Sep 22, 2010
A (highly) unique manga but not deserving the amount of high reviews it has on MAL.
The thing that stands out to me is how far off the reviews are with the actual "overall" definition of the manga.
This can be understandable as it can be quite difficult reviewing a manga with several major character developments without spoiling the whole thing.
This however doesn't excuse how all the reviews read like they are reviewing the synopsis instead of the whole thing.
The two main issues I'd like to contrast with the other reviews are that:
...
1) This isn't a twist within a twist manga
There are really few to no clues provided to the reader early on for any of the major shifts to be considered twists rather than sudden event shifts. Normally this is a pedantic issue but for this type of manga, it is important to emphasize how you won't get much of an idea how much you'll like the latter events from the earlier chapters.
2) This isn't a bi-gendered theme manga
Well...maybe it is. I haven't really read any background for this manga to know which things are symbolic and which are not but all I can say is that while the gender issues are brought up a lot in the series, overall it's a non factor and the whole thing is hand waved at the end. This shouldn't bother anyone who's already planning to check out this manga but for those wondering if you should skip this because the topic seems like it would be boring (and in my opinion the manga presents the issue as boring and cliche) it's important to emphasize that if you read this to the end, you'll understand what I mean by this and while I can't say it would definitely be worth reading up to the end, if you don't reach the ending, you won't get to enjoy this manga as anything other than a gender based manga.
Unto the other stuff:
A major part of this manga relates to character's inner personalities but I suggest not going into this expecting any valid psychological analysis thrust unto the characters. Rule of cool is used to justify many of the mental solutions in this manga and while it is a major part of what makes this very unique, it can also be very frustrating getting caught up in the character elements only to have to remind yourself that it's obvious after each mini-arc that the manga doesn't really plan on addressing the character's issues beyond the surface level or maybe even less than that.
It gets worse once you find out about the ending so try to keep this in check because the characters all have their potential to be great. Some if not many do rise to this level only to fall in quality and rise again but the important thing to keep in mind is that if a certain character gets annoying or boring enough to make you want to stop reading the manga, just read on. This is the type of manga where you lose more by not reaching the end because by that point it wouldn't matter at all. (Not because you have reached the end of a manga but because by the end, without spoiling any major detail, your hate for many of the characters won't matter at all where as stopping at mid point will keep you from discovering many of the out of nowhere character developments that are suddenly brought up.)
In the end, I personally didn't like this manga very much but it has that unique charm that kept me going and I do feel it wasn't a waste of a time finishing this despite there being no event that really made me like this.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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