I'm not even sure what I want to say here; there was something incredibly human about this. It felt like every character was one side of somebody, maybe the mangaka themselves. Everybody was incomprehensible to everybody else, including me. I kept expecting developments that didn't happen, changes, progression of any sort, but was presented with ideals in the form of characters bouncing off each other, crashing and failing, sometimes coming to what seemed like a good resolution, only for that to be proven wrong immediately. An idea of a proper structure formed, but the focus was still stilted, to the point where you start to wonder what the main idea is even supposed to be. Am I meant to be paying attention to this character? Waiting for this development? Is the mangaka even focusing on one thing or are they just drawing whatever they want?
I really liked that. I was genuinely engrossed, actually; I felt myself slipping into one of those moods where you can tell it's going to linger with you after you're done reading. The lackadaisical nature really gave this manga a feeling I haven't felt in a while.
But once you get to the end of a story like this, you realize you've been on a path that feels narrower and narrower as you go, to the point where you're effectively walking a tightrope to reach the end. Can it just end the same way it felt the whole time: pointless? Maybe it can, and maybe it can even feel satisfying. This is not one of those times.
The best way I can put it is that it felt like a very small amount of effort was put in to give a decent resolution to a major moment in the manga. Not one that came out of nowhere, but one that still felt as though something was happening without it being for the sake of a plot. The moment felt natural, and as interesting as the rest of the manga, but the resolution was lackluster. I'm really curious what the idea was here, to have such a wishy-washy ending that still tried to capture a classic feeling, when the rest of the manga tread ground I very rarely see tread.
And so, while I still feel that mood I had when I was reading, I'm also just feeling underwhelmed. If this had ended in a more open way, or with a feeling of things left unresolved, I know it would stick in my mind much longer than it will. But that's not the manga that was written, for better or worse.
