My Wife Has No Emotion – Ep. 1 (First Impressions)

My Wife Has no Emotion is a romance anime centered around a human named Takuma Kosugi (Toshiyuki Toyonaga) and his robot companion Mina (Konomi Iangaki). Mina is only programmed for cooking and housekeeping but one day, Takuma jokingly asks her to be his wife. To his surprise, Mina begins to fulfill this request as best as she can, thanks to her ability to learn and make decisions.

This show demands that you overlook a couple of things. The first is the massive implication surrounding Mina’s humanity. Like, if she can think, learn, and act to the point that she can be considered human, her being Takuma’s property leaves a very uncomfortable undercurrent in the plot. The second is that this premise is simply unrealistic. Aside from the fact that Mina is a robot, you have to wonder how Takuma even acquired her in the first place. The dude is a simple office worker. How the hell did he buy a robot, even if secondhand? Wouldn’t he just buy ramen like any other person?

Evidently, the show is unconcerned with any of that. It just wants to fill the screen with cutesy husband and wife antics. To the show’s credit, I did laugh a couple of times during its premiere. In one scene, Takuma starts to feel bad that he makes Mina do all the cooking so he tries to help, only for Mina to tell him to back off because he sucks that much at cooking. Later in the episode, there’s a scene where Takuma gets drunk and Mina advises him to stop. When her request falls on deaf ears, Mina goes the extra mile of dumping all of the beer into the sink and forcing her husband to drink a comical yet equal amount of water to balance out the alcohol in his systems. It’s all pretty simple humor but I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t funny from time to time.

I think what really holds the premiere back for me is how one dimensional the characters are. The only defining traits Takuma has are his job, his crippling alcoholism, and the fact that he has a robot wife. The only backstory we get with this guy is that he was in a relationship with a girl he liked and it didn’t work out. That’s honestly all we get. He’s very much a self-insert for the viewer. The same could be said about Mina and no, her being a robot isn’t a good enough excuse. Maybe the show can prove me wrong but right now, I don’t find this couple particularly interesting. This is also assuming that I may watch more of the show and that depends on the competition this season.

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Watch My Wife Has No Emotion on Crunchyroll