Tomo-Chan Is A Girl: Season 1/ Episode 3 ” Best Bud’s Secret / Let’s Go on a Date!” – Recap/ Review (with Spoilers)

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Information that may help you understand Jun’s feelings for Tomo arrive as she learns about Misuzu and Jun dating a few years ago.

Aired (Crunchyroll)	January 18, 2023
Episode Title	Best Bud’s Secret / Let’s Go on a Date!
Director(s)	Masahiko Suzuki
Writer(s)	Megumi Shimizu

Recap

This content contains pertinent spoilers. Also, images and text in this post may contain affiliate links which, if a purchase is made from those sites, we may earn money or products from the company.

So The Story Goes – Jun, Misuzu, Tomo

So what happened? From reconciling Jun and Misuzu’s story, after avoiding Tomo in the first year of middle school, Jun asked out Misuzu in their second year, and that relationship lasted only three days. The problem? Jun treated Misuzu as he would Tomo, and she couldn’t keep up physically. So, she went to break up with him, but he beat her to the punch, and him breaking up with her is why she eternally hates him.

But, at least once they ended things, Jun reconciled with Tomo and became close friends again.

More To Our Relationship Than You Know – Tomo, Jun, Misaki

With Jun realizing Misaki isn’t a girl, he gets very territorial. In fact, we learn that since Jun came back into Tomo’s life, he has been this way. However, with Misaki becoming scared of Jun and Tomo not liking that, she coerces him to be nice, leading to Jun opening up. Mainly in that, while he recognizes he can beat Tomo in a fight, if there are rules involved, he’d lose, for he may have the strength but his technique? Even with Jun still training under Tomo’s dad, he doesn’t have that.

And that’s the reason he hasn’t joined Misaki’s karate club. He doesn’t want to publicly lose to Tomo, and he swears Misaki to secrecy. But, being that Tomo too opens up to Misaki, he almost lets it slip that, in some ways, Jun does recognize Tomo is a girl, but Jun pops up in the nick of time to put the fear of God into Misaki.

Try Something Different – Carol, Misuzu, Jun, Tomo

Tomo has moved on from Misuzu dating Jun and knows Jun doesn’t have an interest in any other girl, but that doesn’t solve him not being interested in her either. So, the idea is, Tomo needs to take the lead, as she has always done in her friendship with Jun, but change things up. Together with Carol, Tomo and Misuzu go clothes shopping, and they don’t pick anything drastic, for they want her comfortable but a tad more girly. Also, enough of a switch to catch Jun’s eye but not to lead him to avoid her as he often does when he is forced to see Tomo as anything beyond his best friend.

This kind of works. The two still go to the batting cages and bowl, but then they go karaoke, and while only Tomo sings, kids’ songs at that, Jun does reveal something notable. Mainly that he has been following Tomo, despite how terrifying the things she proposes, because she has consistently found fun things that he enjoyed doing. Hence how long their friendship has been, even with her often getting him in trouble.

But, it seems with the subtle change in her appearance, he may have noticed the shift Misuzu and Carol intended. However, unlike before, when he could shake it off and weed out the thought before it could take root, Jun allows seeing Tomo differently to seep in.

Things To Note

Question(s) Left Unanswered

1. Was Jun’s purpose for dating Misuzu to help him understand his feelings better? To know if getting along with someone who is a girl means he should date them? So with Misuzu being an average girl and them getting along, he thought that was who he was meant to date?

What Could Happen Next

1. Since Misuzu made it seem Jun is a hot commodity, likely a girl confessing to him and Tomo getting jealous that he takes another girl’s confession seriously, even if he rejects them, but didn’t take hers serious.

Review

Highlights

Carol and Misuzu Recognizing They Had To Ease Tomo and Jun Into Changing How They See Each Other

As shown by the skirt segment, you can’t drastically change something when it comes to Tomo and Jun and expect them to adapt and act like nothing is happening. Tomo just entered high school, so she is, what? Maybe 13 or 14, and this is her first major crush. As for Jun? He is the same age, and while he had a three-day relationship with Misuzu, it seems, beyond that, he hasn’t invested much time into dating or any girl beyond Tomo.

So with that in mind, you have to appreciate Misuzu has the emotional intelligence to know that she has to ease both of them into what is meant to be. Now, whether it would be a short relationship like she had, or they would be high school sweethearts? It is hard to say. All that is made clear is that it is going to take a village to get Tomo and Jun comfortable with their feelings and consistent effort.

How Jun Talks About Tomo With Misaki

Jun needs a friend. Plain and simple. It seems he hasn’t made any male friends because of how they look or may act around Tomo, and while the guy from episode one he might be cool with, they can’t have intimate moments. They can’t have moments when Jun talks about how inspiring Tomo is. He doesn’t let anyone in.

Which could honestly be a problem. Tomo is experiencing growth as a person, especially socially, while Jun isn’t. So it would make an interesting twist if she outgrows her crush on Jun because she believes she should expect and deserve more than he is willing to give.