REVIEW: ‘Honey Lemon Soda’ Episode 3 — “Our Little Secret”

Despite a lingering general apathy regarding the characters and their will-they/won’t-they romance, Honey Lemon Soda Episode 3 does its best to win stragglers over fully. More than anything, “Our Little Secret” highlights the major component singling it out from the crowd—its distinctive animation style and unusual utilization of color. While not everything works together smoothly, and there are plenty of stumbles along the way, it doesn’t drag on.

The series is entertaining despite making it hard to invest in the characters and their many minor plights and mini devastations. Uka Ishimori (Kana Ichinose) spends most of Honey Lemon Soda Episode 3 reveling in her new reality. After Kai Miura’s (Shōgo Yano) push in Episode 2, Uka is determined to be more forthright with her wants. First up is befriending Ayumi. It’s a sweet, bumbling scene, elevated by Ayumi’s good-natured personality. She already assumed that she and Uka were friends but, in a nice moment of understanding, realizes that Uka is the type of person where these moments need to be shared aloud.

It’s a subtle point that says a lot about Ayumi, Uka, and the series’ writing. While Kai doesn’t often handle Uka’s feelings delicately, some people in her orbit are ready to meet her at her level rather than forcing her to theirs. It’s similar to the rest of Kai’s main friend group, such as Satoru and Tomoya, who are perfectly pleasant. The latter even sits beside Uka in a seating switch, with Kai on her other side.

Uka is unable to shake her infatuation with Kai. 

But regardless of the other friends she makes, Kai remains Uka’s sole focus. It nears obsession levels as she seeks him out to return his hat. She realizes she’s beginning to feel jealous when she thinks of his relationships with other girls. Kai has yet to do anything that, in my mind at least, warrants such affection. But Uka clearly thinks he hung the moon with her committed infatuation. She doesn’t believe he’ll ever return her feelings, and it’s even stated that she isn’t his standard “type.” But for now, just being close to him is enough.

Knowing a secret certainly helps when she learns that he often wears hats since they hide his bedhead. The moment is meant to humanize him (though one wonders if bedhead is enough to warrant such embarrassment, only teenagers), and it does to a degree. But Honey Lemon Soda Episode 3 better captures his character when he speaks highly of Uka when she isn’t standing nearby. It proves he isn’t just inserting himself as her reluctant protector looking to help socialize and rehabilitate her. Instead, his affection is sincere, even if it’s not yet nearing romance.

The central part of the back half of Honey Lemon Soda Episode 3 finds Uka, Kai, Ayumi, and co. go on a class trip to a local forest. There are some fun visual gags, most notably Uka’s enormous, overpacked backpack. In perhaps the most truthful instance of adolescent humiliation, Uka, horrified, realizes she’s the only one dressed in her gym clothes. That feeling of being the odd one out is so human—so viscerally painful—that it plunges you right back into moments just like it. Uka is still awkward despite everything, which makes her character more interesting.

A field-trip leads to hilarity in Honey Lemon Soda Episode 3. 

Of course, since it’s an excursion out, things don’t go as planned. Uka’s group gets lost, leading to a hilariously dramatic “to be continued.” This, plus the ever-present sweeping score, are the two melodrama reminders in “Our Little Secret.”

The animation continues to get stronger with each episode. In Episode 3, the forest allows the series to highlight different styles and tones, playing with wildlife exteriors instead of schools and cityscapes. The lush greens and moving shadows make for a tangible world. It’s helped even further by the direction and composition, with multiple supporting characters constantly running in and out of frame. Despite some stiff movements, the series isn’t sterile or vacant. There’s plenty of movement to make it more than a simple copy and paste from the page.

That said, it begs the question of whether jumping ship to the manga is worthwhile. Because sometimes what doesn’t work on screen—the relationships and the slightly uncanny character designs (mainly facial expressions)—work much better on the page with different sketching. Mayu Murata‘s manga has the same story but a more varied texture from frame to frame.

Honey Lemon Soda Episode 3 is another step in the right direction. There’s still no emotional pull towards either of the main characters, but the animation continues improving, making for an engaging yet lifeless adaptation.

Honey Lemon Soda Episode 3 is out now on Crunchyroll.