YoungVagabond said: It COULD have been a great manga.
Unfortunately, the two main characters were awful cheaters that completely fucked a good, decent man in Fujiki-san. It was harder to identify with and root for the main characters after that debacle.
That was the main problem, but the rushed, overly dramatic nature of the last volume (a suicide, an unplanned pregnancy conveniently resolved in 2 chapters with a miscarriage...any more cliches?) really brought it down.
It was a 6/10...a good work, but also a disappointment in some ways.
For once in this lifetime, we agree. A glorious day, it is.
It all went downhill quickly once the SUPER-ORIGINAL, well-educated and rich love triangle rival entered the picture. There was no need whatsoever for his character other than extending the drama without good reason, and it left me utterly baffled how - in spite of her moving back to Tokyo for the lead in the first place - Sae suddenly decided she couldn't be with her true love and went with the more faithful doctor she didn't love, instead. It baffled me further when, after rejecting Mr. 100 Ladies / offering her virginity to her four-eyed fiancee, she then slept TWICE with Mr. 100 Ladies behind her fiancee's back. Needless drama which I've seen before far too many times to enjoy.
As for the lead duo's lack of likability, I agree completely. I understood where the lead was coming from when he practically got raped by his friend's girl and then fell for an older woman. No guy in this world would hold true to a childhood promise made without thought, under those circumstances. But when he became a playboy/screwed everything in a skirt; not caring about his friends or his promise at all? That was just downright cuntish. It was as if he didn't grow as a person at all over the course of the story, becoming more idiotic, if anything.
And Sae? She was fine to begin with but once she started agonizing over a first love that could never be... when it totally could be, and then went all lovey-dovey after messing around the doctor and previously acting like becoming one with her love was but a dream, I started seriously disliking her. Plus, it was unrealistic for her to have remained a virgin just because her left leg didn't function properly. She still had her beauty, and one faulty leg wouldn't be enough to make guys hesitant to want to do her. I can't help but see the whole disability aspect as an attempt at making her remaining pure for her playboy love semi-realistic... when it totally wasn't.
The final volume? it was shit. The lead was cured of his reclusive ways (which resulted from the death of a once unimportant character) by one angry beating by his beloved / the request for virginity returning, and Sae got over losing her baby just by seeing the face of the guy who was down with leaving her for three years, after previously expressing how he needed her with him. Non-stop bullshit.
Maybe I'm being a bit too harsh with a 5/10 score, but after recently going through Cigautera and 7/10ing it because of its terrible ending, I think it's justified. The art was often bad to the point of looking incomplete due to laziness, the romance took forever to get going and then never developed beyond basic cooking jokes, numerous characters with no value appeared throughout, and the random switch of focus to Miki's doping/sprinting at the end was awkward. After a bright(ish) start, I'd describe it as once of the most disappointing manga I've read. |