Orange

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Well, to be honest, this is my first time writing a review. The main reason why im doing so for this manga is because I find that most of the reviews here range from extremely good (10) to extremely bad (3) and it shouldn't be. Pardon my frustration, I read this series in a day because I saw the good reviews and wanted to get to the core of what was so good about this manga. Sadly, I can't say it is even remotely close to being perfect.

Firstly, I have to say there is potential in the story. Because it has a slight mixture of ... time trips, but that doesn't put it apart from the usual romance manga. I really have no objection to cliches, but the fact this story tries to get out of the cliche zone is its main flaw. The execution is lacking and emotions built up are shallow.
Therefore , Story: 6/10

Secondly, the art is by far one of the more aesthetically pleasing ones. It's really beautiful to look at and the characters are designed well (in terms of art) Not to mention the 'movement' of the characters isn't quite that stiff, so it's a great read in the light of art^^
Hence, Art: 8/10

Let's come to the real dread and most ungainly part of this story. The character development is a near nil. Naho (main) has literally no other emotions other than guilt and regret, she has two close friends and they are hardly utilized to built that type of emotional togetherness. It was as if they were pasted into the manga to look pretty. I honestly liked the idea of takako and azusa, but nothing was done, they were very flat characters.

How is it possibe Orange is above Kimi ni Todoke, if anyone recalls kimi ni todoke, Yano , Yoshida , Sanada and Kurumi were given their own roles in the story, they had lots of lines as well, because of the feelings they had and their contrast with the main character,brings out the good emotions. Whereas there are very little shits given about the side characters in Orange. Kakeru (main) confuses me, I get he is playing the role of changing factor of the tragedy, but I can't feel his pain, his expressions vary from anger to sadness to happy. No bittersweet, sour looks, frustration or relief.The fact that his interaction with Naho does not move their relationship further at all, neither do we get to know more about them, shows how bad it is. There is a relentless amount of the common scenes thrown across the book, if they were real and in a relationship, it looks as though they had no opinion of each other, no build up to their romance, no anger towards each other (even when they do, its one sided and never develops into anything big).

No quarrels= No further understanding
No friendship breaks or built = No personality, no backstory
Tears, tears and more tears over the same topic across all 5 volumes= A reader that's losing hope

Naho is meant to be a sweet and docile girl, that's a good thing. But the story makes her robotic. The fact that she has *small spoiler*

a child and is married in the future but still treats her husband and friends as a secondary to her past decisions...

Makes her more indecisive and seemingly a person that never learns from her mistakes, never lets go and has only a narrow way of thinking. Suwa clearly likes Naho, hence he gets more lines than Takako and Azusa but only for a small period of time before the story drops back to Naho and Kakeru's repetitive talk. If this was a novel, it would be a mere thesaurus of synonyms.

This is why I felt Character should be given a 2.

As much as I hate how high up this manga is, I'm not going to give it a horrid score so that I can pull it down, because logically that's not even possible. And besides, I can see the effort put in the manga, all the characters have strong potentional, their expressions and mainly their forsaken backstories were well thought of, but we readers get nothing but a glance. I'd say enjoyment is fairly fine if you take into consideration the fluency of the pages and its initial 'beauty'.

But srsly its a 6 , it's not gross because it has good art and reading for the fun of it is not that bad

How much regret do you have in life? Apparently this manga has a lot of it, that it forces it down your throat every 5 pages or so.

So... Orange. A title that doesn't really make sense after you've read it. They drink orange juice once and that's the only thing that comes close in making some sort of relation, but I digress. This manga is all about feels and regret, and I tell you, after finishing this you will feel regret having read this piece of garba... I mean not having read this beautiful and heart warming story much sooner.

The story follows a group of ... 5 friends as they try to help save there dead friend, while preventing regrets they made in their past. Well that sounds awfully familiar. (Basically the plot of Anohana) While the plot might not have been most the original thing I've read, the premise is compelling enough to keep you interested. It starts off with a letter received by one of the main characters. Sent by her future self ten years from now, it contains events that will happen, most likely related their one friend that will be die in the future. With this they try to prevent his death by changing the events that will happen.

While the bulk of the story takes place at their high school days, more often within the story it will transition to there mid twenties, where the letters apparently came from. This offers up a nice parallel between the two as they become more intertwined with revelations as the story progresses. If only the same can be said with the narrative.

If I were to describe the narrative in one word it would be shi... I mean "melodrama". Don't get me wrong, while I'm not a big fan of it, I certainly don't hate it or against it. As long as I enjoy what I'm reading, I'm fine with it. This may have all the common shoujo tropes it could think of, which probably it does, but I still find it enjoyment in it, however when it just tries so hard to shove it in your face to the point that the characters are being irrational, annoying and cringe-worthy just to get its point across, yeah you've gone to far.

I have to say that the characters are the weakest part of this manga. Its a shame though if they had been better it would have been a very good story. Its not to say that the plot is any better it still has flaws but the characters just hits that nail to the coffin. I can't say that they are bad per se, most of them are likable to some extent, albeit a bit 2 dimensional. I just find them poorly written. Through out the course of the entire story, they try to evoke that feeling of regret and anxiety that feels so forced that it just prolongs itself. By the end you think to yourself that they could have easily resolved it much earlier. Its like watching Anohana extended to a 400 episode series.

I don't really have much to say about the art. Well it looks pretty to say the least, its not Murata, Kozue Amano, etc but its what you could expect from a standard shoujo manga. I can't say that the designs for the characters are very original. Some look very familiar from other characters I've seen (see: My little monsters, ore monogatari etc.) Well I do appreciate that it use tones to differentiate between dialogues, its much easier to read in between conversations. Hey at least I give them that. Overall I'm pretty much indifferent about this.

While it may not have an original plot, its premise is interesting enough to entice you to keep reading. The melodrama drama can become overbearing to the point that it deters the story and unnecessary prolong it. Its basically like Mara Okada, Jun Maeda, Stephanie Meyer and John Green all got together and made a novel then extend it in a 5 volume manga. This manga doesn't really know the word subtle. If you hate melodrama stay the fuck away, if not sure why not, give it a go. You might actually like it.

I was told I'd cry when I read this book. I cry...all the time. I'm probably crying right now as I write this.

I felt very little when reading this. The character motivations were so thin. I didn't understand why I'd like or dislike anyone in particular. The two main characters are main characters because...they are. I didn't dislike it. I was just let down because of the high expectations.

I did really enjoy the epilogue thing? Volume 3? Whatever that was. That was good times.

I wouldn't say skip it - but maybe if you're into a heart wrenching fantasy teen romance, this isn't as strong ... as I was lead to believe. Just read it with a grain of salt.

ORANGE starts off incredibly shallow. The characters are not much more than a single personality trait. I could only remember Naho, Suwa, and Kakeru’s names for the first half. The writing is a equally terrible. While dialogue is supposed to move a narrative along, Orange's dialogue does this too literally. Everything is spelled out for the reader, and everything that happens to the cast seems like a contrived convenience. Couple this with generic high school manga situations, and I was left bored and disappointed with Orange. I would have dropped it earlier on if I hadn’t purchased the complete series at once. I’m glad I ... finished it, because it does get better. Perhaps Ichigo Takano just needed the hiatus she went on.

During the first half, I was asking myself a bunch of questions about the logistics behind character motives. Why would five teenagers devote their entire existence to helping some new kid they barely know? Why would Suwa just give up the girl of his dreams to the new kid who doesn’t even come to school half the time? These questions are answered in the second half of the series, and a lot of my problems with the series were resolved. Unfortunately, it ends just as it gets good. I thought I had a whole extra volume in my omnibus before I ran smack into a two-shot Seven Seas added to the book (without mentioning it anywhere!). I would have loved to have seen Orange continue on. The ideas of regret, depression, and suicide are important topics to be discussed, and Takano gives some decent insight.

Although Orange grew on me, I can not give it too positive of a review. The first half of it is unbearable, and the second half average. It’s a good idea, but I don’t care for the execution. I hope Ichigo Takano learned a lot from this series, and creates something really good in the future.

I read this manga quite some time ago, all facts presented in this review in correlation with the manga might not be all correct, but most of the review is based on the story and characters.

SPOILERS BELOW:

May I remind you, this is purely my opinion, and me giving it 6 isn't a bad score.
For me 6 is a fair score, something not good but nor bad, merely 'meh.'

The story is driven entirely by drama, and characters which fail to understand their mistakes. Firstly, To begin the with: the story is interesting, revolving around a girl whose future sends her letters to make up for the ... death of her so-called 'love interest', but this is where it falls flat. this story might appear more compelling to slice-of life fans, while those quite not much interested in the genre might dismiss it has boring, which it seems to be case for me. The 'sci-fi' aspect of this series is very insulting to sci-fi fans or anyone with a brain, it's simply throwing a bunch of letters in the middle of the fucking ocean, and praying for them to be sent.

The drama is not believable enough, it's just an edgy kid blaming himself for the death of his mom, which makes no sense because anyone with common sense would know that it was not his fault.

As for the future aspect, the main girl is annoying as fuck, stuck up on her highschool crush, and resentful of his death. She has a child, a caring husband,yet all she does is reject him and favor the dead emo kid. The manga should clearly be telling the cast of it's characters to live with the pain, and not reject the truth; instead of forcing this stupid sci-fi shit that I clearly find dumb.

Granted, some scenes were emotional, but without the drama, the cast of characters are not compelling enough to drive the story. Overall, a 6 out of 10, the story was painful to sit through, but I was able to find some scenes of genuine enjoyment, by that I mean: It's so dumb, it's seems okay. I guess.

I wouldn't recommend this to anyone, unless they like sappy shit, I couldn't find myself 'crying' at any moment, half the story in, I wanted the main girl to just... be excluded from the story.