In the afterword, Sasuga says "Domestic Girlfriend was the story of Rui's romance, Hina's love, and Natsuo's life." Rui's romance is listed first and foremost, of course.
Yes, unfortunately, Sasuga sure portrayed this well throughout this manga, as Hina's romance was practically nonexistent until the very end. And what does Hina get? She gets the most chaste kiss I've ever seen -- their lips barely touched! This wedding kiss is more chaste than Cinderella's kiss with the Prince in a Disney film! -- and Hina gets to raise her sister's illegitimate daughter. Wonderful!
This series was sold on teacher-student romance -- it's in the synopsis, it's on the front cover of volume 1 -- and we barely got any, and what we did get, instead, was Reverse Netorare as Natsuo banged and impregnated the teacher's sister. What a disaster!
My disappointment aside, this manga had some amazing aspects. There were some great character arcs, some really emotional moments, and fantastic art. I loved Miyabi Serizawa, as well as the Lit Club -- even Forester grew on me -- and, best for last: the romance between Natsuo and Hina in earlier volumes was wonderful for what it was.
Speaking of romance, you might ask: even though I'm no Rui fan, shouldn't I just admit that Natsuo x Rui had heartwarming moments, too? Their romance lasted for over half of the manga, after all.
And I'll be honest: no. Rui's romance with Natsuo sucked, and I never enjoyed their time together. Frankly I don't even see Rui as a real character, in some sense. What do I mean? I mean she has no discernible personality; her character growth didn't make sense. Who she was in volume 1 and who she became by volume 28 is not the logical progression of a character; I can't even tell she's the same girl.
She goes from kuudere, to some kind of happy-go-lucky, determined, bland Mary Sue who can do no wrong, while retaining zero aspects of her initial kuudere self! And please, forgive me for using the term Mary Sue, but seriously, Rui excelled at everything! And she had no real hardships once she and Natsuo got together -- their breakup only strengthened their unfathomable bond! Sasuga says it herself in the afterword: she did everything to make Rui happy. "Rui got everything except for Natsuo" but even then she still gets to raise his bastard child with him!
Such a stupidly and infuriatingly perfect character, who steals Natsuo from Hina, cannot have beautiful romance in my eyes, and I felt nothing with Natsuo and Rui's so-called chemistry. "Oh but their bantering was so funny and witty!" is something I've seen Rui fans say. Yeah I beg to differ. Rui and her bland generic personality left ZERO impact on me, which is why I wanted Natsuo with Hina or Miyabi, two fine ladies of whom he had much better moments with!
Anyways... I just had to throw that anti-Rui rant out there. She ruined this manga, and were it not for Sasuga's apparent Rui-worshiping, Hina could have had her time in the spotlight, she could have had some genuine development in her romance with Natsuo, the romance that she deserved. That is what was stolen from her -- stolen from us, because of Rui. (And because Sasuga just had to write Hina as being pathologically altruistic to the point of cuckoldry... but that was all to appease Rui, too. It all comes back to Rui in the end. Oh and I can't let Natsuo off the hook for being a dense piece of trash, either!)
Despite all that... I'll give Domestic Girlfriend 7/10 overall. The journey for about 75% of the manga was good to amazing. The last quarter dragged on and on with the insufferable NTR of Hina, and this ending was just as abysmal as its reputation suggested. But I did enjoy my time with Domestic Girlfriend (aside from the parts that made me rage, although rage has value in terms of enjoyment too), and it has definitely left an impact on me. Therefore, I really wanted to be able to score this with an 8 or a 9/10, as it had those great moments. But a 7/10 will have to do for me. Perhaps it's higher a score than it deserves, but I do like this manga despite all its major shortcomings.
Oh and for the record, having a child out of wedlock and then marrying the mother's sister is degenerate, no two ways about it. Just has to be said. It sucks, it's not romantic, and Haruka is growing up in a broken household. But Sasuga wouldn't understand such a thing considering what politics she not-so-subtly shoved into this story. "B-B-B-B-But this whole story is degenerate!" you might say. Well, this crossed a line for me. It's not beautiful, it's not idealistic yet it's portrayed in a positive light. That leaves a bad taste in my mouth. It is what it is.
Tenshi_Budo said:even saw author saying shes a GoT fan on an interview
Which is funny considering she goes out of her way in the afterword to state that "I have a responsibility to make me characters happy." That's sure not very GoT-like if you ask me! Isn't GoT a really dark series?
The only thing DomeKano shares in common with GoT besides the bad ending, is a large cast of characters and a whole lot of promiscuous sex. The end. Granted I've never watched a full episode of GoT and I never plan to, but I'm going off of what I know... |