Netsuzou TRap
NTR: Netsuzou Trap

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Why did I read this? I mean, I knew it'd feature a lot of cheating. I didn't go into this blind. What I wasn't expecting, except perhaps by its persistently middling ranking here on MAL, was for it to be so boring and contrived.

Story: 3/10
The story of Netsuzou TRap is pretty familiar, if you've read manga or watched anime in the past two decades. High schoolers dealing with relationships, love, university prep and The Gay(tm). Only, because it's Japan, they're completely clueless to the idea that they're even in love half the time. Therefore, the 'plot' is essentially 85-90% misunderstandings and 'convenient interruptions'. This ... manga has little time for quiet moments, preferring to jump into awkward cheesecake at the drop of a hat, then 'conveniently' interrupt it before the mangaka might have to write something too spicy or emotionally touching. And speaking of awkward cheesecake...

Art: 5/10
The art is... serviceable. It's not amazingly consistent, or particularly noteworthy, but it generally gets across what's going on without being confusing. Some have mentioned the water balloon tiddies, which are pretty bad, but I think the main reason people tend to bring those up is that they're the only thing that stands out (badly) in the art style. Everything else about it is very 'generic shoujo/yuri art'. It basically exists to give the straights reading this something to drool over without requiring much effort on the author's part.

Characters: 3/10
Yuma is your innocent nice girl character, much like Yuzu from Citrus, who gets dragged into a largely unnecessary mess of badly written drama and manipulation. Confident on the outside, but emotionally vulnerable, and prone to trying to please others. Basically, she's a big part of my problems with this series, in that she spends ages fucking around and ignoring her feelings to drag out an otherwise uninspired romance arc, in that same shoujo style that felt tired when Bloom Into You appeared on the scene. She loves Hotaru, but won't spit it out because homophobia, and while that's somewhat valid at first, it's pretty tiring when nothing else is going on.

Hotaru is Yuma's manipulative childhood best friend, who spends most of the series coming onto her awkwardly before being interrupted. She's pretty opaque as a character, and while I kinda understand her circumstances, I didn't like her. She felt like an excuse to insert lesbian ecchi material into every other chapter, moreso than a character with consistent motivations. Again, it's that 'will-they-or-won't-they' tango that was popularized in shoujo manga. Whenever one half of a pairing seems like they have it together, the other one flakes out or does something dumb, all in the name of selling another volume of manga. Your bog standard character who's looking for validation in empty, unfulfilling sex.

Takeda is an actual cinnamon roll, and all round nicest person in this series. He's a nice dude, Yuma's boyfriend, and while his idea of foreplay leaves a lot to be desired (awkwardly pin her to a bed), he doesn't really seem to have a bad bone in his body. He's quite dull, too, but considering what 'interesting' characters look like in this series, he's the best of a bad lot.

Fujiwara is the nominal villain of the piece, and if you've ever seen a villainous man in a GL manga, you already know him. He's physically and emotionally abusive towards women, an aromantic fuckboy, and only really seems to care about Takeda. His whole internalized homophobia deal might have been interesting in a less toxic manga, but gay or not, he's here to play the part of 'asshole #2', and he does it with flair. If you don't hate Hotaru or Yuma, he's here to be your hate sink, and as a result, is a pretty poorly developed character otherwise. Still, at least you're meant to hate him.

Enjoyment 3/10
What can I say? It's like reading Citrus all over again, but worse in every way. Pointless, convoluted misunderstandings plot based entirely on romantic leads not talking? Check. Emotional abuse and sexual assault for edge factor? Check. Opaque, emotionally dense characters who nevertheless end up taking their clothes off a lot on panel? Check. Honestly, the more I look at it, it feels like a knockoff of Citrus with a cheating gimmick, although I'll admit I can't be bothered to check which came first. Given that I didn't like Citrus for similar reasons, it's not like I'm some fangirl here to chastise it for 'ripping off' my 'beloved manga'. NTR is everything I've come to loathe about GL writing in one neat package, in other words. Just... talk to each other. Dear gods, it's not hard. If NTR pissed you off, like it did me, go read Tsukiatte Agetemo Ii kana to detox. It's pretty much the polar opposite of this in terms of writing.

Overall: 3/10
I came into this review thinking I was going to be like 'meh, that was kinda bad, 4/10', but on the flipside it's coming out how much I hated reading this manga. If emotional intelligence is a worthwhile concept, then this manga contains the smoothest of smoothbrains. If you like gay girls loving each other, it's a frustrating waste of time spent watching poorly written hormonal teens make bad life choices. If you like seeing 'gay' girls do the sex at each other in improbable ways, which I know is a hit with dudes in the audience, then NTR will leave you blueballed due to constant interruptions. If you like cheesecake, but not smut, the 'plot' will make you spend plenty of time that could've been better spent looking at your pinup collection reading about angsty, boring teens abusing each other. Everyone loses. Now, pardon me, I have to go see if Ikemen Girl to Hakoiri Musume has any new chapters, and calm the hell down. I invite anyone who bothered to read this rant to join me.

Not even the power of yuri can salvage a morally corrupt manga about cheating. Netsuzou TRap gives you exactly what you want in well drawn girl on girl action, then what you probably don't in rampant netorare with a dash of blatant manipulation.

NTR revolves around a cute girl named Yuma who repeatedly cheats on her boyfriend Takeda with a manipulative best friend, Hotaru. They are definitely a hot pairing, but the fact they hook up behind Takeda's back dulls the excitement considerably. It seems the only purpose of Takeda's character is to be deceived and serve as yet another example of "nice guys finish ... last". Thankfully he has a friend of his own, Fujiwara, who threatens to expose the secret to everyone.

Yuri is always cause for celebration, but Netsuzou TRap manages to achieve the impossible in making it feel uncomfortable. There is a way to depict NTR in a relatively mature way that speaks to a larger picture but a naive high school romance is not that and the undercurrent of drama committed by hateable characters makes this manga a hard one to enjoy.

DO NOT READ THIS MANGA, ITS A COMPLETE WASTE OF TIME
There is literally no plot whatsoever, this "I don't know whether she likes me, but she keeps seducing me all the time and then acts as if nothing has happened" goes on for the WHOLE STORY like it was so annoying at some point I just rejected so much I started this manga (I read it through to the end, hoping there would be a fascinating ending or something but nope)
The only halfway good thing was the art which was pretty decent. I think other than Hokaru who always had an enormous head everyone looked ... pretty good and special. The drawings were very mainstream though, but that's kind of expected in a shojo manga.
The worst part about this manga is Hokaru in my opinion. I was so pissed off by her since the beginning, but I was willing to give her a chance if she changed or if she had a understable reason for the things she did. But nope. We don't learn anything about her for the whole story, it was so damn annoying

I just finished reading it from cover to cover. Obviously the plot is all about cheating (Reading discretion is advised). My first impression while reading, the plot is not really clear because it has a lot of gaps which left me a lot of question mark, another thing is no character development that would make the plot interesting or deus ex machina ( Plot twist ). Ending is very bad.

Story 1/10 (stagnant)
Artwork 9/10 (I like the way they dress)
Character 2/10 (no detailed flashbacks for every character, no character development)
Enjoyment 6/10 (I just simply enjoyed the way they dress)
Overall 4/10


All I can say it's ... bad NTR BUT this one really deserves a remake or overhaul.

Look, the concept doesn't bug me at all. The angle of one girl teasing another under the guise of "practice" for the boyfriends they both have, that's fine. NTR doesn't bother me at all. That said, Netsuzou TRap is still bad. The characters were either annoying, infuriating, or just an awful person who is portrayed as okay. As such, their struggles are terribly boring.

Still, just being here for some dumb yuri content, does it deliver? Well, yes and no. Certain scenes are really great ecchi, but... The boobs are so. Poorly. Drawn. Maybe it's because I'm a girl, but more realistic breast physics are way, ... way more attractive to me. The scenes that didn't focus on the boobs were mostly good, but I seriously couldn't get over how poor they looked. If the ecchi were consistently good, I'd appreciate Netsuzou TRap as some dumb yuri fun, but the inconsistency totally killed it for me.