"The Girl I Like Forgot to Wear Her Glasses" is a manga that, so far as I have seen in the many manga I have read, features the most accurate depiction of teenage romance in all of its social awkwardness. Them struggling to hold hands, Mie just hugging Komura as a response to him calling her cute, etc. The characterization of Mie, in particular, really sells this from the female perspective. It's so spot on in the nonverbal body communication and in the emotional moments. A great example of this was during the aquarium visit.
I watched the anime before I read the manga. The 13 episodes cover up to about half of the manga's length and had events rearranged in what I felt to be a more appropriate order to give greater significance to the characters. However, the manga greatly accelerates its quality after
the confession
. Whether it's because this is genuinely so to be the case or because I have no season 2 of the anime to compare the rest of the manga's chapters to, I am unsure, but I do think the manga's artwork, if nothing else, has increased in quality since the half-way point.
If you're watching the anime or reading the manga, you're likely doing it because of Mie-san, the female lead. She is the selling point, she's also the titular character, being "The Girl I Like" who always forgets to wear her glasses. Mie's tendency to go without superior vision is the driving factor to get the two characters together into a relationship. She depends upon the ML for her sight, so the author has to continuously write scenarios to explain away Mie's lack of glasses on a near daily basis, often leading to the most outlandish of reasons why she goes without them. Without suspension of disbelief, you'll probably irritate yourself thinking "how could she have stepped on them for the third time?".
The manga shifts somewhat dramatically since
they start dating and then afterward the confession
which happens at about 2/3rds of the way in the manga, a lot sooner than what some are used to when they read romcoms in which the two main characters spend what feels like an eternity being oblivious to each other's feelings or fate seemingly preventing them from ever getting together until the final chapter. But with "The Girl I Like Forgot to Wear Her Glasses", the two leads actually
! get together unofficially in around chapter 68 and spend much of the remainder of the manga being in an unspoken relationship before making it official, which is where I think the manga is at its greatest point and where also the whole glasses focus of the story's premise takes a backseat in favor of being more of a drama romance instead of a comedy. I will say I was disappointed with Komura's chickening out of a confession several times while the two were dating.
I think "The Girl I Like Forgot Her Glasses" is one of the most adorable and realistic depictions of innocently awkward teenage romance I've read, and I will be giving it a rating that reflects that opinion.