Aug 18, 2012
Surprisingly, I really enjoyed this anime. While the art was not to my liking (character-wise, at least. The colours were rather beautifully done and backgrounds were very calming, although character designs did not vary much) I could easily look around that and look at character design personality-wise.
A lot of people don't see the difference between characters, and in a way they were correct. All three couples focused on a very clearly-drawn seme-uke format. Who bottomed in the relationship was as easy to tell as taking a quick glance at the characters. The ukes were small, with more feminine features, while semes were quite tall, with
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strong jaws and a more masculine feel to them. But, if you look beyond that, their personalities are quite different. My review will mainly be going over character personalities.
Kisa/Yukina
Kisa is a mature, spiteful man who hides behind an optimistic outside to appeal to men. He is the only uke in the series who has admitted (not just to loving his seme) to being gay. Kisa hides behind a fake mask, usually not even giving his hookups his correct age, in exchange for sex, and on occasion a short relationship. Another quirk he has is judging a man only for his face, and not his actions. Later, Kisa gets lucky and falls in love with an attractive salesman who sells his manga, and gives him the top sales in all of Japan. He's rather stalker-ish when it comes to the salesman, named Yukina, often spending endless hours in the manga store, feigning interest in the shoujo section to watch him. Later, he is introduced, they go out, and he learns that Yukina is a major fan of shoujo manga, specifically his editing, even claiming that although the plots are completely different, they all have the same "feel" to them. And their relationship (although it seems skin-deep because of Kisa's appearance fetish, the age gap--Kisa being thirty and Yukina twenty-one--and Yukina's love for his work, it is actually quite beautiful in the end) goes on from there.
Onodera/Takano
Onodera is the main character, and used to be an innocent, ignorant teenager who confessed his love to Saga-senpai, and started a superficial relationship. They break up after timid Onodera asks Saga if he loves him, and he laughs. They don't see each other for ten years, because Onodera got butt-hurt and ran off without even talking about it. Turns out he didn't even tell Saga about it, but we love him anyways because he was just a stupid kid.
Now, he is more mature, similar to Kisa, but he doesn't hide it. He does not trust easily, and has gone into editing literature. Unfortunately, he works for his dad, and his colleagues believed he was so successful because his father owned the company. So, he transfers companies, but there was a mix-up. Instead of editing literature, he's working in shoujo manga. His new boss, Takano, is a crazy mo-fo, and there's something real funky about the guys who work alongside him. Turns out, his new boss is Saga, and is still in love with him. He confesses this, but Onodera isn't the same man. And so the main plot begins.
Bonus quirks of Onodera's include being a bad drunk, and hauling major baggage in the form of a (SPOILER!) fiancee.
Chiaki/Hatori/Yuu (not a threesome, but a love triangle)
Chiaki is the most oblivious kid you'll ever meet, and is a shoujo manga author, with Hatori (or Tori) as his editor. Working as his main assistant is his best friend Yuu. Turns out, his two best friends hate each other, and have been battling behind his back (note: not so discreetly, but Chiaki's adorable so don't hold it against him he didn't notice) for his affections. Soon, he's caught up in a bunch of misinterpretation hoo-hah in which he believes they're in love with each other, while both are in love with him and hope the other rots in Hell. I'm not going to tell you who he ends up with, but I'll tell you in my opinion Yuu is a much more interesting character than the emotionless blob that is Tori.
Personally, Chiaki is my favourite character, with Onodera in a close second and Kisa in third. I believed that the ukes were more developed, and varied more not only in looks, colouring and body shape more different than the semes, all of which had brown hair and were of near-equal height, but in personality.
This anime, while a lot of people are quite controversial, in general was actually very good, and had me watching to the end. It did not affect me as deeply as other animes, but it definitely left me with a smile on my face.
Bonus: While the ending was not solid, it didn't leave me feeling empty, and I could very easily interpret the ending however you want, and that was, for me, a good thing.
If you like shounen-ai, I recommend this anime. It is a very good starter for the genre.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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