’s something deeper within this series to take away. For us to understand why these things happen in the series, we have to understand the characters and how their actions shape them. A major problem with Citrus is that it doesn’t give enough time for these characters to explain themselves or prove themselves to be something more than a harasser. This is especially true of the anime which condenses approximately half of the manga into a 12 episode run.

There are a lot of characters in this series. And I mean a lot. From a writing standpoint this is awful because outside of our main pair, not many of them get any type of development. Most of the characters are left one-dimensional no matter how many times they appear or how much time they’re given. On one hand, it makes sense that the writer would want to focus on our main two girls but on the other hand, having every character’s whole arc and/or personality based around their desire for either girl is repetitive and boring. The biggest offender here is a character by the name of Suzaran Shiraho, someone so forgettable I had to go hunt down her name on the Fandom website. Her whole deal is that she creates this threat of outing Mei and Yuzu because she’s so observant and also has zero social skills. Oh also she has a crush on Mei, no big deal. There’s this long arc that centres around her as a complication but not only is it boring, it’s also unnecessary. To back up my point, the anime not only cuts out this arc but also her as a whole. It’s not like you even miss anything by not reading this part of the manga because her arc is like Matsuri but with Mei! They do this so much. Every new “antagonist” is just a wrench in the relationship, actually it would be more appropriate to call them papercuts because they’re small, annoying, and inconvenient at best. I mean, even Matsuri’s arc, as uncomfortable as it is to read, had some type of substance to it.

Now let’s talk about our main girls, shall we? Yuzu is the light to Mei’s dark. It’s what makes their relationship interesting and engaging. Yuzu on her own is a bubbly character. She’s rebellious and headstrong, sticking to her feelings and values no matter the consequences. Her disregard for authority is something that’s to be played off as immature when compared to her younger sister, Mei. Mei, as her position as student council president suggests, is extremely loyal to the rules. She likes order and structure, something that later becomes a character flaw as I will explain. From the view of Yuzu, Mei is more mature and experienced with relationships. Or so we’re told to believe.

Subverting the audience’s expectations is one of the things I think the series actually does well. It takes these traits we’ve come to expect and flips it on its head. Or in the case of Yuzu and Mei, gives a surface level impression of one thing before revealing through unspoken moments that the complete opposite is true. I don’t want to call it poetic, but I will give credit where credit is due.

Mei is a problematic character in nature but this is what makes her so interesting compared to the rest of the cast. The more we see of her, the more we understand why she does the things that she does.

Mei is shown to be stickler for the rules. This is due to her connections with the Aihara family. She is expected to be a perfect example for the students and uphold the reputation of her family’s name. The tragedy that comes from Mei is the fact that everyone wants to forget the fact that she’s a child, 16 actually. The fact that she’s expected to carry herself with such a high level of control and authority throughout her childhood without the freedom to live as a kid is what makes her who she is. She’s so quick and prone to do adult and mature things because frankly, she just doesn’t know any better. Her first relationship is with a teacher and if you ask me or anybody at that, it’s pretty messed up. The one relationship that she is exposed to, as we quickly learn, is not based on anything type of love. It’s purely physical and to make matters worse, Mei is being used for her family’s money. She’s been taught to be almost emotionless because that’s her idea of maturity. When she was told that the relationship she had with the teacher wasn’t what she expected, she pretends that she knew all along and wasn’t hurt by it. Throughout both the manga and anime, she constantly represses her emotions because that is a sign of weakness. When it comes to Yuzu and other characters around her, she treats them the only way she knows how, with physicality regardless of consent.

Her knack for structure is only further emphasised in the later chapters of the manga. There’s a chapter or so where Yuzu and Mei go on a date. Yuzu has been writing up a book of what she fantasises being with Mei would be like. And when Mei finds it, she doesn’t let go. During the course of the date, she follows everything to the letter. Yuzu wants to eat here? Sure. Yuzu wants to hold hands? Of course. This makes Mei extremely absent. Yuzu rightfully gets upset and throws the book into a body of water. So what does Mei do? Continue on the date naturally? No, of course not, she jumps right in after the book. It’s a heartbreaking scene but it is one that truly defines Mei’s character. The scene highlights how little she really knows about relationships. And as much as she and other characters would wish to believe, she’s not as mature as she seems. Underneath her strong-willed demeanour, is a scared little girl.

The adult presence (or lack thereof) in Mei’s life has always failed her. Mei’s biological mother and father split when she was very young. Her dad then chose to leave the academy and teach students around the world, neglecting his only child. Her grandfather, although physically present, is extremely disconnected and sees her as an heir to his fortune rather than a granddaughter. And of course, I’ve already explained what that one teacher did to her. Out of these four, it is her father who is the most intriguing. Despite what he does, Mei still looks up to him. The scenes that show Mei breaking out of her comfort zone and being emotionally expressive are those that are catalysed by her father. She sees him as an icon who is a perfect example of an Aihara. The knowledge that he left the academy destroys her and she couldn’t understand why he would choose to do so. It’s the struggle between resentment and idolisation that tears Mei apart. She’s lived her whole life trying to be like her father, so when he became something other than “perfect”, she snaps, leading to another uncomfortable scene that you can go find yourself. But it’s from this moment that Mei learns to be more open. She can see now that there isn't one definition of perfection and it certainly isn’t something she can achieve nor should be expected to achieve. When Mei is welcomed into this new family that isn’t defined by their money or status, she actually experiences “true love” and not necessarily in the romantic kind.

In the last episode of the anime, Mei is chased down by Yuzu. It’s a symbol of her running away from not only her feelings, but also Yuzu’s. But there’s also so much more. When the two finally collide, they have a heart to heart which leads to Yuzu giving Mei an ultimatum. Yuzu waits, eyes closed, for Mei to give her the kiss that would seal the deal. And instead of doing the expected thing of leaning in, Mei uses her teddy bear to kiss Yuzu. The teddy bear is a symbol of her youth and fragility. It was given to her by her father before he left the picture and is something she holds close to her heart.This scene is actually sweet. It’s soft and a complete 180 from what we’ve come to expect from the series. The series is about both Yuzu’s and Mei’s inner conflicts over what they’re supposed to be and what they want to be. Yuzu is supposed to be an older sister but that means forfeiting what she feels. The same idea applies to Mei, with the book scene encompassing her struggle to be what Yuzu wants her to be.

This all neatly ties into the reason the series is named Citrus. Yuzu is the name of a citrus fruit that is said to have healing properties and can “treat the roughness of skin, warm the body, and relax the mind”. This is an obvious representation of how Yuzu manages to break down Mei’s many walls by giving her the comfort and warmth she so desperately needs.

I think the issue with this series is that it tries to be and do so much but at the same time it achieves almost nothing. The anime and the sequel series, Citrus+, were made out of an attempt to fix the many problems of the original. The anime does do a better job, I’ll give it that. But the Citrus+? That one is bland and unoriginal at best. It takes away most of the problematic aspects of the series but in doing so, it becomes another basic yuri manga. It focuses on the concept of the forbidden love having to be kept a secret from the world. In that sentence, I just described every lgbt+ fiction in reality. That series has a whole set of problems on its own but don’t really garner a response to, especially since it is still ongoing. The one upside to the new series is that it gives the side characters room to grow with Matsuri being one of them. The plus series gives Matsuri the dimensionality she so desperately needed by making her a better person who wants to help Mei and Yuzu in their relationship. It’s a nice change of pace from this purely antagonist character we were once introduced to. She still keeps the edge that made her in the first place but now she has more reasoning to her actions than just “I’m in love with a girl I haven’t seen in years”. From what I’ve read of the new series, she’s the only one with any common sense so that’s rather interesting too.

As a sane person, I want to hate Citrus. But as an analytical person, I kind of like it. Citrus is not a masterpiece by any definition of the word. And it’s not the bottom of the barrel either, that title belongs to a different yuri anime. This series certainly has its problems but there are moments that I enjoyed. Citrus is probably the most torn I’ve ever been over whether I should like it or not. There was so much pulling from either direction that it was hard to tell what I was supposed to feel when reading/watching it besides discomfort and in that, I can only describe this series as a guilty pleasure. The art style is so nice for the nature of the series and the same goes for the opening. The plot had something there but it never really knew what it wanted to do. That is to say there’s definitely room for improvement. There are rumours that a second season of the anime is going to be made and I’m personally not mentally prepared for it. So should you check this series out? Well, it’s your life, I’m not going to stop you. I think that because of the complicated morality behind the narrative and the rather questionable ways it represents its themes at a surface level, Citrus is quite intriguing to explore on an analytical basis. Both the manga and anime have their different things they do well and it’s fun to see how an adaption can change how we view a series. And with that reasoning, it would be interesting for you to experience it yourself. I’m not paying for your therapy bills though.