When you feel like you've had your fill of the typical high school romance—which is very common in shoujo anime—sometimes you just have go out of your comfort zone in order to find something new. If shoujo is aimed towards teenage girls, then josei is for an older female audience.
Josei is a category of anime targeting a demographic seeking anime or manga that expands on the romance genre into more mature or serious issues. Because of the age shift, josei explores themes such as adulthood and the realities of love and relationships. It deviates away from the idealities that are more common in anime in order to present a different kind of perspective on life. Here's a list of ten josei anime that you can relax to with a bowl of popcorn the next time you're in the mood for a different kind of anime-watching experience.
1. Usagi Drop
This is probably one of the most heartwarming anime that you will ever see. Imagine that one day you suddenly find out that your grandfather recently passed away and that he left behind a six year-old illegitimate daughter that you now have to raise by yourself! Usagi Drop focuses on the life of Daikichi Kawachi, a 30 year-old bachelor and Rin, the shy young girl he takes in despite not having any experience in taking care of children. Watching Daikichi slowly learn the ropes on how to raise a kid and the lifestyle changes that he makes for Rin leaves you smiling at their gentle and sometimes clumsy interactions.
2. Chihayafuru
3. Chouyaku Hyakununishhu: Uta Koi
If you wanted to learn more the intriguing love poems used in karuta, Uta Koi depicts a little snippet of the lives of the poets behind the works of Japanese literature, giving it a modern spin. Each poem is introduced and interpreted by the Fujiwara no Teika, the man who compiled the poems in an anthology during the 12th century. It makes for an easygoing watch who those are interested in Japan’s literary history.
4. Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu
Rakugo is a very obscure Japanese form of storytelling. A single person sits on stage with only a paper fan and small cloth to use as props while storyteller, called a rakugoka, tells a comedic story about two or more characters. The rakugoka plays each character, which can be differentiated only by changes in the rakugoka’s tones and emotions. The presence of rakugo is embedded in the dynamics of the two main leads from childhood and onwards to as careers. Shouwa Rakugo excels in depicting the lasting impact that rakugo had on the characters, as they go on to tell the tales of their flawed past, ones of friendship, family, romance, and finding one’s own potential.
5. Sakamichi no Apollon
This coming-of-age series is a simple one for those who want something to sit back and relax to. The audience is taken back to the 1960’s, where Kaoru Nishimi, an introverted transfer student, encounters the school’s resident delinquent, Sentarou Kawabuchi, and the class president, Ritsuko Mukae. Kaoru and Sentarou bond over jazz, which quickly leads to a close friendship. Sakamichi no Apollon mainly focuses on the ups-and-downs of the relationships between the three main characters and conveys them in such a way that the series feels much more relatable than other shoujo anime.
6. Nodame Cantabile
Nodame Cantabile veers away from the typical high school setting and steps it up to the next chapter of many young adult lives: college. But not just any kind of university—a prestigious music university. Similar to Sakamichi to Apollon, music is the core of the series and is the common ground between the quirky Megumi Noda and the perfectionist Chiaki Shinichi. Nodame Cantabile is a light-hearted romance anime between two artists as they grow closer to each other and to the goals that they aspire to achieve in their classical music careers.
7. Natsuyuki Rendezvous
Losing a loved one is never easy and it can be incredibly difficult to move on from that grief. Natsuyuki Rendezvous presents a strange love triangle between a young man named Ryousuke Hazuki, an older widow named Rokka Shimao who manages a flower shop, and the ghost of her deceased husband, Atsushi. I’ll admit that there are some flaws to the pacing but it’s still a refreshing sight that offers some variation in the josei category.
8. Kuragehime
Kuragehime, otherwise known as Jellyfish Princess, is an odd anime with a plot as strange as its name. The cast features a hodgepodge group of very eccentric otaku girls living in an apartment building in Tokyo, where the only residents allowed are women. One of the girls is Tsukimi Kurashita, a socially awkward girl who loves jellyfish to an excessive degree. One day, Tsukimi befriends a stylish woman named Kuranosuke Koibuchi. However, Tsukimi eventually finds out that Kuranosuke is hiding a secret—he is actually the son of a wealthy politician and enjoys cross-dressing as woman. The plot of Kuragehime revolves around the interactions of Tsukimi, Kuranosuke, and their friends and how they learn to break out of their shells. It’s an anime full of quirks and humor while it examines the expectations that society places on women.
9. Hachimitsu to Clover
Here’s another romance anime that is set in college. Here, the depth of the characters really take the spotlight. Hachimitsu to Clover fleshes out its cast through the extrapersonal and interpersonal problems that they encounter, producing realistic individuals that don’t feel like many of the cut-and-paste clichés that overrun the anime industry. Being a romance anime, what Hachimitsu to Clover does wonderfully is showing that love isn’t just heartwarming fluff but also heart-wrenching bitterness. It combines a perfectly balanced mix of melancholy and cheer that is enough to satisfy anyone who is searching for something different from the typical angsty high school drama.
10. Ristorante Paradiso
With a slightly classier tone, Ristorante Paradiso takes viewers across the world to a small restaurant in a corner off the streets of Rome. In most shoujo anime, the main character finds herself smitten by a bunch of pretty schoolboys. Here, our heroine Nicoletta is charmed by a cast of older gentlemen, some of whom may already have families of their own. It’s an anime with a slower pace without the excessive dollop of over-the-top, dramatic schoolgirl crushes.
Clearly, no matter what captures your interest, shoujo anime has a little something for everyone!
