Sep 20, 2024
This is garbagio... but... in the same way people watch trashy tv like reality shows and telenovelas. The concept here, I think is interesting: a small lie/theft makes relationships crumble, rise, then crumble again, but holy shit the way it's executed is rather clumsy and unfortunate: you're watching hormonal, stupid teenagers muddle their way through melodramatic moments that (AT ANY MOMENT) can be solved by being honest and open. The classic trope of a liar digging themselves deeper into their lies, and you're just frustrated witnessing the events, screaming at the character to just confess. There are possibly 20 times the obscenely kind and understanding
...
friends of the protagonist opened the possibility for the protag to just confess to the EXTREMELY MINOR wrongdoing, allowing an apology to lessen the whole dramatic and contrived situation.
The art is relatively strong though, there are these cool collages that show the artistic side of the characters and the creator really well. In the manga Blue Period, the author got other real life artists to represent other art in the plot of the story. A similar thing happens here in that the art reflects the different characters very well. I'll say that Gift (our protag) has great skills in painting and it shows that he's put in the work, but the art won't save the rest of the work.
Of course the author, gives us a glimpse into the protagonist and antagonist's past to see how they became to be so dramatically secretive and justice-seeking, respectively. It's not like it helps. You will read about these extreme behaviors developing in our two main underdeveloped, immature children, and it may be due to that immaturity that it can be excused but the protagonist cannot develop, and it's not like he has any lovable qualities beyond being a really good artist. A frustrating character might benefit if they were more charming or funny or alluring, he's just a diminished wet blanket.
The antagonist is fine, kind of cartoonish and devilish, her insane approach to torturing the main character through some mundane and extreme blackmail, she was the most fun to watch flipflop between nonchalant and crazy. I really wished I could see more of the supporting two characters Kokomi and Taima because they had the most potential. Kokomi had this big reveal of her being a kind of baddie with her piercings, which coming from my tatted and pierced self, I know that the piercings aren't crazy but the teen who has them and who hides them, what else will they be hiding? Could have been more spicy. I think some missed potential happened here because she was very sweet and caring and had this secret side to her. Equally, Taima is just a bastion of goodness, he was always supporting his classmates, so caring and kind that surrounded by all these "bad" actions between the protag and antag, he was like a detective understanding things better, I wish he had more screentime.
In the end, yeah I stuck with it to see how trashy it could get, and I will say... the ending almost saved this to make it a whopping 7/10 as I do think the author delivered on a crazy time. But going through this week by week was rather frustrating as chapter after chapter I felt the author had to hook us with huge reveals that, from a perspective of the whole work, make this a melodramatic episodic reality tv style hook that makes you think "yeah i'm okay to waste a minute reading this every week." I recommend this in the same way I recommend shitty donuts.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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