Anime Review - A Sign of Affection (2024) Episodes 1-3

A Silent Voice is one of my favourite anime and why I love it so much is because of the co-lead. Shouko Nishimiya is a deaf character who in the English dub is voiced by Lexi Marman who is also deaf. She is one of my favourite characters in anime for many reasons but the main reason why I love her is because of how relatable she is. She is not defined by her disability. I bring this up as A Sign of Affections main is also a deaf character but is also going through relatable emotions. While their stories are not the same some of the general emotions are, so I do have high standards when it comes to the representation.

A Sign of Affection follows Yuki Itose a deaf university student who one day while travelling to school bumps into Itsumoi Nagi who suddenly piques her interest. She tells her friend Rin about this, and it turns out she is a mutual of Itsumoi. What unfolds is the 2 characters bonding over their life differences.

What I love about this show is the animation and the characters. The show is gorgeous, and every character is visually unique and stunning. What also adds to the characters is that throughout the show they are animated off-model many times mainly for comedic effect and every time it happens it simply just works and is very effective.

I also love seeing the relationship build between Yuki and Itsumoi. There is a moment in the first episode where Itsumoi says to Yuki to let him in her world and her gleeful reaction is super adorable and pulls at your heartstrings. Sumire Morohoshi and Yuu Miyazaki do an incredible job as Yuki and Itsumoi respectively and being honest. The whole cast is amazing, each character is effectively brought to life because of the cast.

Throughout the first 3 episodes, we see the beginning of a relationship starting to form. The jealous friends make their intentions known to the audience and seeing Yuki come to with their emotions. My only big issue with the show is that Yuki childhood friend Oushi Ashioki knows sign language but instead of communicating just with sign language the characters narrate what they are g. I just feel like an easy way to get out of finding a way to communicate what they are saying to the audience.

However small issue aside I had a great time watching A Sign of Affection. It is a super cute and fun anime that I hope sticks the landing as if it does it could be one of my favourites.