Tokyo Tarareba Musume (Tokyo Tarareba Girls)

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Alternative Titles

Synonyms: Tokyo Tarareba-Jou, Tokyo "What If" Girls, TarareBar

Japanese: 東京タラレバ娘

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Information

Type: Manga

Volumes: 9

Chapters: 31

Status: Finished

Published: Mar 24, 2014 to Apr 25, 2017

Genres: Comedy, Romance

Demographic: Josei

Serialization: Kiss

Authors: Higashimura, Akiko (Story & Art)

Statistics

Score: 7.44¹ (scored by 1,708 users)

¹ indicates a weighted score.

Ranked: #3584²

² based on the top manga page. Please note that 'R18+' titles are excluded.

Popularity: #3556

Members: 6,863

Favorites: 89

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7.44

Ranked #3584Popularity #3556Members 6,863

MangaKissHigashimura, Akiko (Story & Art)

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Volumes: /9

Chapters: /31

Tokyo Tarareba Girls

Volume 1
$10.99

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Synopsis

After 33 years, Rinko Kamata's life has come to a standstill. Her once-successful career as a screenwriter has gone downhill, she spends most of her nights getting drunk at bars, and worst of all, she is still unmarried. While younger girls enjoy their love lives, Rinko and her friends—Kaori Yamakawa and Koyuki Torii—wonder what went wrong with theirs.

One night, as the three women are drinking at a bar, they come face-to-face with the handsome model, Key, who tells them off for dwelling on "what if" scenarios. Drunk and full of spite, Rinko declares that by the time the Tokyo Olympics arrive in six years, she will not be a bachelorette anymore.

Tokyo Tarareba Musume follows Rinko and her friends as they struggle to find love as 30-something-year-olds in a city run by the young, the trendy, and the successful.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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Background

Tokyo Tarareba Musume was nominated for the ninth Manga Taisho Award in 2016 and placed ninth in the final ranking.

The series was published digitally in English as Tokyo Tarareba Girls by Kodansha Comics USA from February 14, 2017, to November 21, 2017. The publisher's translation of the manga won the Eisner Award in the Best U.S. Edition of International Material—Asia category in 2019.

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Yamakawa, Kaori

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Kamata, Rinko

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Reviews

Nov 21, 2018

somaisbatman

Recommended

Last month a very strange thing happened. I found myself reading, God forbid, a heterosexual manga. And on top of that, I found myself sincerely enjoying it too. So how did I even get into this position?

Well, it’s my love of Akiko Higashimura’s previous works that brought me to Tokyo Tarareba Girls. The cast consisting of women in their 30’s was the part that really intrigued me. It’s so rare to see mangas about people past high school and young adulthood, and especially ones from the perspective of working women. The closest other thing I can think of to this perspective is Turning Girls, the ... hilarious and overlooked Trigger short about female coworkers struggling together as they face the prospect of turning 30. Tarareba Girls feels like a continuation of that spirit, in name and in plot. Our girls are into their 30s, haven’t married, still have boozy girl’s nights together like nothing has changed in a decade, and are generally terrified about their futures. Reading this through my birthday gave me some very relatable feelings!

Packed into this romantic/depression comedy is a lot of explicit and implicit social commentary. Lots of grumbling about how underwhelming the men in Japan are, lots of questionable guys doing creepy things, some discussion about the role of married women as workers versus housewives, just the whole works. You start to get the feeling that within the current societal romantic setup, everyone is kinda suffering in some way. And this isn’t just a Japan thing! While some of the sexism and ageism is pretty specific, a lot of is totally applicable to any culture. My takeaway from the early volumes was that heterosexuality is terrifying and as long as it entails inherent relationship power imbalances, nobody will be happy.

This sounds sad and hard to read! But I promise, once the manga gets rolling it ends up being way lighter reading. The trio oscillates in and out of all sorts of relationships, some messier than others. A better work-life balance is achieved. The one thing that stays the same is the girl’s endless nights drinking and badmouthing their men. During these drinking escapades they’re visited by anthropomorphized representations of milt and liver who fill their thoughts with ‘what-if’ questions and aging anxiety, which is a nice callback to Clara from Princess Jellyfish.

Milt and Liver also run an advice column chapter at the end of each volume, in which real world ‘what-if’ women mail them their romance problems to sort out. This is a really interesting role for the mangaka to take on, and it’s played fairly sincerely – obviously there’s a lighthearted air to it, but she does try to offer serious advice. The problems get weirder and more convoluted as the manga goes on, which is always a fun time.

Speaking of romantic advice, I actually kind of disagree with the ending that Higashimura went with. But that’s not a problem at all! I’m younger than the depicted women, my world view is way different, and the ending still carries a very coherent message: don’t regret yourself or make excuses, just keep on living to your best.

Like most of Higashimura’s works, Tokyo Tarareba Girls has a painful autobiographical undercurrent to it, which makes it feel all the more genuine. It kinda sucks being an awkward aging romantic mess of a girl, but I love seeing the mangaka reflect and work through it over the course of multiple manga series!

____
Men still suck though. Try to avoid them if you can.

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Aug 1, 2023

KyleScouter

Mixed Feelings

I am a big fan of Higashimura-sensei. Her funny jokes and beautiful pictures make this manga one of my favorites. But, it might be a bit hard for fans from other countries. You need to understand some Japanese to get all the jokes.

The title, 'Tarareba', is a good example. It is a mix of two words, 'Tara' and 'Reba'. Both words mean 'if' in English, but also stand for 'Pacific cod' and 'Liver' in Japanese. The characters and the story come from this mix of words.

But don't worry if you don't know much Japanese. The story is really good. It's about people who wish they ...

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Jul 29, 2019

TrickRift

Not Recommended

It's not worthy of an Eisner. Story wise, everything was typical, you can easily guess what would happen next. And this is not me hating on a cliche, a cliche can be good if done right (Ex: How to train your dragon). The main guy character is needlessly abusive and he gets a pass for everything that he does to the main character just because he had a traumatic/sad past. I'm sorry but this only promotes a very bad example for women, that they can change a bad man into an ideal man. How many times have we seen this and how often did it ...

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Poll: Tokyo Tarareba Musume Chapter 31 Discussion Safrichh - Feb 12, 2024	0 replies	by Safrichh »» Feb 12, 2024 10:06 AM
Poll: Tokyo Tarareba Musume Chapter 30 Discussion Safrichh - Feb 11, 2024	0 replies	by Safrichh »» Feb 11, 2024 4:16 PM
Poll: Tokyo Tarareba Musume Chapter 29 Discussion Safrichh - Feb 11, 2024	0 replies	by Safrichh »» Feb 11, 2024 6:38 AM
Poll: Tokyo Tarareba Musume Chapter 28 Discussion Safrichh - Feb 9, 2024	0 replies	by Safrichh »» Feb 9, 2024 1:16 PM
Poll: Tokyo Tarareba Musume Chapter 27 Discussion Safrichh - Feb 8, 2024	0 replies	by Safrichh »» Feb 8, 2024 12:09 PM

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