Betrayal Knows My Name

The plot of the story is a teenage boy, Yuki Sakurai, who has a mysterious power. He was abandoned as a baby by an orphanage and has since hates being a burden to others. Yet at the same time he fears being left alone and not being needed by anyone. The mysterious power that Yuki possesses is the ability to feel the emotions of the people he touches and see some of their memories. Because he is unable to control his ability, he has made insensitive blunders before. Now with death threats, his abilities increasing and somebody claiming to be his brother appears what will Yuki do?

The main relationship of the anime is between Yuki and Zess aka Luka. They have a very complex relationship. Luka only opens up and displays emotion when Yuki comes into the picture. It turns out the reason is because Yuki is one of the many characters in the anime who has been reincarnated multiple times but before this life he was always a woman and in his past lives as a woman he and Luka were lovers. This change causes a great deal of pain and confusion for everyone. Throughout the series you get glimpses of the past lives of Yuki with Luka and how much the two were in love. It’s rather heartbreaking at times.



The animation style of the show is what made me want to watch the series in the first place. I love the character designs all with elegant faces and hands. All the characters are slim and tall, if you like the art style of Vampire Knight you’ll also enjoy this. The backgrounds are not sloppy and help add to the scenes be it a battle scene or moment of friendship.

I was a little weary of watching this series because I had read it had some shounen-ai, and usually I don’t enjoy shows about two guys in love. I’m very happy I didn’t let that stop me from watching this series. Overall the series main focus is on relationships be it friends, lovers or family. The show also has fighting with mystical abilities which I loved. While the relationships of many of the male characters are extremely close there is no out right yaoi. The males are all very close in what I’d call strong bromances. I found the developing relationships very interesting and added great depth to the story.



Overall I really enjoyed the series, the growth of the characters is wonderful to watch and I found I liked all the characters which is rare for me. The artwork is beautiful and in a style that I wish I could recreate for my own artwork. The backgrounds of the characters is well done and they give just enough, never overdoing it. I was only disappointed when the series ended without answering all my questions. There were enough fight scenes to make me happy but it just didn’t feel like it should’ve ended when it did, the last two episodes felt rushed. I will be picking up the manga as it is released in hopes of getting some of my questions answered. I recommend this series if you’re a shojo fan, there are fights throughout the series but I’m not sure if the bromances would be well received by everyone.