”Shitty and creepy” Fate fan turns out to be not such a bad guy after all.

This month’s big theatrical anime release in Japan was the lengthily titled Fate/stay night: Heaven’s Feel I. presage flower, which opened on October 14. The latest adaptation of the lengthy and multi-branched Fate visual novel video game series, presage flower focuses on one of the optional paths through the games in which Sakura Matou (pictured above) plays a key role as the female lead.

▼ Fate/stay night: Heaven’s Feel I. presage flower trailer

Fate’s plotline is pretty complex, but boiled down to its essentials it’s a tale of people summoning warriors from history and legend to do battle for ownership of the Holy Grail. The series has built a reputation for exciting fantasy battles, lavish visual production, and lengthy philosophical pondering. But Fate started off as an eroge, or adult video game, series, which means that different fans might be watching it for different reasons, something that was brought into stark focus for Japanese Twitter user @khpnVG, who recently went to see presage flower at the theater.

https://twitter.com/khpnVG/status/920227662567575553

“I saw Heaven’s Feel,” @khpnVG tweeted. “It was a wonderful movie. There was a couple sitting next to me, and after the film finished, I heard the boyfriend saying ‘Sakura Matou is just TOO sexy…Mmmm…sexy Sakura.’”

This didn’t seem like a respectful line of dialogue for a guy to be having with a girl he’s dating, thought @khpnVG. “The guy was being so shitty and creepy that I didn’t think I could stand it anymore,” @khpnVG continues. “But then his girlfriend smiled and cheerfully said ‘When we get back home, how about if I do some Sakura cosplay for you?’ Then I felt terrible about myself.”

It’s not clear if @khpnVG’s facetious self-condemnation is based on guilt from doubting the solidarity of the couple’s relationship, or simply an unfulfilled desire for a real-life sexy cosplay partner of his or her own. Either way, though, it shows that in the modern era of otakuism it’s not only men who can appreciate anime’s sexy factors.

Source: Twitter/@khpnVG via Hachima Kiko
Images: YouTube/アニプレックス