Kimi ga Bokura wo Akuma to Yonda Koro

Yusuke Saito is a normal high school kid...well, normal enough, except that he can't remember anything from his life except the last six months. But when he starts to get confronted by people who insist they're from his past, who allege that he did horrible things to them...suddenly Yusuke's missing memories become crucial to remember. Otherwise, the skeletons in his closet may just make him a skeleton, too...

(Source: Kodansha USA)

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Kimi ga Bokura wo Akuma to Yonda Koro was published digitally in English as Back When You Called Us Devils by Kodansha USA from May 25, 2021, to June 28, 2022.

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Saitou, Yuusuke

Main

Ichinose, Akari

Supporting

Aizawa, Youjirou

Supporting

Reviews

Jul 16, 2025

DanteArigieri

Recommended

This manga is a fucking masterpiece. We accompany Yusuke Saito, a boy in high-school that goes by the nickname of "Devil" for the deeds he comitted against other people at the school. Thing is, he doesn't remember. He had amnesia, and wasn't able to recall what happened by himself. Still, even being now, another person, he is forced to confront the weight of descovering who he really is, his now past identity and the weight of the past. That information hazard that would rot and destroy him inside out upon discovery.
This is a story about guilt. About reflection. About redemption. Vengeance. The weight of the ... past. About Crime and Punishment.

Characters: 9/10

The characters are incredible. They feel real and the are numerous. The way they interact with the main character is interesting and when the reader keep discovering the intricacies of Yusuke Saito's relationships (how people really see him, how much they trust him, how much they like him or not and etc.) it turns out to be a fucking blast. The last chapters are really a punch to the face, when you discover what you didn't really had certainty about before in the manga. How people really see him. What the people he walks with and he keeps close (in certain ways) think about him. Why did I give 9/10 then? Sincerely, even though we discover the intricacies of their relationships, the characters, except by the protagonists, doens't really change. Not like that's a bad thing, but it would be cool to see them changing throughout the years. Also, we don't really get insight into why they think what they think, all of the reasons why one character would have so much polarizing opinions about him. That's not really developed (but in no means it makes the story bad). At least I didn't understand, maybe some other people with more knowledge of pyschoanalysis or smth could tell more about it.

Story: 10/10

We get some time skips. There are 2 major time periods. The first one lasts 1/3 of the story, and the second one covers the rest, except by the last 15 chapters. Since the beginning, I found the story to be very compelling and interesting (even though I figured there were many many people that didn't really like the beginning), along with the characters. The story tackles many dark themes and the question of "can someone so hedious be forgiven?". It shows how people react to the knowledge of one's past. What people want to do to him. What they wish he would do.
When the first time period was close to finishing I had doubts about some characters' actions and thought they didn't really made sense, and I started to think that maybe the story was going to become flawed, bad. It didn't.
The second time period is even better than the first. The story quality derives from this part. The first one was just to show the pillars of the story. The second time period is about manipulation, investigation, fight, guilt, redemption. All I said in the beginning. Here is where it starts to really get good.
Do you think the characters are the only one being manipulated? No. You, the reader, will be left havings doubts about your judgement for many chapters to come. The writer inserts the reader as a direct witness of the most important events.
The MC finds opponents, enemies, he finds guilt and he finds punishment.
And the end. The end comes like a punch to the face. The last 15 chapters were pure existencialism. Pessimism. The meaning of things. Even some of those being barely touched upon, it really makes a thoughful part of the manga.

Art: 7/10

The art is really interesting. Unique. The artwork reflect the themes and the "darkness" (how edgy of me for saying that shi) of the plot. Even though it has those merits, it also lack in some of the basics. It's not a question of style, but of consistency. Sometimes the proportions, perspective and shading feels off, and it's perceptible. Not enough to make the manga bad or to break the feeling of the scenes, but sometimes it's just very off and it annoys me a little. But when the art is good, it is really good. But sadly, nothing in the level of Rainbow or Alive type shit.

Enjoyment: 10/10

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Nov 7, 2023

hexashadow13

Mixed Feelings

Well-written

tl;dr: A manga that is full of terrible writing but can still be surprisingly deep at times.

This manga is about a devil of a person who ceases being a devil. Yusuke was a complete monster throughout middle school that performed a long string of vile acts just for the fun of it. However, soon upon entering high school he lost the memories of the past fifteen years of his life, and comes out a pretty normal and reasonably nice guy. But it’s not like the crimes he’s committed have gone away. As such, this is a story of him trying to find some sort of ... life he can accept living despite the evil of his past. The manga deals with a number of related themes and manages to make some profound statements about the human condition, but these are essentially just short glimmers in a sea of nonsensical writing.

The first arc which takes up the first third or so of the manga, involves him just trying to survive not having any of the memories of his past and others taking advantage of that. There’s a mystery of sorts involving his past that he’s trying to solve, but it’s mostly just him going around haphazardly until he triggers memories. It involves exploring how he acted as a devil and his relationships with his victims. Characters aren’t fleshed out very well and there’s a lot of aspects that feel really forced. It’s also not particularly well paced. It tries to make some overarching statements about how sins never go away and how one can atone for them, but it feels pretty superficial.

The second arc is pretty distinct from the first arc and takes up the majority of the rest of the manga. The core of the first half of the second arc is supposed to be somewhat of a thriller where it isn’t quite clear at all what’s going on. I feel the intent of this was essentially to make the reader question how much they trust the protagonist as that itself somewhat plays into the larger overarching themes in the work in whether someone evil can ever be truly trusted to be good. However, that doesn’t really work in context, because it becomes less a question of whether the reader trust the protagonist and more so whether the reader is willing to believe that the author would completely just drop all the progression that occurred in the first third of the manga. And from that perspective, this portion is overtly slow and not particularly interesting.

The second half of the second arc turns into somewhat of a battle of wits. It’s somewhat interesting in that the battle of wits is pretty much entirely oriented around who’s willing to trust in whom. Still, beyond that it’s pretty stupid with none of the twists or moves feeling all that intelligent or particularly well planned. This also touches on themes relating to how people with the best of intentions can cause terrible things to happen and also delves into how good people can be pushed into doing terrible things due to just small nudges here and there and thus that even devils may deserve some sympathy. However, the situations surrounding this were ridiculous to the point it doesn’t really feel like these points landed properly.

The epilogue plot wise feels incredibly forced. There’s hinting at it through random cuts to the future in the second arc so it’s not like it wasn’t planned. But despite that it still doesn’t feel cohesive at all. This part is the most direct in trying to try to convey a message to the reader regarding forgiveness and empathy that permeate through the entire work to the point that it gets pretty preachy. Still, I would say that it does a better job than the entire rest of the manga so I would say it works out well as being the conclusion to the work thematically as it’s very clear what the manga was trying to say. Still, that doesn’t change how it doesn’t really fit the flow of the manga at all and plot wise is full of massive gaping holes in logic that it’s attempts to write around don’t really do much to fix.

The art in the manga is okay. It fits the atmosphere and type of story it is reasonably well, but it’s pretty rough and it never looks particularly good or well drawn.

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Nov 23, 2023

Chufal

Not Recommended

I binged this manga over the last week or so and I regret doing so

In this manga we have the story of a "Devil" a man that committed such heinous crimes (SA, extortion, extreme violence etc) in middle school and his life and the consequences after the fact. The manga tries to tackle the redeemability of such a person when they have lost their memories of these crimes and a story of penance with the guilt and weight of them.

The manga was interesting enough to finish reading online but after finishing it I cant say id recommend it. I feel like the story never really ...

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Kimi ga Bokura wo Akuma to Yonda Koro
Back When You Called Us Devils
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Kimi ga Bokura wo Akuma to Yonda Koro
Back When You Called Us Devils
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