Overall: although I love some of the realistic slice of life parts, it's just too slow. Aired on GagaOOLala.

Content Warnings: manipulation, something else that is spoilery for a side character and I'll put it in a comment after this is done airing

What I Liked
- those kids were super adorable in ep 1 and did a great job
- set the time well with SARS (2003), although VHS tapes weren't new technology, it should have been a DVD player unless I understood this incorrectly
- differently abled representation with two characters
- the transition with the photo taking helped me figure out who was who in ep 1
- some realistic parts like having school pen pals, how you feel when you first start university and are on your own
- that hair made me laugh and the grandpa and friends reactions were hilarious*
- supportive friends with the pen pal thing
- production value

Room For Improvement
- too many time jumps and some not clearly marked, this reminds me of when I used to write stories and came to a less interesting part I'd just skip over it and jump to the next section
- I watch at double speed and it still feels slow, they should have cut this down to 6 or 8 episodes instead of 14
- in general I didn't care about any of the romantic relationships, I felt nothing about them
- Champ's character's plot could have been folded into another character
- that's an oddly aggressive pursuit from Nan, I guess it's supposed to be romantic but it felt unrealistic and unwarranted
- the whole thing with the Name's secret online friend was annoying and I would have been waaaaayyy more angry but I guess with the other circumstances he didn't care
- the lack of communication/being honest dragged out way too long
- need more than 1 song played on repeat every other minute (it's a nice song but I've come to loathe it)
- the constant references to the time period are unnecessary
- in episode 1, it seemed unrealistic that a parent or teacher wouldn't have talked to the other students about Name (update, confusing if he was homeschooled at that point because he was wearing a school uniform)
- the awful wigs* why oh why were there sooooo many bad wigs for so much screentime