Parents' Guide to

Komi Can't Communicate

By Joly Herman, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 13+

Popular manga debuts as anime; watch out for sexual context.

TV Netflix Comedy 2021
Komi Can't Communicate TV Show poster

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this TV show.

Community Reviews

age 13+

Based on 6 parent reviews

age 16+

No value

The voices are largely irritating in their extreme sounds and stereotypes, and about 50% of the “dialogue” is Komi breathing in little gasps of surprise, excitement, fear, etc. If you want to see a female portrayal of extreme fear, shyness, and weakness, this is a good example. Also, it’s not a comedy. Drama, yes, funny, only occasionally. From the handful of episodes I saw with my kids, a few sexually explicit scenes were present. The descriptions others have provided don’t go into detail but should for viewers to be aware. One where a girl lusts after a hole in Komi’s stocking (that she’s wearing) and goes through dramatic inner turmoil including showing the character between Komi’s legs struggling, as you hear the character’s inner struggle. It is very suggestive. She later makes off with her stocking over her head while boys look on with interest in girls running by bare legged. The taboo element is cranked up in the portrayal of all of this. Another example shows a girl giving a handmade chocolate lollipop made in her naked image with the character encouraging the recipients of her gift to “lick me, eat me” etc. As for educational value…not much. We don’t see a personal growth transformation in any way that the viewer can take any moral or life lessons from, like you would find in a show like Atypical or Mixedish, for example. This show is likely to exacerbate a kid’s anxiety not provide any positive growth opportunities.
2 people found this helpful.
age 12+

IT’S ONE OF THE BEST ANIME’S OF ALL TIME AND IM NOT JOKING but I can’t even talk about all the good stuff in this parental guide because of the sexual content with a huge side of fan service for a PG rated anime on Netflix.

I’m a 14 year old but it won’t let me put it in my account but this is what you and your kids should know about this show. In this show a teenager named Komi tries to get 100 friends but she can’t talk because of her sociophobia so Tadano tries to help her which is a pretty wholesome show with absolutely no sussy or gay moments… LOLOLOL LMAO you made me laugh of course their are I mean I can’t believe it’s not TV-14 on Netflix becuase a PG rating is misleading at best but it’s still an amazing show. But some of the sussy stuff is here: First the popular girl named Yamai is gay because she loves Komi so much so she did the following. First, she kidnapped Tadano because she likes him and she almost kills him but after Komi and her unknown gender friend named Najimi untie him from the closet they escape with Tadano but after they go to show and Yamai apologizes she misunderstands Komi because she can BARLY talk as Yamai thinks she’s says she doen’t like her but she didn’t. When she thought that she pulled out chopsticks attempting to end her life but after Komi writes her thoughts she says she’ll be Yamai’s friend so she doesn’t kill herself. Then then they go to a festival Yamai asked Komi to eat her “Big thick juicey” hotdog but she was sexualizing it as she was pretending she had a dick but then Najimi (the unknown gender person) ate it then later before the next part/event/day/scene yamai asked Komi to put a “white chocolate banana” in her before getting cut off by Tadano who says don’t do that. But another time of this sussy stuff is when they picked what to do for the school festival and people bring up some things and make an excuse to see/do something with Komi “there school goddess” and Yamai brings up a haunted house and says to the people they can touch her behind since it’ll be dark and the others agree. Netflix this really is some “suggestive dialogue” if you know what I mean. Plus there is a lot of fanservice (showing/sexual content mostly from girls) like the time where komi’s friends take her to the mall to pick out an outfit (they have ideas). And when they go to a water park some of the men score the girls bikinis in there mind giving them all 10 points but giving Komi and her showing bikini a 10000000 points because she’s the most beautiful girl in school (and they voted her to be a school goddess) I can go on and on but what I’m saying is watch some clips and other reviews and see if it’s alright for them but IT’S ONE OF THE BEST ANIMES OF ALL TIME!!!!!!! And if their younger they probably won’t even get the sexual gags as well but IT SHOULD STILL BE TV-14 BY DEFAULT but it’s your choice so do more research and make your mind

This title has:

Educational value
Great messages
Great role models
Too much violence
Too much sex
Too much swearing
1 person found this helpful.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (6):
Kids say (20):

Based on a popular Japanese manga series that has a strong following, Komi Can't Communicate delves into issues of social status, social anxiety, and peer acceptance. Fans of manga and anime might be able to see past the objectification and sexualization of high school girls and trans people, but it's hard to ignore the short skirts and tight blouses that the main character, Komi, is wearing. Lewd comments are more overt in the English-subtitled version than the dubbed version, but the message is pretty clear: A teen in a short skirt who is too anxious to speak can be made into a sex object.

A PSA-style announcement in each episode about taking into consideration that some people have social anxiety and have difficulty communicating is just bizarre. It might be well meant, but it's jarring with the sexualized content. Teens and adults can find better animated content to delve into together.

TV Details

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