Shuichi Shindou is a rising rock musician. Acting as the lead singer for Bad Luck the band hes been pushing since high school with an old friend of his the struggle to break out is all he can focus on. One night as hes sitting alone in the park working on his lyrics one sheet is ripped away from him by the wind landing at the feet of a tall silent stranger who picks it up and after only a glance hands it back to him declaring him completely talentless. Furious at this rebuke Shuichi tracks down this stranger a successful novelist by the name of Eiri Yuki intending to give him a piece of his mind... Instead unintentionally handing over a piece of his heart. From here a chance encounter blossoms into a roller coaster of complicated romantic entanglement with each new revelation either drawing them closer together or tearing them apart. Will the trials and tribulations of their turbulent romance guide Shuichi towards his bright future? Will Shuichi be the key to unlocking Eiris tragic past? Or have they both just been Bad Luck for each other all along? Sometimes it genuinely surprises me that Studio Deen is still alive and kicking. It doesnt have as cursed a resume as Xebec but I do think its fair to say that their output has been more miss than hit over the years and their track record doesnt paint the most assuring of portraits overall. They have done quite a few impressive looking anime over the years but lets just say they had to dig through quite a bit of dirt to find that gold. Its telling that their best period was probably in the nineties when anime had a good excuse to look bad. Still Gravitation isnt their worst looking title. Thats not to say it looks good what with janky and limited character motion and some very obviously reused footage in the concert scenes but it gets by just well enough. The director was at least savvy enough to never push the animation beyond its financial limits generally saving as much money as he could for Shuichis impressive array of physical gag comedy. Other than that this series is mostly grounded in reality in its visual presentation and if Shuichi isnt being extra the cheaper animation does work with the shows sense of humor and direction of dialogue. The designs unfortunately are highly generic and monotonous with only Eiri and Yuki really standing out and very few other characters being visibly memorable from scene to scene. Its easy to get characters mixed up once in a while especially with the mostly anatomically correct aesthetic they all followThis is probably due in part to the fact that there arent a lot of female characters in the cast and there are only so many hairstyles and colors that the audience will take seriously Shuichi being pink is already pushing things and a fairly consistent color palette that can switch from bright and colorful to drab and boring pretty abruptly. I mean that in reference to both the characters and the backgrounds by the way with some shots feeling like they took place in entirely different universes. The English dub is sadly not that much better. Im not entirely sure who made it as I keep running into conflicting information but the cast is almost exclusively full of nonames and smalltimers who peaked and were forgotten twenty years ago. The only two names I recognize are Megan Hollingshead and the late Rachel Lillis both of whom are impressive in their very small roles. Im not entirely sure how I feel about Rich McNanna in the lead role though... Hes an actor Ive never heard of before but to his credit he tries really hard to match the chaotic energy and sincere charm of Shuichi its probably the best performance in the show but I cant help thinking how much better Greg Ayres would have been in the role. True Rich does match the Japanese voice in the undubbed song sequences pretty well but the solution to that would be to let Ayres sing his own songs. Everyone else is either bland or forgettableexcept for ADR director Bill Timoney who was clearly having a blast hamming it up as the bands manager but the only other actor Im going to comment on is Rome Elliot who plays Yuki with the emotional range of Microsoft Sam. Like with Shuichi I couldnt help imagining another actor in the role namely Chris Patton who could have easily added a layer of condescending sarcasm. So here we are again talking about a yaoi anime for reasons that Ill get into later on in the review. Ive had my hang ups about this kind of content in the past so before we get any deeper into this where does Gravitation stand with the problematic elements that Im usually on the lookout for? Well first off everyones of age thats a good thing. This series isnt afraid to be known as a gay anime so the actual yaoi element of the writing isnt buried in subtext. And most importantly theres almost no nonconsensual eroticism in sight Well when I say almost there are a couple of uninvited kisses which is a terrible idea in real life but its usually not too over the line in a fictional romantic fantasy especially if they dont FEEL like violations. Id place it alongside Bloom Into You in terms of severity uninvited kisses that just happen to lead to better results than youd expect. Theres a bit more but its a big spoiler Ill just say its handled pretty well. Beyond that Yuki is occasionally kind of a dick but his relationship with Shuichi isnt straight up toxic or anything. Actually their relationship is one of the two pillars of the show the other one being Shuichi as a character in general. Since I brought him up I might as well start with him Shuichi is a fantastic main character. Hes not just likeable hes outright lovable. Hes one of those characters whos too dimwitted to be dishonest too innocent to be negative and too sincere to be disloyal. He is to put it bluntly the best possible variety of dumbass the kind who wears his heart on his sleeve at all times and while he can be selfcentered its not with any malicious intent he would never screw over his friends on purpose... And somehow despite the fact that hes extra as all hell he never comes off as annoying. Part of this is because of how well balanced the comedy surrounding him is. Hes kind of a Looney Tune constantly breaking reality with his antics which would normally bother me in a series where everything else is largely grounded in reality but his defiance to such rules is at least kept consistent throughout the series. Also he is just genuinely really funny about it. Like yeah hell pop into a conversation out of nowhere in a silly costume for no fucking reason but then hell deliver a serious speech while still wearing the damn costume and I cant not laugh at that. There are moments that are so thoroughly divorced from reality that I almost cant justify how hard I laughed at them like the strangest reaction to a sniper attack that Ive ever seen. Eiri Yuki isnt quite as likeable as Shuichi... Hell call a spade a spade hes flat out not likeable. On his own he ranges from boring to just plain unpleasant and just barely sympathetic when elements of his past are revealed. Thankfully thats just on his own. Paired with Shuichi well I actually really like them as a couple. They have wonderful chemistry together combining the old Fool and Straight Man dynamic to its most romantic possible conclusion as the energetic goofball Shuichi relentlessly tries to get close enough to Yuki to break down his barriers while Yuki alternates between fighting with himself over letting someone get close and protecting his adorable pursuer. Opposites are very much attracting in this situation and its some genuinely compelling stuff. As for the story itself its fine. Both Yuki and Shuichi have their own individual character arcs that are at worst serviceable enough. Theres a ton of screen time dedicated to the rise of Shuichis band as he deals with the backstage politics and bureaucracy of the music industry while Yuki is dealing with other aspects of his life such as his tragic backstory his family and an inconvenient arranged engagement. Theres a lot of intrigue going on some backstabbing and some genuinely tough choices that characters have to make and while I didnt find any of this boring or tedious it kept my attention well enough its not that memorable and I really only cared about any of it as far as it was a backdrop to Shuichis antics and his developing relationship with Yuki. The main character and his chemistry and dynamic with his love interest was what carried this series for me and those two elements are in my opinion what makes this show worth watching and recommending to other people. Shuichi is a great protagonist and paired up with Yuki they form one of my favorite BL anime couples period. But all of this has been leading to a question that Ive been meaning to address for a while now even though I have no idea if anyone has actually been asking it Why do I watch so much yaoi these days? Im not gay. I dont get the same kind of erotic thrill from it that I sometimes get from yuri. So why is this of all things what Ive been seeking out lately? Well its time for me to go off on another one of my long winded tangents and its gonna be a political one so if thats not something you want to deal with right now skip to the conclusion. Unless youve been living under a rock life for the LGBT community has been getting increasingly difficult over the last few years and it was frankly never that easy in the first place. Hatred and bigotry are on the rise to a degree that hasnt been seen in decades. A violent backlash against the progress of the early 2010s has pushed farright extremism from the fringes of society into the mainstream. Book burnings are back in force. Anti discrimination laws are vanishing. Conservatives have found clever ways to reappropriate the names of actual serious crimes to describe things they hate. They refer to LGBT related literature as pornography so they can screech about schools making porn accessible to children so they can spread anger amongst people who dont question their logic. They refer to LGBT people and anyone who affirms the nonstraight identities of minors or even lets kids know that homosexuality exists and is an option for them as groomers. Remember Kevin Conroy the voice of Batman for generations? After he died of cancer conservative groups branded him a groomer for being a gay man who kids looked up to. By that logic Elton John must also be a groomer since he was my childhood icon fuck you. This year America kicked off Pride Month with the murder of actor Jonathan Joss his husband and his dog by homophobic neighbors who also burned his house down and this happened in fucking 2025. The people responsible for all of this targeted outrage hold all of the power and its disturbingly likely that theyll find a way to subvert or outright cancel any upcoming election that threatens their power. Life is getting darker and bleeker for this innocent community and theres very little you can actually do about it almost none of which stands a chance of creating any actual change. You can protest and speak out you can offer a safe haven and travel assistance you can be a supportive presence in the lives of any LGBT people that you know... And you can watch a ton of gay media. Now you may be asking how does that help anybody? Well from one perspective it doesnt. What you watch on your own time in the privacy of your own home isnt going to improve anybodys lives in any tangible way. But it can change your own perspective. One of the first reviews I ever wrote was for Free Iwatobi Swimming Club a show I really liked but that my friends were skittish about. One of them asked me How gay is this show? And I basically called it a gender flipped KOn where characters are close friends and their interactions are only flirty if you interpret it that way. When I wrote the review with these people in mind I spent three paragraphs describing how it wasnt a gay anime and while my intention was to assure my straight friends that it wasnt like that the review comes off as very accidentally homophobic which is why its the one review Ive never posted to Anilist. I didnt watch much yaoi back then but now that I do I would not have made that same mistake if I reviewed the series today. The more gay media you expose yourself to especially if you take the time to discuss said material with actual LGBT viewers the more you educate yourself on the topic and the more you normalize homosexuality in your own mind. You can change the world even just a little bit by indulging in this material regardless of whether its good or bad. Its a good way to breed solidarity and understanding and a little bit of both goes a long way. Okay you ask so why yaoi specifically? Because there isnt a whole lot of trans anime to pick fromWandering Son FTW and yuri is something I would watch normally anyway and have been for years. Besides if were being brutally honest lesbian representation has always been easier to find than gay male media. Like I love the new Shera cartoon but have you noticed how Bows Dads are the only samesex couple on that show who never kiss onscreen? Or how all of Steven Universes queer representation involves femalecoded gems? Or how every canonically confirmed LGBT character in RWBY is female? Or how in comic books Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy get to have a fullfledged romance but every major male character like Loki Deadpool and Constantine who get confirmed as bi or pan have that side of their sexualities relegated to jokes and vague references to previous events we didnt get to see? Theres also Legend of Korra Adventure Time Arcane Camp Creataceous the list goes on. I am not going to pretend to know why female queerness is considered more socially acceptable than male queerness. Frankly thats a discussion for another day. What it means to me is that watching yaoi feels like a significant act of defiance against a society that conditions men to fear and ridicule anything that might pose a threat to their manhood and even moreso to the political movement that sprang up from it. Dude you watched a gay movie does that mean youre GAY now? laughs Yes I grew up in the nineties and early 2000s. My point is not everything deserves to be normalized... Some things really SHOULDNT be normalized... But this is something that should be. You should watch yaoi especially if it makes you uncomfortable hell you should watch it until it STOPS making you uncomfortable because even if theres nothing else you can do to make the world a better place for someone else that little offering of solidarity and understanding and that little step towards normalcy is literally the least you can do. Or maybe Im just an ignorant Asexual who should stay in his own lane who fucking knows it just feels right to me. Gravitation has been available on DVD and Bluray from several sources over the years but seems to currently be the property of Crunchyroll who also stream the series. An OVA duology that I havent yet seen is available on most physical releases. The original manga by Maki Murakami is available from Seven Seas. So this review went a little off the rails but I do enthusiastically recommend checking out Gravitation. Its not a perfect show it definitely has its flaws... The visuals are mediocre at best the English dub only has a few bright spots and the actual plot and cast of characters outside of the main couple are nothing to write home about. The humor may not work for everyone what with its loose grasp on reality and the presentation is a little rough but it succeeds where it needed to presenting a compelling engaging and genuinely wellwritten love story between two queer characters and we need more stories like that in our current political climate. In any case if youre looking for somewhere to begin your Boys Love journey Gravitation is a good place to start. Its a pretty good show. Its not the best yaoi or my personal favorite yaoi but where Love Stage could be seen as too explicit and where Yuri on Ice could be seen as not explicit enough Gravitation is the porridge in the middle thats just right. I give Gravitation a 7/10