Tomo-chan is a Girl! (トモちゃんは女の子!, Tomo-chan wa Onna no Ko!) is a 2023 television anime series based on Fumita Yanagida’s manga series of the same name. The series was adapted by studio Lay-duce, and the staff credits include director Hitoshi Nanba, series composition writer Megumi Shimizu, character designer Shiori Hiraiwa, and music composed by Masaru Yokoyama. The anime first aired in Japan on January 2023.
Background:
“Tomo is crushing hard on her childhood friend Junichiro, but he only sees her as a bro. Hoping to fix the romantic failure, she turns to her classmates for help. Will their schemes get through to him? Or is she destined to be in the friend zone forever?”
Plot Synopsis via Crunchyroll UK, September 2024.
There’s a lot of romance anime produced over the years and what interested me to Tomo-chan is a Girl! is the idea that our female lead is in fact a tomboy which is a nice change of pace. She’s a fun character throughout the series as well as her friends who have their time to shine throughout. The romance aspect goes at a steady pace and what worked the most with this anime is that it adapts the whole story so by the time the series ends so does the story which ended on a pretty solid note in my opinion. Seven Seas have released the manga in English for a while but the anime adaptation was announced not long after to my recollection.
I like to believe that Tomo-chan is a Girl! was one of the big shows during the Winter 2023 season, which was helped by Seven Seas releasing the manga in English so there were those who knew of the source material. The last anime that I watched from studio Lay-duce turned out to be Classroom Crisis which was a pretty underrated series back in 2015.
Crunchyroll picked up the streaming and home video rights for Tomo-chan is a Girl! before its simulcast and also screened some episodes early at a convention. One of the Japanese voice actresses also reprised their role for the English dub which is a pretty rare case to see.
Limited Edition Contents:
Tomo-chan is a Girl! was a surprise hit in my opinion and considering it covers the whole story I think it’s neat to see Crunchyroll offer a limited edition.
This release is presented with a rigid box and inside contains an Amaray case that houses the discs, as well as a 76-page Artbook. Bundled outside the rigid box is a separate small cardboard box that includes 2 Character Sticker sheets and 8 Art Cards. The Artbook contains character designs, interviews with the staff and voice actors, manga panels promoting the adaptation, illustrations and more.
The rigid box artwork is free of any information or BBFC content and there’s a wraparound covering that information and specification like recent Crunchyroll UK limited edition releases. The limited edition Blu-ray & DVD combo pack has an unspecified amount of units printed for an SRP of £69.99, with a standard edition Blu-ray also available same-day for an SRP of £44.99.
This is a relatively new release but I didn’t get around to pre-ordering it like I normally would for other releases, but the series was on offer as part of Crunchyroll UK Store’s Black Friday sale which is a first given their UK store only started a few months prior. The price on offer was £36 which normally goes for £60 (or £57 if you have a Crunchyroll Premium account which is 5% off any product).
Physical Contents:
- Rigid Box with Amaray packaging and clean artwork
- Info sheet for specification and BBFC description
- 76-page Booklet
- 8 Art Cards
- 2 Character Sticker Sheets
On-Disc Contents:
Distributor: Crunchyroll UK
Released: 16th September 2024
The limited edition release for Tomo-chan is a Girl! contains the complete series, episodes 1-13, across two Blu-ray discs and two DVD discs. All the discs were authored and encoded by Crunchyroll.
Audio options include Japanese audio with English subtitles and the Crunchyroll English dub. The white subtitles are locked during playback (they use the wording of ‘Off (dub only)’ to confuse you but it basically means subtitles can’t be turned off during Japanese audio playback) and the regions are accessible with Blu-ray players set to A & B and DVD players set to 1 & 2 (Region 4 has not been tested).
Blu-ray Specs:
| Languages | English, Japanese |
| Audio | English Dolby TrueHD 5.1 Japanese Dolby TrueHD 2.0 |
| Video | 1080p High Definition Native format 16:9 aspect ratio |
| Region | A B |
| Subtitles | English |
| Locked Subtitles | Yes |
| Discs | 2 BD-50s |
DVD Specs:
| Languages | English, Japanese |
| Audio | English Dolby Digital 5.1 Japanese Dolby Digital 2.0 |
| Video | Standard Definition in NTSC format 16:9 aspect ratio |
| Region | 1 2 |
| Subtitles | English |
| Locked Subtitles | Yes |
| Discs | 2 |
Blu-ray On-Disc Extra Features:
Disc 2:
- Anime NYC – JPN VA Comments (before showing 1st 2 eps) (01:50 runtime)
- “Making Of” Shorts (00:34 runtime)
- Promo Videos (01:07 runtime)
- Trailer Collection (04:29 runtime)
- Textless Opening Song “Kurae! Telepathy”
- Textless Closing Song “yurukuru＊love”
DVD On-Disc Extra Features:
No extras across all discs
Unboxing Photos:
Final Notes:
Tomo-chan is a Girl! is available to purchase on Blu-ray by Crunchyroll in the UK & Ireland. The limited edition Blu-ray & DVD combo pack release can be bought across different retailers including Amazon UK, Anime-on-Line, and Crunchyroll UK Store. A standard edition Blu-ray is available and can also be bought across different retailers including Amazon UK, Anime-on-Line, and Crunchyroll UK Store.
(Disclaimer: Amazon links are also included when available. They are affiliated so if you decide to order them, I’ll earn a small percentage if they ship which will help me with any hauls or small bills.)
The Normanic Vault 
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