YMMV / My Dress-Up Darling

• Adorkable:
  • Gojo, whose lack of social skills combined with his overall Nice Guy demeanor make his interactions with Kitagawa very endearing to watch.
  • Kitagawa is such a geek for her cosplay passion that you can't help but find her charming. Once she develops feelings for Gojo, she has more than a few moments where she's reduced to blushing like a shy schoolgirl.
• Best Known for the Fanservice: While the series is already chock-full of fanservice in general, Kitagawa getting her measurements taken wearing nothing but a skimpy bikini is what made the anime adaptation, and the manga by extension, well known to the wider manga/anime community.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Kaoru Gojo is quite the well-liked character, mostly by manga readers, due to being a Cool Old Guy and the best parental figure for his grandchild Wakana, and to a lesser extent Marin and Sajuna. It's got to the point that manga readers wish that no harm will happen to him in future chapters.
• Escapist Character:
  • As always in these kinds of Romantic Comedy series, Gojo makes for a wish fulfillment character, being a male lead with poor social skills who, suddenly and without needing to depart from his comfort zone, finds himself basking in the charms of a beautiful girl who also respects and admires even his most embarrassing sides, and is actively trying to ease their way into a romantic relationship.
  • Kitagawa herself is seen by the female audience as a borderline wish fulfillment character, which is no surprise given the author of the manga is herself a woman who also cosplayed. Kitagawa is a beautiful, popular, and successful young woman who lives independently, enters the cosplay scene with a talented and handsome guy by her side, and they help each other overcome their insecurities and grow as people. Her relationship with the guy she likes is healthy, understanding, and characterized by communication, empathy, and kindness. Furthermore, the guy she likes is respectful, actually listens to her, becomes a better person for her sake, and does everything in his power to make her happy and help her fulfill her dreams. Not only that but Kitagawa is a bonafide nerd, extremely confident in her nerdy interests without fear of people thinking less of her for it, all the while maintaining her beautiful gyaru looks that she's proud to flaunt, and without ever stopping being a Nice Girl.
• Fandom Rivalry: Over the years, it's built up one with 2.5D Seduction, another manga about cosplay with ecchi elements. Most of the rivalry is focused on how well executed the cosplay focus is, with Dress-Up primarily focusing on the act of making the costumes while 2.5D focuses on the otaku aspects of cosplay culture. The way each series handles its romance subplots gets heated debate too.
• Fountain of Memes: Kitagawa's cosplaying, which fans completely ran with by having her cosplay any existing character imaginable from other series of media.
• Memetic Mutation: Fans will often replace L for W when bringing up Kitagawa's expressions, such as "wike" for "like," emulating the subtitles' choice to translate her particular way to say "love" as "wuv."
• Misaimed Fandom: The budding relationship between Gojo and Kitagawa has hooked plenty of fans who aren't very interested in the cosplaying portion of the story. This resulted in small circles of fans who grow annoyed when an arc takes long and detailed dives in the cosplay scene and its crafting process, clamoring for more romantic developments between Gojo and Kitagawa instead. While their chemistry plays a definite part, the cosplay and fashion are meant to be the connecting factors that drive them together, and therefore are just as important to the narrative rather than one serving as background details for the other.
• Periphery Demographic: The series is for seinen or older male audience in terms of target demographics with its wish fulfillment angle and Ms. Fanservice female lead Kitagawa, but it's very popular amongst older women as well, especially those who are into cosplay.
• She Really Can Act: While Amanda Lee's vocal talents have never been in question considering her reputation as a English cover artist for anime themes, her performance as Kitagawa has been the one fans rave about the most and say cement her among the greats of the voice acting community.
• Signature Scene:
  • As aforementioned, Kitagawa's measuring scene while wearing her bikini, which easily makes up the bulk of all the fan art.
  • Gojo grabbing Kitagawa's waist as she straddles him during the photoshoot at the love hotel. Many manga readers considered this their most anticipated scene to see how the anime would adapt it, and were not disappointed with how the anime even expanded upon the scene.
• Squick: The series is criticized for its use of Accidental Pervert moments towards the Inui sisters, on account of Sajuna looking very young and Shinju actually being young.
• Superlative Dubbing: Fans were quite impressed with how Amanda Lee handled the role of Kitagawa from just the first few episodes. Ditto to Paul Dateh for his role as Gojo, which is extra notable considering this series is Dateh's first ever voice acting role.
• Sweet Dreams Fuel: A light, fluffy and heartwarming fantasy wherein a shy and insecure teenager is allowed the chance to be led out of the cage of emotional trauma by the warm, understanding hand of a kind and beautiful classmate. The lack of mean-spirited slapstick in response to Accidental Pervert moments, coupled with how fast the main cast become friends and how supportive they are to each other's insecurities, is a nice bonus. Kitagawa managing to also pursue her otaku and cosplay dreams with the help of the adorable and handsome Gojo also makes the series this for its female audience, especially for women who want to enter the cosplay scene without fear of being judged.
• Unconventional Learning Experience:
  • The series could easily be described as a beginner's guide to cosplay with a story built around it, teaching everything from where to gather the proper materials for outfits and how to apply makeup, to the basic rules of cosplay conventions and the finer details of photography.
  • The story gives an extensive look into Hina dolls, a relatively obscure Japanese craft for the international audience, and photography as well as artistic aesthetics in general.

---