THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS
Overall if you want to categorize this manga, it would be romantic or love triangle. But it is much more that that.
For me this manga on a very high interesting note until the double suicide but slumped in the following chapters while it rumbled on high school drama, in other words, the normal life. Fortunately, it picked up speed and substance again in the last 2-3 chapters.
Looking through the series, I think very few characters won but many lost, without any fault.
Saeki's friend – She was an honest friend who always wanted best for Saeki. Her character had clear perceptive,
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grounded with the reality. I think she was a positive character but circumstances took away her positivity when her friend abandoned her without any intimation or touch.
Saeki – Most of us would call her ‘bitch’, even the author criticizes her character. But I believe she was one of the characters who lost everything, her very essential self. For me, she wasn't a ‘bitch’ from the beginning. She was popular but never was it shown in the starting chapters, that she was egotistic or in a greed of popularity. The chapter where she appreciates Kasuga taking side of Nakamura during the money theft incident, and then greeting Kasuga when others are booing him, itself points the goodness in her.
She did get out of her own control later, but to some extent, per me, it's Kasuga's fault. He did play with people's emotions, especially Saeki. Denying her was the worse for her, she did love him and all she wanted was to understand him. After a series of episodes of denial, bitterness creeps into her, and part of her deviance (which each one of us have to some extent), grew, finally turning her into a bitter, cruel being.
The saddest was when she changed herself physically, to look like Nakamura for Kasuga. Even after growing up, she finds a boyfriend who looks like Kasuga, isn't that sad? Very sad. Her raping Kasuga was the final stage of losing innocence and the peak of her transformation, ending into a twisted, cruel personality who doesn’t care of anyone's feelings.
Tokiwa – She resembles Nakamura and is an aspiring writer. I don't want to write much about her, she wasn't my favorite character anyway.
Kasuga – This guy made so many unhappy, though unintentionally. But then the question is, which still haunts me, 'How' is one supposed to be? Be one who 'does not' make others unhappy or be true to self and just be, but with that end up hurting others? Is there a mid way?
Many would feel empathy towards him but he is the only one who won. He represents most of the confused people, sometimes overthink and try to be someone else. The confusion, mistakes, impulsiveness, regrets, all are real.
There are many places where I think the author does not completely portrays his character. Up into the forest, hills, Kasuga confesses he is not like Saeki nor like Nakamura. He is hanging in between. He doesn't understand 'The flowers of evil'. He pretends to understand and brag about it. In other words, he is confused, not unlike many of us. Later in high school, he keeps himself away from others, confused how to fit in. I think this is unlike his character. Ideally, assuming that there is not sudden turnaround, he would try to understand Nakamura, himself or the evil book, and not on how to fit into the society. Or perhaps, the author hints his end of puberty, his resignation to the questions, where trying to fit in society is the only solution and a part of process of maturing.
Another thing is - kasuga thought of Nakamura day and night, junior, high school. He could simply not forget her. Yet, how he simply fell in love with Tokiwa (maybe it didn’t happen simply but he did fell in love with her). I was a bit surprised and disappointed. (Is this the reason why Saeki says she is disappointed?) This raises the question, did Kasuga really love Nakamura? Or his feelings towards Tokiwa was to escape his bleeding past?
Nakamura – Most of the readers would agree with me that of all the chapters where the manga was super-interesting, were the ones where we had Nakamura and Kasuga together.
Nakamura is purest form, what’s on her mind, is in her words, in her acts, though calling everyone shithead was a bit too much :D
She is the most interesting character in the series but the least explored. She disappears after the double suicide. Author keeps her away from us for a very long time and only to reappear in the ending chapters. But her disappearance peaks our need to know more about what happened to Nakamura. Honestly, I kept on reading through the high school crap only in an anticipation to find Nakamura. It worked well for the author and the story.
Reunion on the beach was the best. When you see and hear Kasuga and Nakamura, you just know that they both are made for each other. If you see, throughout the series, Nakamura showed selflessness, first when she pushed Kasuga during the suicide. She wants him to lead him normal life or she felt he is not there yet (of perverseness). Second time on the beach, when she asks him to leave and lead a normal life. On the beach, when she asks Kasuga if he is seeing Tokiwa, Kasuga replies yes to which her reply is ‘I see’. It was very emotional conversation for me. Maybe it was here again when she decides (to push him) that he is now leading a normal and happy life.
In the end of the manga, Nakamura is shown as calm, there is no clarity what the word really mean. In the extra chapter the author showed us Nakamura’s perspective, I wish he also had showed us what went through her when she met Kasuga again on the beach.
But in the end, I feel sad. How much I wanted to see Kasuga and Nakamura together.
Two things in the ending chapters I really liked was Saeki returning to Gunma and re-uniting with her friend. I really felt much better for both of them. At least they have each other for support. Maybe that will dissolve Saeki's bitterness a bit. And the other was visiting Nakamura. She was no longer the foul mouthed kid once she was, but still a strange girl with added mystery to her aura.
This was my first manga and I really loved it. There were many questions un-answered. But I wouldn’t dwell on those now. I would be re-reading this manga again, not immediately though. I am sure there would be answers to the questions that are floating in my mind after first read.
In the end, I do want to say that the anime does justice to the first part. I wish they animate the rest of the manga too.
Sep 25, 2015
Aku no Hana
(Manga)
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THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS
Overall if you want to categorize this manga, it would be romantic or love triangle. But it is much more that that. For me this manga on a very high interesting note until the double suicide but slumped in the following chapters while it rumbled on high school drama, in other words, the normal life. Fortunately, it picked up speed and substance again in the last 2-3 chapters. Looking through the series, I think very few characters won but many lost, without any fault. Saeki's friend – She was an honest friend who always wanted best for Saeki. Her character had clear perceptive, ... |