Prepare yourselves for a long review.
Mousugu Shinu Hito begins as a memorable deconstruction of the harem genre. The MC's harem is forced on him, he can only choose one "true love," and the rest of the harem will die after he makes his choice. Accordingly, each of the female leads does everything in her power (in some cases crossing ethical lines) to woo him in order to ensure her own survival.
==Story: 5/10==
It takes a lot of explanation to suspend disbelief that these dramatic circumstances have befallen these seemingly everyday characters in a situation that, other than the disturbing video that causes the forced harem, closely
...
resembles daily life. This explanation is never given in any adequate form: the mangaka probably realized they had dug themselves into a hole with no logical way out, so they hand-waved some Ibara no Ou-style ~psychophysics~ into existence to move the plot along.
Great "dark" stories usually make disturbing ethical conclusions seem reasonable. Mousugu Shinu Hito utterly failed in that regard.
I guess a redeeming factor in the story is how, through the wonders of ~psychophysics~, the plot does come full circle, from the perky "I want these people to be happy" video in the VERY beginning to the eventual explanation of the death video's purpose.
==Art: 7/10==
The characters were all cute and appealing. To compare the art style to anime, on a spectrum from Berserk to Kill la Kill, the characters were decidedly more Kill la Kill.
The art style is characterized by its minimal, yet clean use of lines. Hiroki deserves praise for his tasteful, somewhat restrained use of "super deformed" characters where appropriate to set the mood. None of these panels felt out of place.
Hiroki did well making the characters mostly distinguishable by their hair, except for a few frames when it was difficult to tell whether a certain character was actually Riko, the school's "idol," and that character's similarity to Riko wasn't a plot device. From this, it's safe to conclude that Riko wasn't supposed to look similar to that character, and that that accidental similarity was Hiroki's fault as an artist.
The tension palpably rose from the first death to the investigation of the video, and the doll was always unsettling where it appeared.
Color inserts were clean and easy on the eyes. For a yandere manga, gore was minimal.
==Characters: 7/10==
The MC is a little dense and doesn't realize the genuine feelings a few characters have for him until other characters tell him unambiguously. The redeeming thing about the him is that even though the girls in the harem almost all throw themselves at him in the beginning, he rightfully sees through the actions of the ones who are merely trying to ensure their own survivals, and refuses to take advantage of them in those situations. He's quite the gentleman.
As for the others, the characters featured in the video and its later incarnations (including the MC) come to save their friendships with each other over the course of the manga. As a result, it's hard for readers to hate any of them in their entirety.
The revelation midway that a character other than Haju had genuine feelings for the MC didn't feel forced at all.
Where this manga failed to argue for any striking conclusions, the harem characters were entertaining and singlehandedly forced me to finish Mousugu Shinu Hito, which leads to...
==Enjoyment: 9/10==
I am ashamed to have enjoyed this shallow manga as much as I did. Where the mangaka wanted me to cry or scream, I laughed and cheered for whoever I thought was best girl, even though "best girl" changed nearly every chapter. I wonder if the mangaka echoed my sentiment--it's easy to interpret the ending as evidence of such.
If you decide to read this manga, don't go in prepared to question everything and find out the truth, and definitely don't go in with a high barrier to suspension of disbelief. Go in prepared for a wild, occasionally gory ride that explores how some people become yandere to survive while others don't.
============plot holes / unanswered questions below================
(intentionally vague to prevent spoilers):
- HOW did the doll that Mikoto found appear in Riki's backpack to begin with?!
- one of the main girls irreversibly maims another of the main girls, and putting the attacker into jail would have been an easy way to force her out of the competition, so why doesn't the victim do anything?!
- who the !@#$ thought housing a server (yes, the kind that hosts a major NND-esque streaming site) in the mountains where (1) cellphone service is nonexistent and (2) five people have gone missing trying to fix the server?! On that note,
- why don't the cops, who are called to that building where one of the main characters is kidnapped, search the building immediately?!
- why don't the main characters catch the perpetrator when they get the chance?!
- what was the "dirt" that the ultimate antagonist had on their handler-turned-accomplice?!
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Aug 3, 2017
Mousugu Shinu Hito
(Manga)
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Prepare yourselves for a long review.
Mousugu Shinu Hito begins as a memorable deconstruction of the harem genre. The MC's harem is forced on him, he can only choose one "true love," and the rest of the harem will die after he makes his choice. Accordingly, each of the female leads does everything in her power (in some cases crossing ethical lines) to woo him in order to ensure her own survival. ==Story: 5/10== It takes a lot of explanation to suspend disbelief that these dramatic circumstances have befallen these seemingly everyday characters in a situation that, other than the disturbing video that causes the forced harem, closely ... |
