My First Girlfriend is a Gal

はじめてのギャル (Hajimete no Gal)

7.8(2)

OtakuDen

6.3(333,091)

MAL Score

Ranked #9486

Popularity #419

Comedy
Ecchi
Romance
Harem
School

Episodes: 10
Duration: 23 min per ep
Aired: Jul 12, 2017 to Sep 13, 2017
Status: Finished Airing

Synopsis

After a prank by his lewd-minded friends, Junichi Hashiba works up the nerve to confess to Yukana Yame, a fashionable “gal,” hoping a girlfriend will finally change his status as a clueless virgin. Put off by his desperate approach, Yukana initially reacts with disgust—but Junichi’s earnestness and her own teasing back-and-forth begin to close the distance, and she unexpectedly accepts his confession.

Hajimete no Gal follows Junichi as he tries to build confidence and rein in his impulses while navigating a suddenly unfamiliar school life. With Yukana and a colorful group of girls around him, everyday moments quickly spiral into awkward misunderstandings, flirtatious comedy, and unpredictable chaos.

Otaku Consensus

Hajimete no Gal lands as a watched-more-than-loved ecchi rom-com: its MAL popularity rank of #418 shows wide reach, while its 6.26 MAL score and 59/100 AniList score point to a firmly mixed reputation. Hiroyuki Furukawa’s direction works best when NAZ keeps the pacing in rapid slapstick mode and foregrounds Yukana’s gyaru teasing, but the most common criticism is that the harem fanservice and virginity-driven comedy often crowd out the romance viewers came to see.

Why You Should Watch

Watch Hajimete no Gal if you want a short, loud ecchi rom-com that treats embarrassment as a contact sport rather than a tender slow burn. Its sweet spot is the viewer who likes gyaru flirting, harem pressure, and slapstick escalation, but does not want the cleaner wish-fulfillment polish of My Dress-Up Darling or the long-form sprawl of To Love-Ru. At 10 episodes, it moves like a season of sketches: misunderstandings hit fast, reactions are oversized, and Yukana’s fashion-forward presence gives the show a distinct 2017 gyaru texture. The appeal is not subtle romance; it is watching a painfully inexperienced male lead get dragged through a minefield of teenage bravado, teasing, and ecchi punchlines.

Key Characters

J
Junichi Hashiba
Junichi is the show’s cringe-comedy pressure point, a male lead whose insecurity and hormonal panic make him either painfully relatable or deliberately exasperating depending on the viewer’s tolerance for ecchi embarrassment.
Y
Yukana Yame
Yukana is the series’ defining hook: a gyaru heroine whose teasing, tsundere edge, and fashion-coded confidence give the anime its strongest personality beyond the harem mechanics.

What Makes It Stand Out

1
The anime is unusually compact for a TV rom-com, running 10 episodes from July 12 to September 13, 2017 rather than the more common 12 or 13-episode seasonal format.
2
NAZ produced the adaptation with Hiroyuki Furukawa serving as both director and character designer, giving the series a unified approach to exaggerated reaction comedy and gyaru visual appeal.
3
AniList’s tag profile makes its identity unusually clear: Gyaru sits at 92%, Female Harem at 81%, Nudity at 80%, and Slapstick at 79%, placing it much closer to ecchi farce than subdued school romance.
4
The show’s reception profile is distinctive: it is highly visible on MAL with over 331,000 votes and a popularity rank of #418, yet its rank of #9439 marks it as a divisive title rather than a consensus favorite.
5
Its production credits include dedicated prop designers Keisuke Nishijima and Hideyuki Satake alongside color designer Chiharu Tanaka, a notable setup for a series whose visual identity depends heavily on fashion, accessories, and classroom-detail comedy.

Fun Facts & Trivia

Fun fact 1: Hiroyuki Furukawa handled two major creative roles on the anime: director and character designer, an arrangement that often gives a TV comedy a more consistent sense of expression and timing.
Fun fact 2: The series composition was handled by Yuuichirou Momose, while Keisuke Yanagi served as editor and Masakatsu Oomuro as sound director, placing the rhythm of the adaptation in the hands of a clearly defined comedy pipeline.
Fun fact 3: Its MAL and AniList scores are strikingly aligned: 6.26/10 on MAL and 59/100 on AniList, suggesting that the mixed reception was not limited to one platform’s user base.
Fun fact 4: Despite its modest critical standing, the anime has 1,880 AniList favorites, showing that its gyaru/ecchi niche built a dedicated fan pocket even among viewers who rated it cautiously.