YMMV / My First Girlfriend Is a Gal

• Americans Hate Tingle: Minoru is usually despised by Western audiences, due to Comedic Lolicon characters generally not being very well-received outside of Japan. While the characters and narrative tend to treat him as a harmless person that will hopefully grow out of his obsession with time, Westerners see him as a ticking time bomb waiting to go off.
• Broken Base:
  • Yukana and Junichi's relationship. Some like it because they go through enough Character Development to stick together and truly care for one another. Others don't like it because of the obstacles they face which test their relationship.^note The Ranko subplot, Nene's subplot, and the anime original plot of episode 9.
  • The English dub. Some fans take exception to the fact that the dub uses a rather loose translation of the script (e.g., giving Yukana a Valley Girl accent), while others consider the dub to be funny, translation accuracy be damned.
• Catharsis Factor: Though Dai Mitarai's existence is short in the anime, his beatdown by Ranko and Minoru is nothing short of satisfying due to how much of a heartless scumbag he is.
• Fan-Preferred Couple: Junichi x Yui has taken off with manga readers as the most popular ship, largely due to Yui's substantial Character Development while retaining her original haughtiness, her tendency to be embarrassed or humiliated when her scheming backfires, her genuine adorableness when she's happy, and the fact that she genuinely cares about both Yukana and Junichi as people, putting both of their happiness ahead of her feelings for Junichi. Yukana still has a sizeable fanbase because of her sunny personality and beauty, but has also gained a number of detractors for actions or decisions that seem pretty callous towards Junichi, or at least causing misunderstandings by not being honest with him. Misunderstandings that, more than once, Yui has gone out of her way to fix for them.
• Informed Wrongness: Episode 9 has everyone calling out Junichi for being insecure, jealous, and not trusting Yukana. However, the only reason he thought this way was because Yukana didn't even explain that there's nothing between her and Dai Mitarai, a guy she was classmates with back in junior high. Once he tries to bring up these insecurities to her, she gets mad at him, gives him the silent treatment the following day, and then hangs out with Mitarai behind his back. This very well gives Junichi a valid reason to feel threatened by Mitarai's presence in their relationship, which leads to Junichi thinking Yukana has only jerking him around this whole time, despite the fact that they've been dating for quite a while. Of course, Junichi complaining to her made this debacle worse, and it makes him look hypocritical in comparison, but it all started with Yukana not reassuring him that there's nothing to worry about.
• Moe: Nene, before and after she becomes a Gal.
• Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: Shinpei, Keigo and Minoru were annoying at first, and many find the latter's characterization as a Comedic Lolicon to be rather creepy. That said, episode 10 shows that they still consider themselves Junichi's True Companions to help him out in his time of need. Also, Minoru is willing to cheer up a crying girl for the right reasons and threatens to make whoever hurt her regret it.
• So Okay, It's Average: The general consensus of the series, particularly the Japanese version, is that it's your standard Romantic Comedy.
• Superlative Dubbing: While the Japanese version is considered to be So Okay, It's Average, the English dub has been touted as this due to the gratuitous amount of liberties that were taken.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: Not all fans liked the changes made in the anime, including the Flanderization of Junichi's friends and introducing all the girls in the first episode.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic: In the eyes of some fans, everyone involved in episode 9:
  • Yukana chews out Junichi for being unable to trust her and getting insecure about their relationship, and her group of friends feel the same way. She has a point there, and quite a large one since she had just learned of an uglier side to Junichi, but this episode had Junichi finally bring up his insecurity when he saw her talking to another, more attractive guy who was trying to flirt with her, and because she's hurt by the accusation she gives Junichi the silent treatment and doesn't try to explain anything to him. Given that she also constantly teases him about his flaws, it's easy to see why Junichi would suddenly blow up like that.
  • Junichi is an extremely Insecure Love Interest, and his accusation to Yukana seems rather jerkish when put into context. If simply talking to a handsomer man puts him into a jealous state, especially when he regularly hangs out with beautiful girls that are ready to jump on him if he gives the word, he comes off as a bit hypocritical and unfair to Yukana. And given that she actually has feelings for him at this point, his accusation just spits in her face and implies that Junichi never saw her as a real girlfriend.
  • Yui and Nene make things more complicated because they don't even bother to learn the whole story, scolding Junichi for the situation.
  • Now put all of this in contrast with the first manga, which handles a similar situation, but Yukana just asks Junichi to tell her the truth if he's insecure about something, showing much more maturity in that scene than anyone did in that particular episode. And they've been going out for a few months at most there overall, where the anime places this incident after a year of dating.
• Values Dissonance: In the manga, after her feelings for Junichi become clear, Yuki convinces Yui that she needs to quit live streaming. For Western readers, this can seem like a crazy leap of logic, but in East Asian countries, female entertainers (like idols and, indeed, some streamers) often remain single due to Contractual Purity, as they are expected to treat their fans as their "boyfriends", and it's considered "disrespectful" to the audience to give their love/attention to another man. Ranko, however, proves that her audience already knew she was totally in love with "Doggy" and was actually rooting for her to get her man.
• The Woobie: Nene begins her arc seeing the boy she's admired and pined for her whole life being taken by another girl and ends it sitting naked on top of said boy, begging him to take her virginity, only to make him realize he actually loves said other girl. Of course, she goes a bit off the deep end in between, but it's hard not to feel bad for her.
• Woolseyism: This video makes a case that the English dub adds more character to the cast by deliberately exaggerating their character traits and made it more entertaining. Episode 7, however, controversially added some new lines that were digs at Donald Trump and fans of Visual Novel. Much like similar changes to the English dub of Prison School, this caused backlash from many fans, as they either felt they were being attacked or they simply thought these lines were out of place.