5-toubun no Hanayome
The Quintessential Quintuplets

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"ALL Harem Animes/Mangas are trash!" they said. "Every Harem MC is either a useless pervert or a dense disgusting protagonist," they said, putting any fellow anime watcher on the cross because they made a mention of an example of such a genre. "Harem anime? How vulgar! Go back to your slums", such yells became the norm, there were people bullied, ridiculed, and humiliated, yet having to face this kind of treatment was second nature to us harem readers, as we moved forward with our heads high, our spirits unfazed. We were "The Strugglers" as we called... Until that moment.

I can still remember their cries ... as I watched my fellow harem enjoyers looking deep into my soul with teary eyes as if pleading, telling me "Stand up for us".... The culprits shouted vile words like none had seen before. "Your waifu is trash!" such cruel words shouldn't be said out loud... the screams that echoed in the air and the passion that resonated with my brethren. Me sitting down and writing this was an event of fate, after all. Maybe.

So here am I. Gotoubun is a harem manga, yada yada yada, you know the usual stuff. "Dumbgefkun, get to the good stuff already!" I know, I know.

First of all, girls are well-drawn. If you are looking for the same thing as my dumb teenage self did at the time, that is cute anime girls, then you're in a treat, because girls are phenomenal. while they might fit into some archetypes essentially they have their own personality and are quite memorable. whatever you are looking for, no matter if youre the type of guy who thinks to himself "I want a girl who will absolutely break me" while in the middle of a shower (if thats your taste, no judgements here.), if youre the team "I can fix her" or just a girl who generally stays quiet, hell, even a "Genki" (cheery type) girl all for you to read along. The story reveals their backstory and shows their development quite decently.

"Decently?" Didn't you give this review a perfect score? Of course, I did. Because, as the wise people on a certain manga site would say, "I came looking for copper but I found gold."

Don't be fooled by the name of this manga, it is a dextrously made move by the author of this manga, to whom I give my utmost respect for this work. Think about it, which one would sell better: A picture of different cute waifus put together or just a chill guy? Yeah, you guessed right.
we witness more of Uesugi Fuutarous's development and self-actualization rather than following the quintuplets. The quintuplets just happened to be the "friends" he made along the way.

Our main character is introduced to us as a high-school student. Classic right? Hear me out. Right from the first impression we get he is a goofy hardworking high-schooler whose family is struggling financially. Fortunately, he has good academic skills, and thanks to his previous efforts he is able to find a job that can help ease up his family's financial situation. So he takes it. It was actually planned to be a one-shot only but it got quite popular so the author continued it.

Anyway, throughout the story we see how Fuutarou is able to change and grow, how this friendless guy who is as dense as a block changes his view on many things, his struggles, and how he overcomes them each and every time no matter what struggles or absurdities fate throws at him. It doesn't happen immediately, he makes stupid mistakes, he sometimes tries and fails, changes plans, and says dumbass things but in the end, it is who he is and what made him who he is that made him go so far. At the time I read this manga, I was so impressed that I actually put some more effort into studying and improved my academics quite a bit too.

If you are looking for a good main character and some romance on the side I absolutely recommend this. I consumed quite a lot of anime/mangas and there are only two other characters I can compare to Fuutarou regarding his story, development, and growth. If you are also looking for a good female cast then I also recommend it. If you like reading manga then I also recommend it.

Personally, I read this manga four or five times already and I can still notice new details every time I reread it. Some part of the reason is nostalgia, sure, but more than that just witnessing the sheer character of Fuutarou is the actual reason. He is not a plot device like one character who everyone hated, then loved, then hated the shit out of after he said "FOR 10 YEARS AT LEAST", the plot revolves around him and his actions, and out of all the parts I can say I've seen him break character only once in a mild situation that wasn't essential to the plot. And lastly, he doesn't get played around by the girls or try to appease them he is only there to do his job right. A prime example of Sigma Male, just like how he Fuutaroud all over the manga. Truly, one of the characters of all time...

TL:DR
Great writing and charming characters but it can't quite live up to the premise of five equal love interests and suffers from a very rushed ending. Mixed Recommendation

Story: 6/10
Well paced for the first ~80%. There's a long section at the start where there's little to no romcom shenanigans and I wish more manga slowed down at the start to give us a chance to get to know the characters outside of a romantic context.

The author gave themselves herculean task trying to develop six distinct main characters (the sisters + Uesugi) and, for the most part, they manage to pull it off. They manage to portion ... it out so that this development is never too quick and that ensures the reader feels it was narratively earned. It's also well balanced so no one character is ever the focus for too long. inter-character relationships (and not just the romance) are also fleshed out too and change with time. However, not all six get the same amount of attention and some are characters are plain worse than others (more on this in the characters section of this review).

The romance too is evenly spaced so each character gets their shot and it doesn't feel like they all fall in love with him at once, it feels natural (at least as natural as five girls all falling in love with one guy can be). The quintuplets all deepen their relationship with the protagonist in several intertwined plot threads so it never feels like the manga is pausing to push one relationship in isolation but always keeping the other characters and their actions and reactions in mind.

As for the other 20% of the manga, the pacing accelerates to light speed and we're barely given room to breath. Frankly, the manga is simply too short and, I can't believe I'm saying this of a romcom manga, it should have been stretched out over more chapters. There is too much drama cramped into too few chapters that feels forced and is never resolved in a satisfying way. Some quints are introduced into the romantic rivalry too late into the manga and are left critically undeveloped (yes, I will get to the controversial ending shortly). The manga needed an extra volume or two just to fully flesh out the plot points it introduces near the very end.

The author tries to maintain the illusion that all five twins are in the running for the protagonist's love but they clearly have favourites and some characters get far more time to shine while the rest are relegated to more supporting roles. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, some characters are just more interesting than others and they don't need to be completely equal.

There are no real recurring support characters in the manga and it's a little suffocating that every single character is a romantical rival. Usually the protagonist has a friend or two to speak to or for comedy in between the drama but here it's all quintuplets all the time. The author seems to have recognised this and the protagonist makes some friends but they show up maybe two or three times afterwards and don't have any impact on the manga. The rest of the support cast have extremely minor roles or are mere plot devices.

Finally, we get to the most controversial part of the manga: the ending. Now, only one character can “win” here so people were inevitably going to be upset when their favourite waifu didn't win, there's no getting around that. Most people understand this and would still enjoy the ending IF it was well-written. Unfortunately, the character the protagonist ultimately ends up with is the least developed and introduced to the rivalry last. This essentially means that the most boring character wins and that will be controversial no matter how the manga ends. Now, I didn't hate it as much as many seem to have, I think the choice makes sense but it absolutely needed more build up and the character needed development. As it stands, the ending came out nowhere in an unsatisfying way and it's very disappointing when looking at the potential this manga had and the great writing the author is clearly capable of. It's like the author tried to subvert the readers expectations without understanding why this works in other media.

Character: 7/10
The male protagonist has some development, changing from academic focused anti-social hermit to someone with more perspective on what's important in life. I particularly like that he isn't as dense as most harem protagonists and has at least some emotional intelligence.

Nino and Ichika are the two most interesting quints and by far the most developed characters. They receive the most attention in the manga and really steal the show. There arcs are well-written and they continue to grow as characters almost until the very last chapter.

Itsuki is a good character in her own right and receives her fair share of the spotlight. She has her own arc and, while it was shorter than the two discussed previously, it was enjoyable and well-written. Unfortunately she falls by the wayside near the climax and is largely forgotten.

Miku is interesting because she is one of the more prominent characters and gets nearly as much attention as Nino and Ichika do, yet she feels like a slightly worse version of each. I think some more work could have been done to make her more distinct from the rest of the cast. I also think her character arc just sort of peters out with out a satisfying end. This is clear in the final chapter where Miku helps a different character in their dream, because the author forgot to give her one.

Yotsuba is the worst character. I liked her personality and something interesting could be done with her but she never changes in anyway. She has one flaw that she's scolded for the entire manga but she never resolves it and has no actual character arc. We barely get anything more out of her character than what we knew at the beginning.

I will reiterate that the non-romantic support characters need better characterisation. They have their own mini-arcs but most don't have any actual impact on the plot. The only one that does is the quintuplets father, he does affect the plot but he rarely shows up and feels more like a plot device than an actual person.

Art
Top notch art, every character has a distinct, meaningful designs that say something about their character.

Great panelling that's easy to follow and is overall a pleasure to read.

The manga also has a digital colour edition available and it's really elevates the manga to have it in full colour, though they did have to give the quintuplets different fantasy hair colours to help differentiate them.

Nothing else to report here - it's just very good art.

Overall: 6/10
Mixed Recommendation - despite enjoying this manga quite a bit, the ending was simply too out-of-nowhere to be satisfying and it doesn't feel great to have all these very likable characters only for the least developed, least interesting one to win completely unearned. I would avoid the manga if a bad ending can ruin it for you, otherwise it may be worth reading just for how good the rest is.

"They had us in the first half, not gonna lie" is a sentence that could perfectly describe the writing of 5-toubun no Hanayome. For the first 90 chapters, the manga was pretty good. It had some flaws obviously, but was very enjoyable and promised a great future.

But then, the festival arc came, and it only went down from here.

Also, massive spoilers ahead, you know the deal.

For the first half of the manga, I think we can all agree that it was pretty enjoyable. We were promised an ending immediatly, and we had to figure out what girl was going to marry Fuutarou based on the ... elements we were given throughout the manga.

To be fair with Negi, this must have been a tough story to tackle. Balancing a good amount of mystery with a good amount of romance, while developping 6 characters was definitely not an easy task, and oh boy did he fail at that.

The problem is that the more you work on the romantic side of the story, the more the mystery of who will win becomes obvious, and it was pretty obivous who would win. So when Fuutarou made his decision, I thought one of those two things would happen :

- He wouldn't chose anyone. A realistic assumption considering Fuutarou never showed any romantic interests towards any of the girls. And that would mean that he would chose a girl later in the story. Sadly there were only a handful of chapters left.

- Or he would chose Nino, the only realistic choice at that point. It wouldn't make any sense for Miku's character arc to be with him at that point, Ichika didn't stand the chance, and Yotsuba and Istuki were never in the race to begin with.

More than anything, I think Fuutarou's decision arrived much too soon in the manga. Like I said, he didn't seen to have any romantic interests, and it didn't make any sense for his character to make this choice at that point. He wasn't oblivious the the quints' feelings, but it didn't feel like he liked anyone. This manga needed at least 2 more volumes for Fuutarou to developp some romantic interests to give a satisfying ending to the story.

And just like that, he chose Yotsuba, even Shyamalan wouldn't make a plot twist this dumb.
I have no problem with Yotsuba winning the race in itself, I have a problem with how it was done and why Fuutarou chose her. There were ways to make any quint win in a satisfying way, but sadly this didn't happen.

For the whole manga, Yotsuba was pretty much a background character, and it didn't change one bit with this decision. She is exactly the same in the first chapter as she is in the last. A typical Genki girl that would be good a side character and a plot tool to make the story move, but lacks the depth to be a main character. She has no progression, no character arc, nothing. She doesn't even have a job in the last chapter of the manga, she just lives with Fuutarou, and that's it.

In the chapter after he made his decision, Fuutarou explains that he chose her because he would've collapsed long ago if it wasn't for her. Okay, fair enough, but how doesn't that apply to Miku and Itsuki as well ? Sure Yotsuba helped him get the quints together, but Miku and Itsuki did just as much if not more.

This ending is insulting. I don't have the slightest clue with Negi chose to do it this way. It just doesn't make any sense. If the manga really had to end quickly, it would've been better to make Nino the bride since it didn't need several volumes from that point to justify why they love would love eachother.
It wouldn't be a great ending but it would at least be satisfying.

After the festival arc, Nino even regressed in her character developpement when she gets heated over Yotsuba winning. Didn't she say that she would support anyone that wins ? Sure I can see her emotions getting the better of her like when she pushed Fuutarou in the water during the school trip, but at least make her regret the things she said to Yotsuba.

And during the wedding, she even cries when Fuutarou calls her during the last quint game ?? It's been 5 years and she's not over that already ?


This ending also leaves a lot of plot points unexploited.

Who kissed Fuutarou under the bell during the scrambled eggs arc ? Since Yotsuba won, it's supposed to be her, but it would be so out of character for her to do that. I guess you could say that she kissed him to make him see her sisters as potential romantic partners but that would be hard to believe. I think it as supposed to be Ichika, doesn't make sense for any other quint to kiss him in such a way.

Did Fuutarou learn that Yostuba was the girl he met 5 years ago and that Ichika didn't lie when she told him that she played with him ? I think that if Yotsuba has to be the bride, this should be a major plot point.

Did Fuutarou learn that Itsuki was playing Rena ? What was in her love charm that fell in the water ? What was the point of that story if it's left like that ?


Overall, 5-toubun no Hanayome was pretty enjoyable. The first 90 chapters were brilliant, Ichika, Miku and Itsuki had great character arcs and it was a very good premise.
Sadly, the ending was rushed and didn't deliver on the expectations. A very disappointing ending for what could have been the masterpiece of harem mangas.