I’m going to skip the typical SOTB intro and get right into it. I promise I’ll also keep this short(er than typical SOTB posts, since it is Sunday evening after all).

MARRIAGETOXIN is already one of my favorite romcom anime of all-time (so far in its story), and there’ve only been 10 episodes of the dub and 12 (as of this writing) episodes of its sub. I’m not typically a person who claims something as incredible off the strength of a few episodes, but this is a rare exception. While I’m only speaking as an anime-only, here’s why it’s a rare exception for me.

In a nutshell, MARRIAGETOXIN is what you get when you combine the Yor Forger route of SpyxFamily with the sheer WTF-ness of The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, Really Love You, blend it up in a Yakuza Fiance blender and pour it into a cup laced with Nisekoi and with a pinch of DanDaDan sugar on the rim. Equal parts romcom, character drama and shonen battle anime, MARRIAGETOXIN follows a very powerful, incredible socially-inept poison-utilizing assassin, Hikaru Gero, and his plight to find a marriage partner to continue his family’s bloodline of assassins. He decides to get married for two reasons. First, he wants to find love/prove to himself and others that he’s capable of loving someone and being worthy of love. Secondly, he wants to keep his lesbian sister, whom he loves very much and respects her queerness, from having to marry a guy and produce children with said guy.

What I appreciate the most about MARRIAGETOXIN is that it takes some risks with its storyline set up. In fact, it’s not one you see often in anime or manga. Additionally, the way it’s been presented so far (at least in the anime), it’s a story that handles its queerness not as a joke or a burden. Need more proof? Read on.

In the first episode, Gero meets Mei Kinosaki, who he initially is tasked to kill. Mei is an adorable–but incredibly capable–blonde voiced by none other than Brittany Karbowski in the dub (and Shion Wakayama in the sub). Why is such a cutie being condemned to being unalived, you ask? That’s because our adorable blonde is, in so many words, a genderfluid scammer who screwed over the wrong people. Mei, a marriage scammer, scams both guys and girls, and they look (or apparently look) absolutely stunning doing so. Hell, they’re wearing a smile staring down the business end of a syringe.

As such, they ran into the wrong crowd, got captured, and eventually end up at Gero’s mercy. Now, before Gero delivers the killing blows, Mei tells our aloof assassin why they scam people. Pretty much, it comes down to, as far as we know, the fact that Mei wants to save their younger brother from a life-threatening ailment. Gero, being a cold-blooded assassin with morals, says “let me not kill this person, but have them help me find a partner with your well of knowledge about love, like, lust and the like.”

This is the basic story of MARRIAGETOXIN, more or less, as of season one of the anime. Please remember that I’m speaking from an anime-only perspective.

What follows is Mei helping their stoic partner find people to woo, while also helping Gero find/complete jobs. Throughout the first season, the dynamic duo meet other assassins, some friend, some foe. We get comedy, we get action, we get romance. We get deconstructions of shonen battle anine at some points, and heavy leanings into the tropes at others. We get hints that there’re even more sinister machinations at work that we know. Overall, it’s a damned good show, one that does a lot with a convoluted backstory and makes it work.

It’s a funny show when it needs to be. When it needs to go dramatic, it does so in a way that is not corny or over the top. So far, the battles have been incredible and incredibly animated (this is an anime animated by Studio Bones, after all). The characters are interesting and not one-note. Even the villains are well-written. And the story itself–whether you’re here for Gero marrying someone or to see what the hell happens with the assassins and their hierarcy–is one that’s engaging. I’m not an anime expert, but this is definitely a series you should check out.

It’s been announced that there’ll be a second season, one that’ll apparently adapt a fan-favorite arc. I, for one, am excited.