Watashi no Shounen

Thirty-year-old Satoko Tawada lives a rather monotonous life: she is single, her office job is dull, her boss is her ex-boyfriend who constantly bothers her, and she has nothing to look forward to in her off-hours. Fed up with another lousy day at work, Satoko stops by a park at night to have a drink and unwind when a stray soccer ball lands by her feet.

Chasing after the ball is a 12-year-old boy named Mashuu Hayami, whom Satoko scolds for being out so late. But soon enough, she learns that evenings are the only time Mashuu is allowed to practice and refine his soccer skills. Due to her past tenure on her university's futsal team and a general concern for his safety at night, Satoko begins to teach Mashuu the basics of soccer.

However, the more time Satoko spends with Mashuu, the more she finds herself becoming a maternal figure for the neglected boy. Mashuu himself begins to find solace in their outings, but not everyone may be able to support or understand their odd relationship.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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Background

Watashi no Shounen was nominated for the 10th Manga Taisho Award in 2017. In the same year, the manga ranked sixth on the Nationwide Bookstore Employees' Recommended Comics of 2017 list, third in the Best Printed Manga category at the third Tsugi ni Kuru Manga Awards, and second in the Kono Manga ga Sugoi! for the Male Readers division.

The series was published in English as My Boy by Vertical Inc. from April 10, 2018, to May 10, 2022.

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Characters

Tawada, Satoko

Main

Hayami, Mashuu

Main

Tawada, Mayu

Supporting

Ogata, Nao

Supporting

Shiikawa, Fumitaka

Supporting

Reviews

Mar 13, 2021

taWada

Recommended

rewriting this for the 3rd time on 3/20/22 because i want to make my review shorter

at first, i really appreciated this manga because i felt as if it portrayed how a mother/son like relationship would be. me and my mother's relationship was really difficult, mainly due to the fact that i was born from my father's affair. it was extremely hard to get along with her but i found comfort in a story like this. it made me like to think about how me and mother's relationship would be like if it was normal.

also, the way takano hitomi portrays separations between mashuu and satoko is ...

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May 6, 2021

Gluomme

Recommended

Boi did this one hit close to home.
Ok so I'll start this review by saying that it will include what I consider minor spoilers but may be considered relatively important by others. It's kinda hard to tell more without spoiling you know. Anyways before spoiling anything, let's just say that : it's a cute story about two people having truckloads of affection for each other but everybody else is kinda frowning when looking in their direction. Go read it.

Now onto the real review.
You know, this type of story with an adult and a child getting together by chance and forming a sort of parent-child relationship ...

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Sep 16, 2022

MahatmaZiki

Not Recommended

Informative

Preliminary (19/43 eps)

Spoiler

I'll start this review off by saying that first page of every chapter of this manga should have a disclaimer that warns people that they shouldn't do anything they saw in this manga. I started reading this because I just finished reading My Girl and I thought this was a manga with different premise but similar themes, but boy was I wrong. Yes, this is wholesome manga, BUT (and I can't stress this enough), the behavior of the female mc is UNDER NO CURCUMSTANCES ACCEPTABLE, EVEEEEER. I haven't read the whole manga because I had to stop at the half way point since I couldn't ... shake off the uncomfortable feeling I had while reading it and I will explain why.

*What the female mc is doing is simply wrong*
There is no excuse for what she is doing. Yes, we know that she had no malicious intent behind her actions but that doesn't make them justifiable in any way. And the worst part is, she is aware of it. *Spoiler alert* When the father calls the company to report the fmc and her boss confronts her about it, we finally get to see fmc realizing the whole situation. Yes, she was aware before that what she was doing isn't really ok, but now she experiences a break down because she finally understands the severity of her actions and the situation. And almost losing her job and being transferred to another branch didn't seem to had as strong of an impact on her because she goes back to square one. After she gets into contact with the kid again, she becomes determent to explain to him the situation and how what they were doing isn't right or acceptable and that they shouldn't be in contact anymore, but seeing the kid in person again was enough for here to forget all about it.

*She is an adult and should know better*
She is 30 years old. He is 12. He is A KID. He doesn't know anything and you can't explain these stuff to him. She on the other hand is a fully fledged adult and a functioning member of society. She knew that she shouldn't have developed the relationship between them, and even if she did do it, once she realized that it was wrong, she should have acted as a responsible adult and ended the whole thing even if the kid didn't really understand it and not what she actually did. She even said to him that her actions could be interpreted as the actions of child abductor and after he said "So what if other people think that, that's just normal for us" she should have just ended things then and there. The whole thing even started with her misunderstanding his circumstances thinking he is mistreated by his father and that his father doesn't care about him, and apparently her realization that she got the whole thing wrong about everything wasn't enough. She as an adult had the responsibility to cut off contact with the kid and allow him to forget about her and stop being depended on their relationship which was completely inappropriate.

*Yes, I read the ending*
I had to because I had to give my mind peace. They didn't end up together (YET, and the ending is also kind open so they could have ended up together) but even if they didn't, that doesn't make whole thing any better. Honestly, it makes it mildly less worst. They shouldn't have developed the relationship that they did in the first place and at the half way point, she should have ended it and that's it. And to people who actually shipped mmc and fmc, I'll just remind them that, best case scenario, this was borderline paedophilia. I don't want to rate this manga because I didn't finish it, so my rating is purely arbitrary for the sake of posting this review.

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Poll: Do you prefer Satoko and Mashuu to end up together romantically? foxhunt99 - May 4, 2022	1 replies	by Desireless »» Oct 31, 2023 8:23 PM
Poll: Watashi no Shounen Chapter 43 Discussion LastLuminescence - Nov 21, 2020	19 replies	by Desireless »» Oct 31, 2023 8:17 PM
What do people think of this JSeanaY - Oct 22, 2022	0 replies	by JSeanaY »» Oct 22, 2022 4:46 PM
I believe Satoko and Mashuu did end up together romantically foxhunt99 - May 4, 2022	0 replies	by foxhunt99 »» May 4, 2022 1:37 PM
Poll: Watashi no Shounen Chapter 15 Discussion Stark700 - May 18, 2018	4 replies	by izlah »» Apr 14, 2022 10:41 PM

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