Kyou no Kira-kun
Kira-kun Today

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First of all, i wasn't expecting this end. Truly, i wasn't.

This mangá called my attention by the title and cover, i thought it was really beautiful, and it was! I didn't read the synopsis, actually, so i just dived in the history expecting something cute. I was wrong and right at the same time. It IS a really cute history, the characters development are really good and intensive, especially from Nino and Yabe. I mean, Kira too, but those two was really good, but Nino and Yabe was even more than i thought.

Well, let's go to the specifics scores:

Art: 9.8/10
It's a really ... cute art, but sometimes it was a liiiiittle bit weird. Just a little. The hair was my favorite part of the artistic details, especially Nino's. The "hair history" in Japan is really present in the manga, and i loved it.

Plot: 10/10
I. WASN'T. EXPECTING. THAT

Characters: 10/10
Really lovely, i adore the characters. The first one is Rei. She is really cute, love her ♥

Enjoyment: 10/10
Oh, i loved to read this. And... yeah, that make me cry, so... i loved it.

Overall: 10/10
It was a really, really, really good manga to be read. I think i waited too much to read this, but it's okay. I recommend this, especially if you like dramas, 'cause it's really dramatic. Sensei (the bird, which name is: Robert Okamura Yakisshiller!), love you <3

Read it! You'll love (i guess and hope)

This opinion might not be applicable to everyone, as I read from an explicitly disabled perspective, but:

Kyou no Kira-kun is a cute, average shoujo manga with a gripping premise and flawed execution. The art is cute, the main relationship dynamic is wholesome and enjoyable, and the call to action is novel and intriguing. At times it's a very powerful and emotional narrative about mortality and love, but usually it doesn't quite reach that level of impact.

I had a few minor hang ups: a arguably unnecessary student/adult relationship with an immoral school nurse, Rei's entire character, the direction of the ending. But I think the main ... reason I can't love it is the use of disabled pain for dramatic effect.

As someone with a progressively worsening illness, I threw myself into this narrative like a drowning man toward shore. I wanted to relate to the fears and struggles in the story, and largely I did. But as the manga bores on it becomes painfully clear that his health is worsening for the build up of dramatic tension, and that he has medical emergencies at pivotal moments. His health becomes a narrative tool, and it begins to feel dehumanizing.

(Ending spoilers) In the end they even subvert the expectation the story had been building (which I had been looking forward to for the catharsis of it), and it really feels like they either 1) ran out of story ideas and needed to wrap things up, 2) wanted to shy away from hard realities of being terminally ill and, when finished profiting off the sad drama of it, refused to commit to telling a fair disability narrative, 3) desperately realized they wanted to give the audience a happy ending and looked for the easiest way to do it. And while a happy ending for a disabled person is never necessarily a bad thing, the execution felt cheap in light of the entire premise of the story being built on a now broken promise. (Which they then tried to rectify by putting the burden of death on the bird, like some sort of manga messiah satisfying the sacred conditions of the text? Absolutely villainous imo.)

In the end, it was still a cute story that I ultimately enjoyed and don't regret reading. I just think there was a lot of untapped potential and a bit of insensitivity, and it's not the masterpiece some people make it out to be (though it could have been).

A Mixed Bag.

Kira-Kun today is the story about an incredibly shy girl who always has a parrot on her shoulder and about a Boy who gets everyone's attention. Both share a secret which in turn sort of connects them. The FMC's secret is that the Parrot can talk and is actually somewhat mature. Whilst the Boy will die in 1 year. So now you have 2 people who share a secret and in turn both people changing each other due to this connection.

Now the FMC is the classic 0 friends, no social skills type heroine. Totally never been done before. Now as you'd expect she ... hides her face using her hair and when she does show her face (pretty early on) she is like the most beautiful person to date. I think the author was going for a contrast of ugly and beautiful. kinda like an ugly duckling story. But honestly its just down without real passion. Like i didn't enjoy the turning into beautiful swan story that much. Like it was done pretty poorly and too quickly. At the same time i was actually upset we couldn't see her face in the beginning I originally thought the author was going for a self insert by not giving her a face. So you know it happened, its over, im glad we are moving on.

Now this is gonna blow your mind. But the MMC is actually kind of an asshole. I know completely original. I think this is the first Shoujo series to ever pull the asshole boyfriend trope. He's also living right next to the FMC. Crazy i know. I do like the reasoning they gave for assholeness though. I mean if you had only 1 year to live you'll do whatever you want too. The MMC is also a bit of a crybaby. I was pretty shocked about this actually. Like he cries alot.... a little too much. Like im not gonna pretend i eat glass or spit or something in my free time but honestly him crying so much actually kinda pulled the series down. Like when he did cry to stuff that you would also want to cry it doesn't have the same effect because he cries all the damn time. This becomes more of an annoying trait than anything else tbh.

The 2 main issue that this series had was probably the friendship between the MMC and the generic bad guy who is upset that the MMC isn't an asshole anymore. I actually remember the generic bad guy's name Yabe. Its a problem because Yabe obsession with the MMC gets really odd. Its one thing to do it for comedic purposes but its another to make there friendship borderline Gay. Im not gonna pretend that Naruto and Saskue bromance is the best in all of manga but it got the job done and kishimoto who wrote it I felt did an excellent job making them feel like best friends. In here Yabe and the MMC relationship feels more like what a yaoi fanatic thinks male friendship works. The 2nd major issue was the illness that the MMC had. I did not care man. They tried to pull the sad shit card and it had no effect. Its really sad too because its one of the major focuses in the series as a whole. There was also love traingles and bad comedic timings. But overall they weren't that much of an issue. Some of them were pretty fucking hillarious though. Soy sauce made me say lol outloud.

What i liked about the series was the romance though, which as you'd expect is pretty important in a romance story. The romance didn't just get the job done. But it was actually much much better than i'd expected. Look at any of the girl and boy blushing for each other you can literally see the love written all over there faces. The author does such an excellent job of making the character be in love. This is of course partially due to the artstyle though. Which really brings out the happiness and love the characters have. Honestly i can talk about the blushing faces for hours. I will say i liked the Heroine's love face more but maybe its cuz im a guy so my opinion might be a bit more skewed on this one.

Another thing i liked was the talking parrot. That parrot is my spirit animal. Its quite hilarious how this series has 1000 human characters and 1 bird character the parrot ends up being the most relatable thing in the series. I liked it when the parrot was observing and his inner thoughts. Who was just like *don't you pussy out*. *just kiss him you dofus*. **FFS**. These thoughts were really the highlight of the series involving the parrot. Now i don't like how they revealed how he can talk. but you know i considered it a minor issue anyway.
I didn't like it when he was cockblocking though. That was also annoying.

The ending was decent though. It wasn't rushed or anything, i just didn't like how it all resolved. I did like the *ending ending* or the last chapter as it were. It got the job done but you'd still expect something more.

TLDR: Good Romance and chemistry between the main characters and parrot but honestly this doesn't really do anything. The ending shoud've been better, If you really have nothing else to read i guess you can check this out. 5/10