One of the best romance anime of all time is an underrated masterpiece, but there’s one thing that keeps it from being huge

When it comes to shojo romance anime, old classics like Fruit basket and Kimi no Todoke They’re usually the first ones that come to mind, and while these series undoubtedly deserve the love they receive, a particularly underrated series often goes unnoticed. Kiss Kamisama by Julietta Suzuki is without a doubt one of the best shojo romance anime of all time, but there is one thing that stops it from being as great as others in the genre.

Despite having been shown twelve years ago, Kiss Kamisama remains one of the most unique shojo romance anime of its kind. Although the story makes use of many typical clichés, its sweet and courageous protagonist, heartwarming supernatural romance, and simple yet heartfelt underlying story easily win over viewers. However, the anime’s incomplete adaptation and highly condensed ending likely hold the series back from being one of the greats, while the manga’s inaccessibility highlights a larger problem with the treatment of shojo manga as a whole.

Kamisama Kiss anime was left criminally unfinished

The series’ beautiful ending was crammed into OVAs

Kiss Kamisama follows the journey of an ordinary schoolgirl named Nanami Momozono, who becomes an earth god and falls in love with her familiar, an ancient wild fox spirit named Tomoe. The series details her struggles as a human-turned-goddess introduced to the wonderful and equally dangerous supernatural world, but eventually evolves into much more as the story progresses. Animated by TMS Entertainment, Kiss Kamisama first aired in 2012 and was until Lucky to be renewed for a second season three years later.

The fact that the series received a second season is a miracle, as many beloved shojo anime don’t have much luck. Unfortunately, Kiss Kamisama‘second season without a doubt created unnecessary problems for the franchise. As an adaptation, the second season is very faithful to the source material, maintains a good pace and really begins to present the true conflict of the story.

However, the various plot threads introduced in Season 2 never got the chance to be properly developed, as the series was never renewed for a third season. As a result, fans were left with many confusing questions, the biggest of which being Akura-oh’s identity and his relationship with Tomoe.

These problems were compounded by the fact that the anime concluded with four OVAs that greatly condensed the resolution of Tomoe and Nanami’s relationship, while also cutting Tomoe’s entire character arc. While season 1 covered volumes 1 to 5 and season 2 roughly covered volumes 6 to 10 for a total of 25 episodes, only the final four episodes of the OVA were packed with four entire volumes of content.

While the ending was undoubtedly still very beautiful, it was pretty much just the skeleton of a story that could have been ten times more impactful if the anime had properly adapted the manga and given the story the time it needed to reach that beautiful resolution.

Like many Shojo Manga, Kamisama Kiss is not available on demand

Fans curious about the series have no choice but to purchase the volume

Regardless of its unfinished state, Kiss Kamisama‘ the anime is still a good gateway to the manga. Reading the manga will probably solve any problems with the story. However, an issue that arises is that the only way to legally read the manga is to purchase each volume, whether digitally or physically. Although Viz offers brief previews of each volume, they are also region locked and the series remains notably absent from Viz’s on-demand offerings and subscription plans, like countless other Hakusensha-owned shojo manga.

Despite owning the rights to many of the greatest shojo manga of all time, Hakusensha has not yet offered any of its series on demand and this issue seems to extend even to other genres, such as Furious also suffers from the same inaccessibility. This absence is especially felt with the emergence of revolutionary reading apps like Shueisha’s Manga Plus, which offers Japanese manga in multiple languages ​​with comprehensive subscription tiers. That said, even existing reading platforms still lack shojo representation, which introduces another pressing issue.

Shojo Manga has not yet received a dedicated reading app

Although Shōnen has multiple options, Shojo remains despised

While shōnen manga are available on a variety of online reading platforms such as Viz, Shōnen Jump Plus, Manga Plus, and K-manga, shojo and josei manga are has not yet received a single dedicated reading app. Shueisha has admittedly made strides in this regard with the recent introduction of Rimacomi+, which hosts Shueisha’s shojo and josei series. However, the app is currently only available in Japan.

Although platforms like K-manga and Mangamo offer some shojo series like A sign of affection, My love story with Yamada-kun in Lv999, and even older and beloved Josei series, such as ChihayafuruHakusensha is a huge success The Hana to Yume manga remain a notable absence.

Shojo manga as a whole remains largely neglected and the genre will likely not be able to grow beyond a handful of existing hits unless it is given the same opportunities as Shōnen manga. Although female readers make up a significant percentage of the shōnen audience, many male readers still shy away from giving shojo and josei series a chance and having to buy a volume to do so won’t help the situation at all.

Although Kiss Kamisama had around 5 million copies in circulation in 2016, when the manga ended, the series hardly received the recognition it truly deserved. Kiss Kamisama It could have been as big as other shojo classics if the anime hadn’t gone the way it did.

That said, there has recently been something of a shojo renaissance with Bed and breakfast for spirit drinks being renewed after seven years, Kimi ni Todoke receiving a second season after thirteen years, and The Rose of Versailles returning to a film after forty years. As such, while Kiss Kamisama‘ the prospects for a remake are slim given that the manga ended years ago, these revivals at least leave the door open.