Report Piercing_Truth's Profile

This still doesn't excuse how broken the conclusion was. Rui and Natsuo being so far along and so close to tying the knot is what made the ending feel like being hit with a train. It is one of the most contrived sequences of writing I have ever seen and no amount of different perspective is going to change that. Sasuga took Rui and Natsuo's relationship too far along for it to work regardless of the set up, hints, or anything. Natsuo didn't even have an arc of realizing Hina was the one he wanted. No instead Hina was put into a coma which turns his change in emotion into something of pitty rather than something truly romantic. If you want people to buy into the idea you need to earn it, and Sasuga did not earn it. I don't care if it took another 100, 200 chapters, she needed to redevelop their relationship as a couple first. They had way too little time together ever since their break up for the ending to ever work. This is why you need to be willing to change plans when writing, because when you have to bend over backwards and put one of your characters in a coma to get the ending you want, something is seriously wrong.

I didn't read through Rui goggles. I didn't pick sides. Regardless of intent Sasuga failed to convey the idea that Natsuo still loved Hina to that extent. She dumped over 250 chapters into developing Rui and Natsuo's relationship, developing it so thoroughly that by the end it objectively would not make sense for any other outcome. He's even made it a point that he loved Rui more than Hina on several occasions. If anything saying that the intent was to always be with Hina just makes the writing worse in retrospect. I can understand if that was what Sasuga wanted to write the entire time, but she had to bed over backwards and break her characters after the plot outran her plans. This is why you shouldn't hold fast to plans no matter what. Stories evolve and change over time, and you need to consider the idea that the direction your story has natually taken would not make your original ideas work.

The way I approach media used to be far more analytical, but that became a drain on my mental health and ability to enjoy things wholeheartedly. While I do recognize the actual issues, as I've ranted to other people elsewhere, I'm far more about reviewing stories based on my emotional enjoyment of them. I feel like it's more helpful for people to understand how one would emotional react to a story rather than the technical objectivity behind it, as the art is lost in the logic.


But, since you took the time to approach me about this, I'll elaborate a little further so you know I'm not just throwing words on a paper without any thoughts behind them.


My problem with DomeKano's characterization in the final few chapters, and why I feel it's such a horrendous betrayal of the characters, is that everything they do is completely out of character.


Natsuo for instance knows Hina so well that if he acted in character, he would've turned Rui's proposal down and encouraged them to get married as that is what Hina would want.


Rui also knows this is what Hina would want as well. I can understand, say, putting the marriage on hold to let everyone emotionally cope first, but downright canceling it and having him marry Hina is a logical leap that goes beyond just jumping the shark.
However, and while I had to finish the manga to truly understand how irreparably Sasuga fubbed up Hina, Hina is by the most disrespected out of all of them when it comes to what the story did.


If Hina had actually acted in character, the moment she was approached by Natsuo and Rui about their agreement, she would've been furious. Not passively like the way it's shown in the manga, no, she would've scolded the two for doing such a silly, childish thing. And how patronizing and insulting it would be to her feelings to just throw away what they had as "compensation" for all of Hina's hardship. Hina would have never budged and inch on her refusal and we'd have another 50 chapters of Rui and Natsuo dealing with the fact that their brains turned to mush for 5 years over something so irreprehensible. Hina said she wouldn't stop fighting to have her second chance, but she would want it to be honest and true, not something petty and cheap. This kind of pity love would hurt her more than any of the heartbreak she had endured the entire rest of the series.


That's why I said what I said in the review.