Asagao to Kase-san follows a timid and cute girl named Yui Yamada, who loves gardening and is quite feminine. Yui finds herself falling for her tomboyish classmate Tomoka Kase, who serves as her opposite. The two eventually begin to date, though it’s not always easy. Asagao to Kase-san is the story of the challenges that they face in their relationship, along with the happy moments that make it all worth it. It may only be a one-hour movie, but Asagao to Kase-san manages to take everyone on a roller-coaster ride of emotions with these girls’ relationship.

The theme of Asagao to Kase-san and Yagate Kimi ni Naru is the same - two girls start a relationship together unexpectedly, and they have to deal with exactly what that means. Both of these shoujo-ai explore the ups and downs of this new relationship, highlight both the good and the bad, and showing the girls as they overcome their struggles. Both also have beautiful animation and are sure to make you both laugh and cry if you love a good shoujo-ai story. Asagao to Kase-san is only a movie, so it can only satisfy you so long, but you can definitely have a good hour spent with Yui and Tomoka!

Fumi Manjoume is the main character of Aoi Hana. She’s the first-year high school student at an all-girls’ school and begins the new chapter of her life tragically heartbroken from a failed relationship. Around the same time as starting school, she unexpectedly rekindles her friendship with Akira Okudaira, her friend from over ten years ago. Akira is also a first-year high school student, though at a different all girls’ school. As the two become fast friends again, they help each other deal with their past romantic troubles - and all the while, become closer and closer to one another.

Aoi Hana and Yagate Kimi ni Naru both take place during a girl’s first year of high school, showing her struggles to adjust to a new and exciting, but challenging, chapter of her life. Both of these shoujo-ai anime are stories about how that main girl, be it Fumi or Yuu, are able to face these challenges thanks to another girl that they become very close to. Aoi Hana and Yagate Kimi ni Naru show the value of female companionship over male and set the stage for the girls to become closer than just best friends along the way. If you liked the coming of age elements of Yagate Kimi ni Naru, you’re going to love Aoi Hana.

Fumika Murasame is a popular girl in her school in Sasameki Koto. She is smart and she good marks, and she also excels at sports. What she isn’t good at, however, is relationships. She has had a crush on her classmate Ushio Kazama for some time now but is too afraid to actually tell the other girl. Meanwhile, Ushio has a feeling that Fumika might like her. But she is also afraid to act on her feeling because she has always been rejected by girls in the past. Will the two ever overcome their fear and shyness and accept that they both want to be together?

Sasameki Koto and Yagate Kimi ni Naru are both stories about a developing relationship between two classmates. Yagate Kimi ni Naru has the relationship happening faster while Sasameki Koto is more of a slow burn, but both still show how the relationship builds and becomes stronger. They both create a light-hearted and fun relationship between two girls, one of which is cuter and more childish, and the other more mature and beautiful. Thus the relationships in both Sasameki Koto and Yagate Kimi ni Naru are well-balanced between the two different kinds of characters.

Best friends Haruka Takayama and Yuu Sonoda have just started high school together, and though they are assigned seats on the opposite side of the room, they are determined to have a fun time in school. As the year starts to progress, though, they begin to make new friends as well. For the old friendship, this creates some jealousy, especially from Haruka. When she asks Yuu to do something with her that she wouldn’t do with any other girl to prove they are best friends, the two share a kiss. And then one kiss leads to more kisses. And suddenly, Yuu and Haruka realise that they have become more than just best friends somewhere along the line.

Like Yagate Kimi ni Naru, Sakura Trick has the leading ladies in a relationship near the start of the story. That makes both of these shoujo-ai anime not about flirting and teasing and foreplay, but actually about an established relationship. Yagate Kimi ni Naru and Sakura Trick can both explore the ups and downs of a relationship, what makes it happy and fun, and what also can make it challenging. They both especially show the challenge of being two girls in a relationship together that no one expected, and the odds that they have to face against people that may not be as accepting of that.

Citrus begins right before fashionable Yuzu Aihara is about to start high school, with her mother’s remarriage and Yuzu transferring to a new school. While she at first hopes for the adventure of a relationship and a first kiss, she quickly learns that her style and mannerisms don’t fit in with the rest of the strict all-girls’ school she is now attending. And then she meets the beautiful bit intimidating student council president Mei Aihara, who confiscates her mobile phone on their first meeting. Things only get more complicated when Yuzu goes home only to discover that Mei is her new step-sister! And when Mei pins Yuzu to the ground and kisses her, then gives her the cold shoulder, well. You could say that things just keep getting more complicated for Yuzu!

Citrus and Yagate Kimi ni Naru both have shoujo-ai relationships with a common central core - they are initiated by a beautiful student council president upon a younger girl who has just started high school with dreams of a romantic first relationship. And neither of those first-year girls ever expected that their suitor would be another girl! Citrus and Yagate Kimi ni Naru have different stories from there, but it’s interesting to see how the same beginning idea can develop into two different shoujo-ai romances. And both anime do a great job of creating a light-hearted relationship full of ups and downs and unexpected turns as the story progresses.

Akari Akaza, Yui Funami, and Kyouko Toshino are all best friends at an all-girls’ middle school in Yuru Yuri. Yui and Kyouko had taken advantage of the disbanded tea club’s empty room to start their own club, the Amusement Club, in their first year. The whole point of the club is just to do things that are fun. Akari joins when she enters the school, and shortly after, another girl named Chinatsu Yoshikawa joined as well. Chinatsu thought it was the tea club, though, but ends up staying anyway. The four girls spend their time drinking tea and complimenting one another, which leads to quite a lot of flirting and fun between them.

Yuru Yuri is meant to just be a light and fun shoujo-ai, and it’s very successful at being exactly that. It never gets too intense or deep and is just entertaining to watch as the girls unabashedly fawn over one another. Their relationship is something between friendship and a little bit more while retaining innocent and playful. Like Yagate Kimi ni Naru, it shows a kind of awakening for the girls that they don’t need boys to have fun and can be happy to flirt with their friends instead. Shoujo-ai is both light and fluffy, with cute girls that are all in the same school as the main characters. Yuru Yuri has less of a solid plot and relationship than Yagate Kimi ni Naru, but the feeling is very similar.