YMMV / Kaguya-sama: Love Is War

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A-D

• Abandon Shipping: Fujiwara/Ishigami was a popular pairing in the early days of the manga. After Fujiwara was Demoted to Extra and Ishigami gained actual love interests in Tsubame and Iino, you'll be hard-pressed to find anyone who still ships it outside of those who only watched the anime's first season.
• Alternate Character Interpretation:
  • Fujiwara. Because of the frequency and perfect timing of her Spanner in the Works moments, a popular fan theory is that she is secretly aware of everything, and is trolling as well as manipulating both of the main characters for her own entertainment. This gets a nod in Chapter 43, where a ramen connoisseur over-analyzes Fujiwara's ramen eating technique and concludes that she's an expert like him, when she was just really hungry and wanted to eat ramen.
  • A group of fans actually think that Fujiwara's a Stepford Smiler or secretly depressed, given her more heartfelt moments to Kaguya have her mention not wanting to be left out or left to the wayside, her knowing that Kaguya looks down on her, and her piano hobby being all but dropped for mysterious reasons. Chapter 222 reveals that Fujiwara is a former Stepford Smiler who had grown to hate playing piano. Kaguya's brutally honest advice to just quit doing something she didn't like was the impetus for Fujiwara to become her friend.
  • Was Ishigami's desire to not tell Ootomo about Ogino's slimy personality borne out of true altruism, or just him looking for self-gratification? On the one hand, revealing that would just do a lot of unnecessary harm to her, and the whole point was that Ishigami wanted to help protect her from the shadows. On the other hand, not telling her didn't really solve anything and she remains ignorant and vulnerable to future slimy people, and Ishigami prolonged his suspension and partly caused his own suffering because he didn't want to kowtow to a lie he didn't agree with, making himself the center of something that wasn't ever about him in the first place, which is ultimately validated when the student council (and Iino) work together to keep him in school. Even Shirogane, who sympathizes with Ishigami, bluntly says that Ishigami could have picked a smarter way to accomplish his goal.
  • There's also the matter of what, exactly, Ishigmi's feelings for Ootomo were that pushed his actions. On the one hand, he was perfectly fine with her hating him and explicitly says that he's grateful to her for being his friend in middle school. On the other hand, she matches his favorite type of girl easily, and his actual love interest Tsubame supported him nearly the exact same way Ootomo did before the incident, leading many to think that Ishigami had a crush on her he denies to himself. In-series, Osaragi even comments that Tsubame may be a Replacement Goldfish for Ootomo, but as the chapter was a direct satire of shipping debates the validity of the statement is called to question.
  • Kashiwagi. Is she genuinely oblivious to Maki's crush on her boyfriend, or does she know? If the latter, is she deliberately flaunting her relationship with Tsubasa? Alternatively, does she truly love Tsubasa or is she only dating him to keep him and Maki apart? Chapter 273 puts this to rest when Kashiwagi overhears Maki discussing her unrequited love for Tsubasa with the Student Council boys; she truly was oblivious the entire time. Kaguya explaining how Maki and Tsubasa first met only unsettles Kashiwagi further as she realizes that Maki's had feelings for him since before they (Maki and Kashiwagi) first met.
  • Kaguya's claim of her first encounter with Shirogane was him challenging her to get the first place at the end of semester test in Chapter 193, while calling it as embarrassing. Was her "embarrassment" being a result of her having a bad habit of Forgotten First Meeting with a lot of people (including Kei and Mikado), or her guilt in not noticing Shirogane's presence way earlier in her school years?^note Kaguya and Hayasaka eavesdropped on a bedridden Shirogane that he had tried getting her attention before he puts up the brave façade in Chapter 147.
  • Fujiwara talking about sauces and natto during Shirogane's last day in Japan. Is Fujiwara being her usual weird self, or is she using sauce and natto as a metaphor for her and Shirogane's friendship but is too embarrassed to say what's really on her mind?
• Audience-Alienating Premise: The very idea for the "Official Doujinshi" spin-off was to take a series that deliberately avoids gratuitous fanservice and make it Hotter and Sexier. Needless to say, fans only really started to like it when it dropped that premise in favor of just throwing the characters in various Alternate Universes instead.
• Audience-Coloring Adaptation: In a literal example of coloring, you'd be hard pressed to find a single piece of fanart that depicts Fujiwara with the silver hair she has in the manga, rather than the pink she had in the anime.
• Awesome Music: The soundtrack is highly praised for many memorable songs. The openings in particular are well-loved. In fact, Amanda Lee (Hayasaka's English dub voice) covered the first two openings!
• Badass Decay:
  • Invented. As the two leads became more honest with themselves regarding their feelings for one another, the series' main pull became less of them trying to get the other to confess and more of them awkwardly dancing around their feelings. While there are still chapters here and there where they try to get the upper hand and against others who they consider antagonists, but those "battles" are fewer in number.
  • Kaguya herself tends to get most of this criticism. She is still a schemer deep down and will do anything to help Shirogane if she can help it, but after "I Can't Hear the Fireworks," she's become more and more visibly smitten with him while Shirogane can at least hold his feelings in. Invented as the story try to show her becoming happier, some fans cited that it's still a sign of Kaguya's eventual "defeat" and are upset that her more dominant personality is dormant. She at least develops a routine to prevent herself from overreacting to every little thing, so she's been able to take back some power. Post-coupling, criticisms have gotten worse in this regard, aside from trying to help Iino to understand Osaragi and bowing to her older brother's demands. This, however, somewhat changes when by the near end of the Final Arc, Shirogane figured out she intended for him to come and save her and destroy her family's goals for her. Using various of schemes and tricks to get what she wanted: a romantic moment with Shirogane and to be free from her family.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Kaguya herself gets some folks splitting ends. There is a part of the audience that don't like her extreme trust issues, her insecurities, and the fact that she hasn't done anything big for Shirogane like the Fireworks chapters^note And that's if you don't count Shirogane's birthday arc. Others, however, like the Character Development she's given (being a Defrosting Ice Queen that's more open to her friends) and her character interactions, and find that her spontaneous actions are no less heartfelt as expressions of love than Shirogane's elaborate plans, such as when they both become a couple. Her treatment of Hayasaka is also under scrutiny, especially once the audience is aware of how much Hayasaka puts up with professionally to take care of her. That said, Kaguya not only forgives Hayasaka for spying on her (forgiving anyone, much less a betrayal as personal as that, is a first for her) but becomes friends with her.
  • Ishigami is a very popular character, but his series-wide arc made the fanbase split on him in his home country. Opinions on his method of preserving Otomo's dignity vary, with some appreciating how far he's willing to go for someone who helped him during a dark period in his life, some feeling like he threw everything away for an ignorant airhead, and some feeling like the whole plan was short-sighted and ill-planned in the first place. The fact that the series ultimately validates his actions and has most of the important Shuuchin players restore his reputation for him is a major topic of debate. Him being the "secret protagonist" of the narrative also sees people taking umbrage, as while some fans appreciate the strides Ishigami went through to overcome his loner mindset, others don't like how his attempts to win over Tsubame took up a lot of the post-Festival content. Finally, people are split on whether they prefer Ishigami's pre-development bluntness and gamer otaku personality, or his post-development "normie" personality.
  • Kashiwagi as she continues dating her boyfriend. As the months go on, she shows that she has major insecurities throughout the whole thing, and some felt like the relationship was very one sided given her boyfriend does all of the big romantic gestures while she just reciprocates. However, her Straight Man role is appreciated, and some do like that she turned out not to be the one played straight character in the series.
  • Iino, after her initial introduction. Her treatment of Ishigami throughout the series is seen as a large point of contention for her, due to the fact that she comes off as antagonistic towards him for debatable reasons, and because her character arc is heavily tied to Ishigami's instead of expanding on what was initialized in the Election arc. Others think she has and did obtain room for growth, as demonstrated in chapters having her interact with other characters outside of Ishigami. Her naive but earnest sense of justice and her starvation of affection also come up as points for or against her.
  • Despite enjoying some initial popularity, particularly amongst the anime fans, time has turned Fujiwara into the most divisive character in the manga:
    • Her status as the comic relief either works well for her or holds her back. While Aka has said he intends on keeping her lighthearted, some fans felt cheated due to her backstory and development as Kaguya's first real friend being glossed over for a lot of the series. The occasional glimpses we get into her insecurities regarding her friendship with Kaguya also make some wish for a more dramatic role. However, just as many fans are fine with her remaining comedic, as the rest of the main characters have more serious character arcs to work through and her maintaining levity more than justifies her attitude in story.
    • After taking a level in Jerkass, she gets more of this. She still possesses a fanbase for her constant humor, but some find that she's turned into a total Jerkass, and didn't feel much sympathy for her when she complained about how she's The Friend Nobody Likes later on. On the other hand, some found her more snarky tongue and occasional jerky tendencies a good game changer from her original role as the wall between Kaguya and Shirogane, and it offers new interactions with the main cast that she never got before. Her being Out of Focus after Kaguya and Shirogane start dating is either lamented or welcomed. Fujiwara is particularly hated by fans of Iino for using Iino's naivete and idolization of her to bully her, drawing comparisons even In-Universe to Domestic Abuse.
  • Osaragi has begun to veer into this as of the End of Secrets arc due to blatantly disregarding her best friend Iino's feelings for Ishigami and prioritizing making Ishibame happen rather than talking to her about it, as well as the reveal that she only dated Kazeno to keep him from interfering with Ishigami and Tsubame's relationship. The greatest breaking point came in 203: where she tells Kaguya that because Ishigami worked hard to improve himself for Tsubame, he can keep trying to ask her out despite the fact that it hurts Tsubame to reject him. Chapters 229 and 231 caused her to become an even more polarizing character in the fanbase when those chapters give more insight on her character and motivations. Either fans love her for the complexity she showed in those chapters with her major flaws highlighted and agree with her statements about her disdain towards Iino and Ishigami as a pairing, or they utterly loathe her for her terrible treatment of Iino which is further compounded by the reveal that she was only a "friend" to Iino out of convenience. The fact that she's against Iino and Ishigami developing a potential relationship out of petty jealousy is another sore point fans have against her character. Her going right back to being close acquaintances with Miko during the final arc had many wondering what the point of all that behavior was.
  • Tsubame also has a divided fanbase, as many found the reason why she rejected Ishigami to be fairly weak, even when she acknowledges how much he improved himself for her. This is especially the case with western fans, where a two year age gap isn't as big of a deal as it is in Japan. What made it worse was how this happened just after the first signs of Miko's affection towards Ishigami started to show, with many fans assuming that Aka would set Ishigami up with an, at the time, worse person. Other people however, think that Tsubame was just being honest, and that she was always hesitant entering a relationship with Ishigami.
• Better on DVD: The Ice Arc is a prime example of this. While considered to be one of the highlights of the series, it is widely agreed among the fandom that it is best enjoyed in a single sitting due to how annoying the beginning can seem without later events providing context. Unsurprisingly, the anime chose to adapt it in movie format rather than spread the whole thing out over the course of 3-4 episodes.
• Broken Base:
  • The narrator's characterization in the English dub of the anime has been quite divisive within the fandom. Some praise it for adding more personality to the narrator, and believe that it adds to the comedy. Others believe that the narrator's overly serious tone in the original version was a core part of the comedy, and that the dub's decision to make him a more biased spectator takes away from the joke. However, while the narrator's characterization is heavily contested, it's commonly agreed upon that Ian Sinclair does a great performance.
  • The manga tends to have chapters that divide members of the fanbase in regards to how they handled character relationships, but none have been more divisive than Chapter 278. Whilst it's still heavily implied that they'll get together due to their game of love and war, many people, especially those who shipped Ishigami and Iino together, were heavily unsatisfied how their story concluded. Not only did they feel it was a borderline carbon-copy of the first chapter, but it felt as if their relationship regressed due to how they were so close to confessing their love for eachother in Chapter 246. Furthermore, as the manga would end with a different game of love and war, this time with Kaguya and Miyuki's proposal, many felt it only served to undermine the chapter even more. However, there are as many people who enjoy the chapter, liking how it called back to the first chapter, as well as appreciating the fact that it revealed the next year's student council.
  • In the Japanese fandom, Ishigami and Iino's relationship development in the broader sense gets a lot of heated debate. Some like the ultimate message of love (and the pursuit of it) not needing to be pure, chaste, and noble to be real. Others think they bicker and hide their feelings too much to function as a couple, or dislike the fact that the things that could have made for a decent relationship starter (the sutera flower, secretly helping each other out) were ignored in favor of the pair using more underhanded tactics to make the other fall first, echoing early Kaguya and Shirogane instead of doing a different dynamic. Interestingly, the feelings are reflected (and skewered) with Osaragi, who similarly wanted Iino and Ishigami to get together but was soured when she saw cracks in their relationship.
• Captain Obvious Reveal: Chapter 192 confirmed that Ishigami was the one who gave Iino the flower back in middle school, something that fans had suspected from the moment it was first mentioned over a hundred chapters earlier.
• Character Rerailment:
  • Chapter 65 has Fujiwara return to her roots as the relatively sane character of the main cast, calling out Shirogane and Ishigami on getting overexcited for elections.
  • After kissing Shirogane in response to his confession at the cultural festival and falling into a love-induced coma because of it, Kaguya wakes up as her original cold, calculating personality in Chapter 141. Kaguya, however, return back to her old main series self by Chapter 151.
  • When fans feel that Kaguya went rusty after becoming a couple with Shirogane, she reminds everyone why she is Shirogane's equal. When being forced to enter an arranged marriage with someone she doesn't love, Kaguya makes various strategies and plans to escape from her brother's crazy demands and have Shirogane rescue her, confess his feelings once more, and have her friends burn her father's will (ruining any chances of her brothers taking control of their father's company).
• Continuity Lockout: The series has this by way of Continuity Creep, to the point that people who are coming into the manga after seeing the anime are often recommended to at the very least go back and read all the chapters that weren't adapted so they don't miss anything that could potentially become important later on. This is taken even further with the Spin-Off Yonkoma We Want to Talk About Kaguya, whose very premise as an Innocent Bystander Series and brand of humor pretty much requires the reader to be familiar with specific chapters of the main series.
• Crack Ship:
  • Ishigami and Hayasaka are a popular ship despite the fact they have only interacted once in the first 50 chapters and that was a single line of dialogue. Mostly due to the fact they are good friends to Shirogane and Kaguya respectively, have similar personalities and both are very popular.
  • Shirogane and Hayasaka is another fairly popular ship, despite the two never showing any inclinations of being attracted to one another and Hayasaka being a Shipper on Deck for him and Kaguya. The Official Doujin even dedicates several chapters to the duo becoming the Official Couple.
• Diagnosed by the Audience: Ice, Moron and Child Kaguya may represent a very cutesy case of dissociative identity disorder, as Kaguya will outwardly display huge shifts in personality to cope with the situation at hand.
• Die for Our Ship: Tsubame Koyasu gets this from fans who ship Ishigami with anyone else, who consider her to be a bland and flat Satellite Love Interest. On the flip side, Iino also gets harsh treatment from Ishigami/anyone shippers due to her often antagonistic relationship with him.

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• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Kobachi Osaragi isn't part of the student council and so she mainly appears in scenes with Iino. She quickly gained a lot of fan approval after Chapter 85 which showed her as one of the only people outside the student council who doesn't ostracize Ishigami due to the rumors about him because she witnessed him being secretly kind to Iino, even though he and the latter can't stand each other. She even checked on him without prompting, quietly wishing his efforts to break out of his shell well. Her Deadpan Snarker and not-entirely Covert Pervert tendencies revealed in Chapter 80 had already made her fairly popular as Iino's Hayasaka equivalent, but Chapter 85 was what really cemented it. However, her later actions and subsequent treatment of Iino in the manga have made her into a very divisive character in the fanbase.
  • Shirogane's dad makes few appearances. In the anime, he only appears, once as a joke, until the Sports Festival arc in the latter half of the second season. He started to grow on fans with his hilariously awkward personality in Chapter 83. This only grew when he trolled Kaguya into revealing her deepest feelings for his son in Chapter 86. Then when it was discovered that his voice actor in the anime is Takehito Koyasu, known for playing Dio Brando in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, his popularity skyrocketed.
  • Maki Shijo made her proper debut in Chapter 98 and is known for being jealous of Kashiwagi being Tsubasa's girlfriend. So she's a side chracter to the Beta Couple and she is popular due to the Running Gag of her saying things that make herself realize about her terrible luck in love, along with her being a very comedic example of a Tsundere (almost bordering on parody) and being genuine Vitriolic Best Buds with Shirogane and Ishigami.
  • Rei Onodera is mostly just a supporting character with minimal focus, but her laid-back attitude, the contrast between her seemingly stoic demeanor and fun-loving side, her sincere efforts to change herself after she believes she may have hurt both Ishigami and Iino with her gossip, and her growing genuine friendship with Iino have endeared her greatly to the fans.
• Epileptic Trees: In Japan, some fans have pieced together which developments might happen in the series based on the Theme Naming of all the important characters referencing The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter. Mostly, they argue that the final student Council Member will be Kazune Abe^note he was on the score ranking, due to his name also referencing Kaguya-hime's suitors; that Kaguya might have an arranged marriage arc with Maki's brother Mikado^note  given that his name references the emperor who tried to marry Kaguya-hime; and that Fujiwara will be acquainted (if not given a love interest) with one of the Shuuchin VIPs^note  the Saha club President is a second prince from a fictional country, and Fujiwara's namesake is a second prince with his task referencing a fictional country (Hourai). Only one of these theories turned out to be correct.
• Even Better Sequel: Season 2 starts right after what is considered to be where the manga starting Growing the Beard and as a result is often considered to be superior to season 1 in just about every way, with greater focus on character development and interactions.
• Fan-Disliked Explanation: While it was good to see Kaguya ruminate on her relationship with Fujiwara, some fans didn't like her justification for avoiding telling her about she and Shirogane dating—that she feared that Fujiwara would feel betrayed that her attention was divided elsewhere. The series even acknowledges that Kaguya dodging the explanation until just after she finally had sex felt weird for someone supposed to be Kaguya's oldest friend, and Kaguya had not expressed anxieties like that until that chapter.
• Fan Nickname:
  • Kaguya's dere side is referred to as "Bakaguya" and her cold side is called "Iceguya" or "Kuuguya". When she's wearing cat ears, she's called "Kagunya".
  • Shirogane is called "Monster Virgin" and "Chadogane".
  • Fujiwara is referred to as "Subject F", "(Mistress) Cuddlebuns", "Cotton Candy 2.0", and "Super High School Level/Ultimate Black Ribbon". Whenever she does something or thinks about something traitorous she's called "Natural Born Traitor". She's also called "Mommy" or "Fujimama" whenever she's teaching Shirogane.
  • Ishigami is called "Our Guy", "mah boy" or "mah man", later also being called "IshiKami"^note A portmanteau of Ishigami's name and "Kami", the Japanese word that refers to a god, deity, spirit, etc and "IshiGod".
  • Maki was called "Stalker-chan" prior to her name being revealed. She also earned the title "Our Girl" after developing a close relationship with Ishigami. Ishigami's nickname for her, "Tsundere-senpai" is also occasionally used. Anime fans sometimes call her "NTR-chan".
  • Miko Iino is occasionally referred to as "Lino" due to people having mistaken the upper case I in her name for a lower case L (since the fan translations using a sans serif font). People would later embrace it and claim that it was a Portmanteau for "Lewd Iino".
  • Because Touhou Project also has a filthy rich black-haired Kaguya and a long, light-haired Fujiwara, Kaguya and Fujiwara are also known as "Teruyo" and "Mokou".
  • Kashiwagi is known as "Kashiwagi's Boyfriend's Girlfriend", a carryover from when Tsubasa was only known as "Kashiwagi's Boyfriend". This sometimes extends to other characters as well in a sort of degrees of separation joke (like calling Kaguya "Kashiwagi's Boyfriend's Girlfriend's Best Friend's Cousin").
  • Thanks to being voiced by Takehito Koyasu in the anime, Papa Shirogane is called "Papa DIO". Jokes about Shirogane being related to Giorno popped up as well. A Translation Trainwreck of chapter 159 also resulted in him being called "Daddy in the East", while the second season of the anime earned him "Daddy Dio" as a pun on the opening song.
• Fanon: Some fans are convinced that there was an second unnamed sister who went with Shirogane's mother when she left rather than Kei. This is directly contradicted by the official fanbook, which lists his only immediate relatives as Kei, his father, and his estranged mother. This idea is then completely shut down during Kaguya's visit to the Shiroganes in Chapter 208, where Papa Shirogane mentions Kei being taken by her mother when she left and then Kei herself talks about running away from her mother, back to the rest of the family.
• Fourth Wall Myopia: Quite a few fans are angry at Ootomo for her blaming Ishigami for ruining her relationship with Ogino despite all he did to protect her, even though he deliberately kept her in the dark. From her perspective a boy she barely knew attacked her boyfriend, was accused of being a stalker, never refuted the claim or explained himself, and her boyfriend broke up with her several days later. What other conclusion was she supposed to come to based on the available information? The phenomenon happened again when Tsubame finally told Ootomo the truth; while it is sad that their friendship ultimately cracked because of this, from Ootomo's perspective she's been suddenly thrust with information she should have gotten a long time ago if true, while she's face value supposed to forgive somebody who didn't even exonerate himself on her friend's word.
• Franchise Original Sin:
  • A major fan complaint about the later half of the series is that the Continuity Creep got so out of hand that it was nearly impossible to keep track of all the characters and events. But during the middle of the manga, especially during the highly regarded Fireworks arc and Ishigami's backstory, the strong continuity and Ensemble Cast was considered to be what raised the series' profile from a decently funny rom-com to an interesting, three-dimensional story that could generate actual pathos, and flashbacks and call backs were used sparingly to flesh out characters who needed it. However, later chapters add many previously unseen character relationships and reference the past in ways that don't seem to add anything to those characters, or do anything at all but leave the reader more confused. In addition, the increasing focus on continuity in later chapters leads to characters that were obviously created to be gag characters and parodies gaining serious backstories and relationships with other characters without changing any of their overt parodic elements.
  • Yu Ishigami is definitely the series' foremost Breakout Character, but his popularity has lead to a few recurring problems with the series' later chapters that fans point out:
    • Cerebus Syndrome. Disgruntled fans often point out about how the last few arcs resemble a Soap Opera more than the Gag Series the manga was originally designed to be, with Love Dodecahedrons, family drama, and many things comedy fans find distasteful, but the first real instance of this was Ishigami's backstory during the Sports Festival arc—which was what gathered the series near-universal praise and made him so popular in the first place. The difference was that Ishigami's Character Development was interspersed with pure gag chapters, therefore breaking up his dark past and dramatic realizations with a lot of levity so it didn't really feel too heavy. This ends up getting lost with the Love Triangle plot in Ishigami's later focus chapters, and the greater focus on Kaguya's family and their power struggles, so it makes it easier for the readers to feel like the story has gotten too bleak.
    • Author Tract issues. One of Ishigami's most prominent character traits was him delivering long, impassioned speeches about various subjects from the beginning, but he usually ended up the butt of the joke for doing so, with the implication being that he didn't truly understand the subjects he was ranting about. However, when the other characters started delivering lectures to both protagonists and antagonists alike without any sense of irony, it became easier to see it as Akasaka putting his own opinions in the mouths of his characters instead of a cringeworthy and mockable habit specific to one alone.
    • The Middle School Incident that forms Ishigami's backstory. When it was first resolved in Chapter 90, readers praised the plot as it had decent foreshadowing up to the sports festival, gave Ishigami a lot of depth that allowed him to explore friendships outside the Student Council, and showed that despite still not telling Ootomo the truth, he was willing to overcome his trauma and move on, sending a powerful message about self-confidence. It was this backstory that helped Ishigami become so popular, as he was a "loser" with flaws the audience could identify with, which made them truly want to see him succeed in his self-improvement. However, the story always suffered from having some disconnect with what it said about Ishigami's character and the incident and what it showed. Despite it being said that his actions caused the majority of his classmates to hate him, the only ones that are shown in practice to are nameless extras who are treated as Jerkasses and gossips for that despite only coming to the conclusion any outsider who was witness to that situation would, because Ishigami went out of his way to hide the truth; the majority of the named cast always defended him and his actions. Despite that, it was easy enough to overlook because it seemed like a logical result of his improved self-esteem making him realize that his perceptions of the other students' judgements were a bit overblown. However, as the chapters went by, increasing backstory such as Iino and Osaragi's long-term crushes on him made it harder and harder for fans to buy him as the lovable underdog that the incident had originally painted him as. Its reappearance and major contributions to the Swallow's Cowry character arc, were where it became a problem; while people were happy to see Ishigami's reputation restored and the truth get out, other fans weren't pleased by how every Shuuchin higher up and upperclassman teamed up just to exonerate Ishigami and how quickly the other students went from hating to loving him as soon as the truth got out; how despite the series stating that it was a ill-thought out plan Ishigami's part in it was still looked at as heroic and honorable; and that he barely seemed affected at all when Tsubame told him that she went behind his back and confessed the modified version of the truth to Ootomo (again, the one person he didn't want knowing), with Ootomo being treated as in the wrong for assuming the worst of Ishigami despite no one, not even her so-called best friend, ever bothering to clear it up until then. By the time it came to the Stone Begging Bowl and the incident is brought up again, this time with someone who wasn't involved at all getting angry on Ishigami's behalf and Onodera forcing Ishigami to reconsider his feelings for Miko by bringing up Ootomo, some fans started to get tired of the plotline. By the story doing a slow 180 on how it presented the Middle School Incident, changing its portrayal from the ill-thought-out actions of an impulsive teenager that ended up hurting more than it helped into the nearly selfless actions of a Knight in Shining Armor, fans argue it completely invalidated Ishigami's Character Development, turning him from an underdog who had to work to change his perception among his peers to a Born Winner whom everyone loved all along, undermining the relatability that made him such a popular character in the first place, with his flaws that have nothing to do with the Middle School Incident just not being brought up anymore.
• Friendly Fandoms:
  • Thanks to Papa Shirogane and Dio sharing the same voice actor, and Kaguya calling Miyuki only to get his father akin to a famous Jojo meme, the friendship between the Kaguya-Sama and Jojo fandom was formed. Part 5 fans also love comparing Miyuki Shirogane to Part 5's hero Giorno due to being the son of Dio as well as their similar golden-haired protagonist roles. The first OP's pronunciation of "Oh love me mister" also sounds like "Oh love me Mista", a Part 5 character which spawned some edits.
  • The series seems to share many readers with Tomo-chan Is a Girl!, with many people even labeling Fujiwara as "Cotton Candy 2.0" if the above theory is to be believed. Likewise, some have also favorably compared Kaguya's maid Hayasaka to Misuzu.
  • Kaguya fanbase seems to get along with the Komi Can't Communicate fanbase. Both of which are Romantic Comedy with eccentric cast members. Prompting surprisingly friendly conversations and crossover fanarts. Helps that Komi and Kaguya share the same Japanese VA.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: The Latin America fanbase is an incredibly dedicated one. Every week, scanlations are available in Spanish (sometimes Portuguese) at least two days before English.
• Growing the Beard: While the series was decently regarded beforehand, many readers started flocking to it during the "I Can't Hear the Fireworks" chapters. But the bigger unexpected moment comes from the author decided to include an ensemble cast that becomes interesting on their own to fill up the rom-com elements.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • Kaguya comments in a nostalgic tone in Chapter 8 how she and Shirogane first met during the summer of the previous year, which sounds sweet at the time but becomes downright depressing once it's revealed that they actually met the previous spring. Kaguya having completely forgotten all their previous encounters from how little of an impression they made on her only serves to reinforce Shirogane's belief that she'll never love him for who he really is.
  • Kaguya's reaction when Shirogane says he "hates" it when she's mean to Ishigami becomes a lot harder to watch after it was reveal that she secretly hates herself (especially her cold nature) and dreads the day that Shirogane would come to hate her for her personality.
  • Kaguya's brutal way of teaching Ishigami to improve his grades is Played for Laughs, but becomes less funny as we learn that her private teachers used whippings as a form of punishment to drill the inhumane principles of the Shinomiyas into her.
  • Hayasaka saying she wants to change her job during parent-teacher conferences in Chapter 111 which is a harmless joke at the time but becomes a cry for help once it turns out Hayasaka has been spying on Kaguya for her older brother Oko and it's her real job since they were children.
  • Chapter 222 paints Iino's idolization of Fujiwara in a harsher light when it turns out that even though the basis for Iino's admiration being Fujiwara's skill with the piano, Fujiwara in truth hated it because she was forced to devote all her time towards it and could never play like a child her age should have. And then when she finally got to get close to her idol, she took advantage of Iino's naivete to form a classic, albeit platonic, abusive relationship with her.
  • One chapter has Miko freak out when she believes that Onodera and Kaguya are talking about her behind her back. Her worst fears are realized in Chapter 231, where she overhears Osaragi telling Kaguya what she finds annoying about Miko and declaring their friendship as shallow.
  • When Kaguya learns that Shirogane wants her to apply for Stanford alongside him, she lists some of the hurdles to overcome— she'll have to go abroad, her father would never allow her to attend, Stanford is extremely competitive, and the application deadline might have passed— but nevertheless agrees to go for it and leave her family behind. Kaguya's brother Oko is able to force her to withdraw her application to Stanford, proving that defying the Shinomiyas is not nearly as easy as Kaguya thought.
  • When Kaguya reverts to her Ice persona to cope after her first kiss with Shirogane, she starts trying to bait him into kissing her and holding her hand, with the latter done under the guise of complaining that it's less acceptable for a woman to keep her hands in her pockets. Shirogane misses the obvious hint of Kaguya's arm waving around to be held, instead concluding that sexism must be a big issue in Kaguya's family... which turns out to be true when her oldest brother Oko is introduced.
  • Maki's constant depression over losing Tsubasa to Kashiwagi is played for morbid humor at first, then Chapter 273 reveals that she's been in love with Tsubasa for over seven years, before she had even met Kashiwagi. Suddenly her despair over losing her crush to her best friend makes way too much sense to laugh at.
• Heartwarming in Hindsight:
  • When Kaguya is pleading with God to let her reach the fireworks festival in time during the summer arc, she refers to Ishigami as "the first junior I ever had to look after". It's a sweet sentiment at the time since it was the first time she had ever really viewed him in a positive light, but it becomes so much more meaningful in retrospect given how close the two would grow to be over the next 40 or so chapters.
  • Kaguya fears that one day her family would not only prevent her from getting together with Shirogane but also not letting her choose her own career, even stopping her from joining him in Stanford. Though these events very nearly do come to pass, Oshi no Ko and Chapter 276 show that not only did she manage to get her dream job of being a photographer, but would eventually marry Shirogane and adopt his last name.
  • In Chapter 28, Shirogane states that he would fill a truck with flowers if given a chance. While funny, as he doesn't realize it represent how much love you would give to a special someone, Shirogane actually did what he would do during the Culture Festival, where he release hundreds of balloon as he makes his confession to Kaguya.
  • Starting off somewhat humorous in Shirogane's claim that if he were in The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter, he would have spent hundreds of years trying to reunite with Kaguya. In the Final Arc, he did the opposite of what the Emperor did in the story. Shirogane took the money (immortality elixir), understood what Kaguya wanted (Kaguya-Hime), went to Shinomiya's territory (the moon) and saved her.
  • Shirogane planning to propose to Kaguya when he's a big-time success in the eyes of her family which might take him until he's in his fourties'. According to Oshi no Ko and Chapter 276's Flash Forward, the two are married within a few years. Either Shirogane became a big-time success as Ishigami and Hayasaka mentioned he has a company, or he doesn't care what Kaguya's family thinks.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • When she was first mentioned, many readers thought that Kei had a crush on her older brother and would be competing with Kaguya for his affection. Then it turned out that not only was she not in love with him (romantically, anyways), she specifically goes out of her way to make sure that nobody ever thinks that she does.
  • One of the earliest video's made by the English-speaking fandom was a collection of live reactions to Chapter 45 on 4chan, which used Bonnie Tyler's "Holding Out for a Hero" as background music. Almost four years later, season 2 of the anime would have a pastiche of that very same song as part of its soundtrack.
  • In Chapter 114, Iino tells Shirogane that his face isn't her type and she prefers someone more like actor Sho Hirano (whom she'd been established as being a fangirl of in earlier chapters); while this was probably Foreshadowing on Aka's part (Hirano was the inspiration for Ishigami), this chapter became hilarious when Hirano was cast as Shirogane in the Live-Action Adaptation^note Amusingly, this disparity is referenced in Chapter 140, which celebrates the movie. Ishigami suggests that Hirano resembles Shirogane, which Iino agrees with; when Shirogane turns around and says "If anything, he looks more like Ishigami", Iino gets deeply offended..
  • The premiere episode of Season 2, where Ishigami and Shirogane attempt to use toilet paper on Tsubasa, was aired during the times of toilet paper shortage resulting from the Coronavirus pandemic.
  • Fans have long joked that Ishigami was the protagonist of a harem manga due to his status as a Launcher of a Thousand Ships. With Chapter 190-192 confirming that Iino, Tsubame, and Osaragi all have feelings of varying strength for him, he can officially be considered to have a harem. What's more, a special joke chapter has Ishigami dream that Shirogane was the harem protagonist and that he himself, being the "best friend" character, wouldn't exist. In reality, the reverse is true, and Shirogane and Kaguya neatly fit into the other "best friend" archetype—the cool, helpful, but romantically harmless wingman.
  • In Chapter 14, Miyuki Shirogane worries that Kaguya would have mocked him if he revealed he was a virgin. Future chapters (such as the underwear chapter) show that Kaguya would have more likely have been horrified had he lied and said that he had "done it before".
  • The casting of Takehito Koyasu as Papa Shirogane has naturally elicited jokes of Miyuki being one of the sons sired by Dio Brando. Fast forward to the anime adaptation of Stone Ocean and Miyuki's actor, Makoto Furukawa, is cast as Rikiel, one of the featured three sons of Dio.
• Hype Backlash: The anime suffered somewhat from one after its third season clung onto the #1 spot on MyAnimeList's top list. The people who don't like romcoms simply didn't understand why the show is so popular, while a subset of the show's fans are weirded out by how the show's supposedly "weakest season" ended up being the most popular.

L-W

• Launcher of a Thousand Ships:
  • Ishigami has been shipped with quite a few girls over the course of the series (Hayasaka, Iino, Tsubame, Maki, Osaragi, Onodera, Karen). Fans have been known to joke that he's secretly the protagonist for a harem manga.
  • Hayasaka gets this treatment as well, being shipped with Ishigami, Shirogane, Kaguya and Chika.
• Les Yay:
  • Kaguya and Fujiwara get some moments. Fujiwara's only heartfelt confession in the series is to Kaguya, even if it was just under the asumption that Kaguya doesn't care for her as a friend. In the OVA, during the scene in the girls' shower, after little accidental skinship, Kaguya and Fujiwara openly attempt to kiss each other.
  • Kashiwagi's attachment to Maki is often seen in this light. The fact that she copies everything Maki does and likes everything Maki likes is seen as suspicious, and Kashiwagi has stated that she'd follow Maki to college and beyond if that's where she wanted to go. It doesn't help that Kashiwagi has also expressed interest in kissing girls and that she explicitly tells Maki that she loves the latter girl more than she does Tsubasa, such as when she dances with Maki at the School Festival. Kashiwagi loves her so much that she was willing to give up her relationship with Tsubasa, solely because she finally realized it made Maki sad to be the third wheel (and pointedly ignoring that it'd hurt Tsubasa just as much to break up).
• Mandela Effect: It's shockingly common for people to people to mistake the first I in Iino's name as a lowercase l, leading them to call her "Lino", though it's mostly limited to those reading the fan traslations or watching the anime subbed due to the VIZ manga spelling it as "Ino".
• Mind Game Ship: Kaguya and Shirogane's relationship consists of messing with each other in hopes of forcing a Love Confession because they're too prideful to give one themselves.
• Moe:
  • Kaguya, whenever she has one of her Adorkable moments, shows how romantic and innocent she can be, which is quite endearing.
  • A big part of Fujiwara's popularity is her cute personality. The ending sequence for the 3rd episode dials up the cuteness, on top of having amazingly fluid animation.
  • Iino looks cute by default, but when her childlike naivete rears its head, she can be downright precious.
  • There's also Chapter 17 where everyone puts on cat ear headbands.
    A MARRIAGE!!
• One True Pairing: Ishigami/Iino grows in popularity the longer the manga goes on for. The Christmas party cemented it as the most popular ship in the fandom that hasn't already happened, especially after Tsubame left the story.
• One True Threesome: The few that both want Maki to be romantically fulfilled and Kashiwagi and Tsubasa to remain together end up shipping all three together. It helps that Maki and Kashiwagi are best friends and that Tsubasa already likes Maki platonically.
• Periphery Demographic: At the height of its popularity, the manga ranked #2 among romcoms with teenage girls^note only beat out by the shoujo manga Haru Matsu Bokura, and #1 with women twenty and up. And the anime is popular with just about everyone, with its first season being easily the most popular anime comedy of 2019.
• Play-Along Meme: Shindou's sole appearance consisted of all the other students praising him like he's the best thing since sliced bread all while Kaguya has no idea who he is. Fans naturally ran with it, talking about how awesome he is whenever he comes up in a coversation.
• Salvaged Story: A lot of people were annoyed when it was revealed that Kaguya's desired career path was to become a photographer since while it made perfect sense for her character, there wasn't any build-up to said reveal beyond a couple lines of dialogue over a hundred chapters prior. We Want to Talk About Kaguya addressed these issues by devoting several chapters to laying the groundwork for her decision.
• Seasonal Rot: One thing that the otherwise-incredibly divided fanbase agrees nearly unilaterally on is that the part of the manga that follows Shirogane and Kaguya finally getting together isn't as good as what came before it, although fan opinions of how bad it is by comparison vary from "not quite as great, but still way better than average" to "completely unreadable".
• Ships That Pass in the Night: Ishigami/Hayasaka remains a popular pairing despite the two of them having only interacted once (for a grand total of two sentences) due to them both being initial Ensemble Darkhorses.
• Ship-to-Ship Combat:
  • Inevitably for a Love Triangle, one broke out immediately between Ishigami/Iino and Ishigami/Tsubame. Aka foresaw this, and dedicated a chapter to having a ship war occur in-universe between the two pairings.
  • Fujiwara/Hayasaka is an unusual case as it doesn't so much have competition instead all the fighting is between fans who think the ship is all but canon with Hayasaka's future dream being used as proof versus fans who don't see it at all and think that the other fans are over reacting to just a Running Gag. There is also a lot of back and forth towards whether the two are bisexual or not.
• Signature Series Arc: Given that the series is a romcom, the best known arcs are the two that majorly advance Shirogane and Kaguya's relationship, these being the Dual Confessions Culture Festival Arc for Shirogane's Grand Romantic Gesture and Kaguya's First Kiss, followed by The First Kiss Never Ends Arc where the two come to terms with their insecurities and become an Official Couple.
• Superlative Dubbing: While the English dub of the anime is generally well received, many fans were sold on watching it just to see Ian Sinclair go completely bonkers as the narrator. Given the general nature of the series, it fits very well. By season 3, he grows increasingly frustrated and fed up with the characters' stubbornness that he actually starts roasting them or audible getting frustrated when the two cannot just confess when they can.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!:
  • Funimation's subtitle change in Season 2 Episode 5 ^note "Why are you so far away from me" was changed to "What's the deal with the social distancing?" has caused an uproar among viewers for injecting a meme unrelated to the original script. Aniplex USA acknowledged the error and reverted to the original line.
  • A lot of fans complained about the increased level of fanservice in part 1 of the OVA, given that the chapter it adapted was a parody of fanservice.
  • The live action movie duology had quite the mixed reception. Controversial changes to the story include Kaguya running against Shirogane for the presidency instead of Iino, and as a consequence of that Iino being Demoted to Extra hard in favor of Tsubame taking a more active role in Ishigami's backstory.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • How some fans felt Hayasaka was handled. For most of the story, she served Kaguya as her beleaguered assistant, and throughout her small focus chapters she talks about her cold upbringing in the Shinomiya household, her estrangement from her parents, and how she wishes she could meet Kaguya as a friend and equal rather than a master and servant. While she was able to get some good character moments by befriending Shirogane and Kaguya does eventually realize she needs to take some of the load off of Hayasaka's shoulders, her major character arc ends up being more about the Shinomiyas than about her, and once she's relieved of duty she gets very little focus afterwards. The help Kaguya orders for her (who eventually replaces her) also turns out to be a plant by her older brothers, mentioned offhandedly. The final two arcs also have her tied to Kaguya, as despite her freedom she still gets called in to monitor Shirogane under Un'yo's orders.
  • Kashiwagi. Kaguya considers recruiting her into the student council as a one-off joke at the expense of Fujiwara, and never entertains the idea again even when Osaragi declines joining the Council, leaving a vacant spot that could've easily been filled by her. Given that she had been dating Tsubasa for several months by the time of Shirogane's second term, having a member of the student council with actual relationship experience amidst the whirlwind of Ship Tease and Unresolved Sexual Tension could've been interesting.
  • Played for Laughs with Go Kazamatsuri, in what is likely a Take That! towards works that do this. He's a Kid Detective who works as the sidekick of a famous detective, is the only known "impure" student at Shuuch'in besides the Shirogane siblings, and attends the school to solve the disappearance of his older brother. In a less romance-focused work, he could easily be part of the main cast, if not the protagonist outright. In this manga however, all we see of him is his dynamic with Saburo as Those Two Guys who hang around Shirogane and have a crush on Karen and Erika.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • It's never established who Shirogane made the General Affairs Officer after Osaragi turned the position down. Given that when Kaguya was briefly toying with the idea of running for president herself she had expressed interest in recruiting Kashiwagi into the student council, this seemed like a prime opportunity to make her a more formal member of their circle, especially since she continued to regularly interact with them after the fact.
  • Despite the story pleading for the characters to bring down their emotional walls around their loved ones, Shirogane never actually gets to do so and one of the biggest roots of his emotional trauma is left vaguely dealt with. He never gets an "Our Personas" chapter where he gets to truly show Kaguya his deeper insecurities, and while we get to learn more about why his mother abandoned him, Shirogane never actually has any screentime with her and by the end of the story seems to be on decent enough terms with her (enough to casually scroll through her Instagram).
• Unintentionally Sympathetic: As mentioned in Fourth Wall Myopia, Ootomo. Most of the characters fault her for being bitter about Ishigami assaulting her boyfriend and causing him to break up with her, but not only is she ignorant of the true circumstances, everyone involved chooses to keep her ignorant to protect her innocent optimism. The fact that she was genuinely kind to Ishigami prior to the incident, which is a large part of the reason why he goes as far as he does for her proves that she doesn't irrationally hate Ishigami, even though Tsubame thinks she does.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic:
  • Kaguya falls into this in the aftermath of her First Kiss with Shirogane. Anxious that she jumped too quickly into a relationship that her family won’t allow (especially after learning that her French kissing was too far for their first and made her look hypersexual), she reverts to her Ice persona while trying to have him initiate another kiss. She does this by hypocritically mocking him for thinking that her kiss or his Grand Romantic Gesture meant anything, then resorting to verbal (and sometimes physical) abuse whenever he doesn't pick up on her roundabout requests to progress a relationship that she's denying even exists. Maki insists that he needs to be more considerate toward her feelings, yet many readers at the time found Kaguya frustrating even with the full context of what was going through her head. While the purpose of the arc is to highlight both parties' insecurities, Shirogane's are easier to smypathize with given the more self-destructive nature.
  • Osaragi and Kaguya during the very divisive "Buddha's Stone Begging Bowl" arc. While the arc tries to give equal weight to both Osaragi and Iino's perspectives, some believe that Osaragi was a poor friend to Iino, and that Iino was by no means obligated to forgive her for badmouthing her behind her back. Not to mention, Osaragi's resentment of Iino during the arc stems from, in Osaragi's perspective, Iino failing to help Ishigami during the middle school incident, ignoring the fact that aside from Ishigami harshly rebuffing Iino so she won't be involved, Iino still ended up helping Ishigami graduate from middle school by protesting for his right to, while Osaragi never did anything to help. Kaguya also comes off as callous for demanding that Iino empathize with Osaragi, treating her as a petty child who just Can't Take Criticism for not wanting to associate with someone who admits that she can't stand her, views their friendship as superficial, and wouldn't support her dating Ishigami.
• Unintentional Uncanny Valley:
  • Fujiwara's memetic dance is, like the first ED to Haruhi Suzumiya, obviously rotoscoped animation of a real woman with a giant anime head stuck on top. It almost—but not quite—matches her flowing movements or her realistic body proportions. Occasionally, it comes across like a YouTuber superimposing a cutout face atop live-action footage as a gag.
  • In between his two terms as Student Council President, Shirogane loses his sleep-deprived glare, with everyone except Kaguya (who was attracted to his sharp gaze) finding him more approachable. To be fair to her, Shirogane's wide, bright eyes do look rather off-putting compared to his usual visage.
• Unpopular Popular Character: Ishigami. Almost every first-year girl in school hates him, but he's well liked by fans of the series.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: Downplayed. The series is actually serialized in a Seinen magazine, but a lot of readers mistake it for a Shonen series. It's not hard to see why though, as despite being Seinen, there's nothing in it that makes it unsuitable for teenage audience (and is marketed as such in the official English translation). The backstories of the main cast can be quite sad, but nothing too dark and the manga never uses any explicit fanservice elements. This is to a point deliberate. The mangaka has said that he prefers his work to be as widely-read as possible, and is occasionally critical of manga magazines' strict demographic lines in general. This is even mocked In-Universe where the male characters read a manga that is suspiciously similar to the actual manga itself and Ishigami complains about the lack of fanservice.
• The Woobie: There's so many people in this manga that need a hug that it has its own page.
• Woolseyism:
  • Translations of Chapter 27 (and Episode 7 of the anime) would attempt to culturally translate the ensuing dick jokes. The most convenient translation has Fujiwara actually talk about her dog's wiener, but a more direct translation some choose is how he stands "tall and erect" on his hind legs. Fujiwara's questions to Shirogane also get edited in translation so that the responses she tries to elicit are also suitable innuendo.
  • In the second episode of the second season, Kei insists that Kaguya call her by her first name without honorifics, vetoing "Kei-san," and even "Kei-chan" before Kaguya calls her "Kei." The dub has Kaguya call her "Miss Kei" ("Miss" is occasionally used with first names) as a rough equivalent to "Kei-san," but since "-chan" has no direct equivalent in English, Kaguya instead asks if Kei's sure about this before proceeding to call her "Kei."
  • The narrator in Japanese frames events like someone would in a Shonen battle series, in a matter-of-fact sense. This makes sense due to the comedic aspect of the story being about the two leads "battling" for each other to confess first. This works for the most part, but it can come across as unnecessary from a western perspective, since the narrator often repeats something the viewer can pretty obviously pick-up. The dub reframes the narrator into being closer to something of a commentator instead, and by a certain point, the narrator becomes effectively an Audience Surrogate, while still commenting on some of the actions of the leads. This makes the narrator in the dub not only entertaining, but outright hilarious.
  • In Episode 12, after Shirogane steals the giant Dragon's Jewel from the roof, in the sub, Kaguya shouts about someone stealing Shirogane's "giant ball", which Hayasaka responds with "phrasing". However, because in English, the slang for male genitals is usually plural, the dub opted to make Kaguya shout about someone stealing Shirogane's "Dragon Ball", with Hayasaka responding "copyright".

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