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Is there anything worse than spending Valentine’s Day alone? Of course there is, but if you watch movies or TV shows during this time of year, you wouldn’t think so. Thankfully, anime is here to tell you that sometimes, love stinks. So, if you’re alone this Valentine’s Day and need some cheering up, here are a couple of my favorite shows to make you feel better for not having found that romantic partner that society demands you acquire.

Listen, I don’t know why you’ve found yourself alone, but I do know that you need some cheering up, so, while the rest of us get nicely loved up, here are some anime you can watch to make it all a bit easier:

• Mob Psycho 100 
• Your Lie in April
• Romantic Killer
• Death Note
• Interspecies Reviewers

Want to know more about each title? Keep reading!

Mob Psycho 100

Most of Mob Psycho 100 isn’t about romantic love, but the ending? It is perhaps the best exploration of dealing with rejection you can find. Mob is a powerful esper who suffers from crippling social awkwardness, causing him to second-guess himself in every interaction with his childhood crush, Tsubomi. But Mob gets himself some honest-to-goodness character development and finally asks Tsubomi out. And she says no. What follows is Mob’s psychic powers going wild until he finally talks it out with his mentor. He doesn’t try to chase her or blame her or anything; Mob hurts, processes it, and then moves on. Which sometimes you have to do.

Your Lie in April

Single on Valentine’s Day? Time for a good cry. And few anime can cause that therapeutic ugly cry quite like Your Lie in April. It is a story about a young boy grieving his mother’s death. He finds the courage to play piano again thanks to violinist Kaori, who herself is dying from an unnamed but deadly heart condition. It is tragedy upon tragedy, but it is actually beautiful to watch. Sometimes love gives us the strength to move on with our lives. Even when it ends poorly, we can hopefully be better people in the end.

Romantic Killer

You know what you don’t always need in your life? Love. It can get in the way of what you really want to do, which, in the case of Anzu from Romantic Killer, is playing video games, eating chocolate, and petting her cat. She isn’t looking for a relationship right now and is instead focusing on being happy in herself. That is something we can all aspire to, really. Now, a word of warning – the last few episodes of this Netflix anime take an unexpectedly dark turn, but this show is primarily an anti-rom-com where the main character is trying to avoid falling in love despite being surrounded by suspiciously cute singles in her area.

Death Note

Normally, love is beautiful, but when it is bad, it can go oh-so-badly. That is what we get from the romance subplot of Death Note. Here, Misa Amani, rising idol and budding sociopath, falls for Light Yagami, who is embracing his villain era and using the Death Note’s power to kill at a whim and shape society as he sees fit. Their relationship is among the most toxic in pop culture; Light openly uses Misa to further his plans without remorse, and Misa allows this because she feels she owes Light her life. So, you know, no matter how bad it feels to be single, at least you’re not stuck in a relationship with one and/or both of these two dumpster fires. Silver linings!

Interspecies Reviewers

We’re not gonna flat out recommend you watch hentai, mainly because you already know where to find it without our help. However, Interspecies Reviewers is basically I Can’t Believe It’s Not Hentai, to the point where Funimation stopped streaming the show halfway through because they suddenly realized this show is just the mangaka’s excuse to draw monster girl porn. The core concept is that monster girls exist and prostitution is legal, so two men make it their life’s work to try to sleep with every type of monster girl and rate their experience. This goes exactly how you expect, with a lot of “hentai-lite” moments to help you pass your time alone.

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