YMMV / Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid

• Adaptation Displacement: A good chunk of the fandom has no idea that the show began as a manga... four years prior to the anime's release.
• Adorkable: Despite being a powerful dragon equal to Tohru in strength, Elma is shown to be fairly innocent and naive at times, is easily flustered, gets very excited about sweets, and gets fired up over simple things while often failing to look threatening at all. She even amuses kids with "old man" humor. Before she manages to become a proper coder, she was pretty much the office mascot due to this.
• And You Thought It Would Fail: Before airing, a lot of people wrote it off as one of Kyoto Animation's B-projects, especially because the yuri fandom saw the series as an example of yuri, and Kyoto Animation is infamous for massively increasing Les Yay but then throwing it away. Then the first few episodes aired and surprised people with how funny and heartwarming it really was, and the series became so popular that it might be one of the most recognizable anime of the last years. Its success came to the point that Yu-Gi-Oh! of all things would create a line of monster cards named Dragonmaid that was officially approved by Cool-Kyou Shinsha himself, and later Kyoto Animation choose the series' second season as their great return project after the fire that damaged their studio in Summer 2019.
• Awesome Art: All of the dragons are animated by hand in the anime.
• Broken Base: Episode 6. People generally have no doubt that the first episodes are well-executed comedy/Slice of Life, but the sexual innuendo between Kanna and Saikawa, and especially between Lucoa and Shouta, is a turn-off to many. Others, however, think it isn't that sexual to fall into ecchi, and those who have read the manga (or otherwise know Cool-Kyou Shinsha enough) would say that Kyoto Animation has toned down the content.
• Crossover Ship: For whatever reason, certain fans on 4chan have taken to shipping Elma with Jack from Baki the Grappler. Presumably, it's because of Elma actually being a badass dragon who could take Jack in a fight.
• Die for Our Ship: Some fans of the series have the same aggressively negative reaction as Tohru about Takiya being a possible love interest for Kobayashi.
• Fan Nickname: Japanese fans have nicknamed the face Saikawa makes whenever she experiences Cuteness Overload from Kanna "bohegao" ("bohe face"), since she says "boheeeeee" whenever she makes it. Very likely a derivative from "ahegao" ("stupid face"), a facial expression of The Immodest Orgasm mostly used in Hentai media. In the same vein, Western fans call it "Kannagasm".
• Fanon: Fafnir being a fan of Dark Souls. It's never stated in the actual series just what game he's playing in certain scenes, but in the anime, Fafnir became interested in video games due to Takiya playing a blatant expy of Dark Souls during his introduction. Try finding a fan work that doesn't have him referencing the Souls games at least once.
• Friendly Fandoms: With Fire Emblem, since both series place a focus on humans interacting with (often-female) dragons who can shapeshift into humanoids.
• Genius Bonus:
  • Episode 5 treats the viewers to Kobayashi's line of work. It happens to be a web server. In Python. That actually follows what you're supposed to do, more or less.
  • When Lucoa is explaining her role as a former goddess in episode 6, a pterosaur known as the Quetzalcoatlus (named for the Aztec deity that Lucoa's based off of) can be seen behind her. She also states that she dislikes being labeled as a dragon or demon, and prefers to be called an ex-goddess, feathered serpent, (which is often considered the Mexican/Central American equivalent to a dragon, but the similarities are mostly superficial) or Venusian. While Kobayashi doesn't understand the last one, it's a reference to her mythical counterpart's association with the planet Venus.
  • Tohru states that the recognition inhibition spell was invented by a man named Emrys. She's most likely referring to Emrys Wledig, a 5th century Romano-British war leader who was the inspiration for Merlin.
  • Lucoa reflexively wiggling her body whenever Shouta plays the flute seems a bit weird, but once you remember that the Quetzalcoatl is a gigantic snake, you realise that Shouta is accidentally doing a snake charmer act.
• Ho Yay: At one point, Kobayashi offers to wash Tohru's back and it's not hard at all to convince her. Sure, it ends with Tohru turning into her dragon form and Kobayashi having to use a hose to do this, but the way they interact and Tohru's moans are anything but subtle.
• Improved Second Attempt: In the anime Ilulu is drawn to look somewhat older than she appears in the manga, to alleviate some of the Squick factor that comes from sexualizing such a young-looking character.
• Memetic Bystander: The blonde delinquent girl from season 2 episode 4 is something of a bizarre example since she's actually Houka Kazetomo, a supporting character from Metsuko ni Yoroshiku by the same author. But since Metsuko ended almost seven years before the episode aired and was never officially translated into English, most viewers would have no way of knowing who she was ahead of time.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • "Ame ame ame!" ^ExplanationKanna singing "rain rain rain" while dancing in the rain. Fans found it so cute that long loop videos were made on YouTube.
  • Milf Coded. ^ExplanationA Tumblr user, attempting to take the series to task over its sexual content, called Lucoa this; "coded" refers to a character being portrayed in a way that parallels a particular demographic (intentionally or not). "Milf Coded," meanwhile, sounded silly to people unfamiliar with the term, and those who did know what "coded" meant considered the phrase misuse (since it's usually used in reference to how minority audiences work around underrepresentation of them in media). This led fans of the series to spam "Milf Coded" in relation to Lucoa.
  • Ravioli Ravioli, don't lewd the dragon loli. ^ExplanationA modified version of the "Ravioli formuoli" meme from Spongebob used whenever there are implications of perverted things being done by or towards Kanna.
  • I'm going to jail!/FBI open up! ^ExplanationA copypasta that originated from Twitch's week-long anime marathon stream, referring to fans jokingly being worried about enjoying Kanna being lewded too much.
  • Blue-Eyes White Dragon. ^ExplanationSome anime viewers have noticed that given the color of her eyes (blue) and her hair/dragon form's body (white), Kanna fits the description of Seto Kaiba's signature Duel Monsters card and have created fan works that make reference to this.
  • It'll be Uzaki all over again. ^ExplanationOnce it was confirmed that Ilulu would be in the second season, quite a few fans began to dread (or look forward to) the inevitable complaints about her character design on social media, comparing it to what happened when Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out! aired.
  • The horrifying truth behind Fingerless Hands. ^ExplanationFollowing the anime adapting the joke where Ilulu first creates her fingerless ball hands, and with it the reveal that they're actually covered in millions of microscopic hands for holding things, countless viewers have noted how this acts as a horrifyingly good explanation for all other examples of Fingerless Hands, especially mediums that use the same "ball hands" style, and thus they can never see them the same way again.
• Misaimed Fandom: The whole "Ravioli Ravioli, don't lewd the dragon loli" meme could be considered this, due to the creator having previously worked in adult lolicon-focused content, the erotic subtext between Kanna and Saikawa, as well the fact Kanna is depicted nude in a bath scene of the manga, which has her chest to be exposed in the bath tub.
• Moe:
  • Kanna is basically the living embodiment of huggable adorableness, being a sweet and precious dragon-child that Hates Being Alone, resulting in heavy The Woobie qualities which inspire a strong desire to cuddle her and give her the attention she craves.
  • Tohru doesn't normally inspire moe feelings due to being aggressive and confident, but any time she lets her guard down, she shows feelings of helplessness from being stuck in her role and a desperate desire to live freely that just make you want to both hug her and cheer on her efforts. Flashbacks to when she was a baby dragon exemplify this much better, since she's so cuddly and naive that just the sight of her inspires protectiveness.
  • Elma mostly holds to the Adorkable form of lovability, but any time she lets out her heart and shows that out of everything she just wants to love others and be loved, especially when it comes to her former best friend Tohru, you can't help but want to hug and support her to make her smile, even if doing so might cost all of your money on food.
• Moral Event Horizon: The god Loki basically crosses this line by attacking Ilulu, Elma and Azad and taking Take and the Saikawa sisters hostage in order to force Tohru and Fafnir to take part in a tournament for dragons.
• Most Wonderful Sound:
  • Georgie's uber-soft, soothing voice.
  • Kanna unplugging her tail in episode 2.
• No Yay: Anything that sexualizes Kanna is likely to receive a reaction of disgust and hatred from the fanbase, because she's the equivalent of a human child. This only applies in the western fanbase, however.
• Older Than They Think: A lot of people only familiar with the anime think that Kanna is based off of the main character from Fire Emblem Fates (since she has both the main character's default Japanese name, "Kamui", and the name of their child, "Kanna"), unaware of the fact that both characters were actually named after an Ainu deity (not to mention the fact that the manga predates Fates by two years in Japan^note In America Fates was released 8 months before Dragon Maid).
• Squick:
  • Various people in the western side of the fandom think that Lucoa's advances toward Shouta are very uncomfortable to watch. Shouta himself holds this point of view as well. Saikawa being in love with Kanna has been another source of ire from North American critics accusing the show of pandering towards pedophiles as a result.
  • The fact that Ilulu is a short young-looking girl but wore skimpy clothes in her debut and has absurdly massive boobs drew the ire of critics on Twitter and other social media websites for the same reason as why Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out! was lambasted for Hana Uzaki's appearance.
• Strawman Has a Point:
  • While Tohru's father crosses the line by trying to send her back to their world by force, then attacking Kobayashi when she intervenes, he's well justified that running off to live amidst your species' mortal enemies and telling no one, much less your own family, isn't really okay, and considering the enmity between humans and dragons in his world, he has reason to be suspicious of Kobayashi. Even though the reader knows she won't hurt Tohru, he doesn't.
  • The manga version, which takes place before Elma's arrival and has Tohru's father be nowhere as vicious as he was in the anime, further justifies his reasons for Tohru to return back to the dragon realm, showing concern about other dragons learning about Tohru being on Earth and then arriving there to fight her. Within the next few chapters, Elma wrecks Kobayashi's apartment when she arrives on Earth to continue her rivalry with Tohru (with Kobayashi learning from Kanna just how destructive their fights can get), while Ilulu would destroy the place where Kobayashi and Tohru first met and cause Tohru to launch an attack on her that, had it not been for Elma's shield magic, could have easily destroyed most of Kobayashi's neighborhood.
• Suspiciously Similar Song:
  • The music during the Eye Catch is rather similar to that of the chorus of "Our House" by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young.
  • "Maid with Dragons❤︎", the ED for season 2, sounds just like the beginning of "Bon Appétit♡S", the opening theme for Blend-S.
• Sweet Dreams Fuel: The family dynamic Tohru, Kanna, and Kobayashi share make the series a very comfy watch and read, even with the more fantastic elements added in.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Elma seems to be The Rival upon her introduction, but is promptly sidelined to be only an infrequent source of Big Eater jokes. What's worse, Ilulu later usurps her rival role, pushing her even farther into the background. Fortunately, this was balanced out by the reveal that she'd be getting her own Spin-Off, and the main manga revives Elma's status as Tohru's rival, and even sets up some possible romantic tension between them.
  • Shouta is a Child Mage who summoned a dragon, the son of Kobayashi's boss, and around the same (human) age as Kanna and Saikawa. This obviously sets up many different interactions with the rest of the cast, and opens up some interesting questions as to how a family of wizards got to Earth and why they're okay with a dragon being around them, and could even shed some light on the dragons' and humans' enmity in the Other World. Instead, he rarely interacts with the rest of the cast and, just like Elma, only gets screentime to be the butt of jokes (in this case, borderline-pedophilic ones). Fortunately, the manga does develop the magical world more (such as by showing what a magical exam is like as well as expanding on magic and wizarding) and gives Shouta some focus outside of jokes with Lucoa.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Ask around and there is a sizeable camp of people who would have preferred Tohru not be a shapeshifter, focusing instead on the aspects of a human woman living with a gargantuan dragon.
• Values Dissonance: Again, the scenes with Lucoa and Shouta are much less popular in the United States, where Shotacon isn't exactly a "funny" topic, than in Japan or the Hispanosphere.
• Viewer Gender Confusion:
  • Prior to his introduction, many people thought that Shouta was a girl because of his hairstyle and due to the fact that he was shown wearing a stereotypical witch hat in the opening (and he's young enough to lack any secondary sexual characteristics).
  • Yana got hit with this as well, due to having long hair and a slender, androgynous figure.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: Despite the cute character designs and Slice of Life setting, the series is actually Seinen and has quite a bit of Fanservice (with most of it coming from Lucoa, who's also portrayed as a Comedic Shotacon). Seven Seas Entertainment rated their translation of the first volume of the manga as an all-ages title despite all the fanservice and other content present even in the first volume, and their translation didn't censor any of it, either. This was fixed for the later volumes with a more appropriate Teen rating, and later printings of the first volume are also rated Teen, though the manga's content would still end up causing some problems when Volume 6 was found in a Nebraskan middle school. While the anime is Tamer and Chaster than the manga and focuses more on the found family theme, it still has some fanservice.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not Political?: From the point of view of the Anime News Network, this series is a covert study of the cultural shock of immigrants in Japan and a study of the problems that a foreigner living in this country would face.
• The Woobie:
  • Kanna. Already rarely noticed by her parents, she started pulling pranks to try to get attention, but this wound up backfiring and she was banished to Earth. She is emotionally shaken to the point where she can barely trust humans (it took her a bit to trust Kobayashi, and even she said she wouldn't trust anybody on a planet she was new to). It definitely helps she's incredibly adorable.
  • Kobayashi in Episode 13 when Tohru is taken back home by her father. She has a hard time taking care of Kanna while working full-time and she can't even keep her apartment clean while Tohru's gone. The episode shows Kobayashi's pain and depression over losing Tohru and how much she needs her.
  • Ilulu. Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds before her Heel–Face Turn. Having to be forced to grow up after losing her parents and taken in by the more radical elements of the Chaos faction, she had to abandon the few human friends and attachments she had and believe her only purpose in life was to bring destruction. When Kobayashi repeatedly challenges this it causes Ilulu to break down and admit she doesn't want the life that was forced upon her and just wants to be a kid again.

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