Imasara desu ga, Osananajimi wo Suki ni Natte Shimaimashita
It's a Little Late, but I've Fallen in Love with My Childhood Friend

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8.1/10


I didn’t know this manga got a MAL page, but I guess it did — this review is off the top of my head, and I didn’t reread the manga to make this, so take it how you will. I’m also only bothered enough to do this because I feel like this manga is over-hated and misrepresented due to some rather questionable decisions via the author in the plot.

Yes, this manga starts off as a light, cute romcom depicting teenage romance/crushes, but it’s not overbearingly “cute”; not at the cuteness stage where darker topics become completely nonsensical.

The plot is also nothing short of amazing, as ... it’s not tiresome and pretty refreshing with some of its developments and plot points. I mean, there have been some really unique plot points in humor or development which I’ve never seen before — and for my experience, that’s one hell of a compliment.

As for the characters themselves — they are amazing. The fmc is written amazingly and so is the mc; they provide the perfect balance between cute interactions and humor, and it’s simply amazing — they don’t act robotic or not like high schoolers, which a lot of school romance mangas struggle with.

Though, there’s a lack of side characters or introduction of side characters, which makes this manga feel less like a serialized manga and more like a webcomic. Though, I’m not complaining too much since the characters are more than interesting enough to carry the story that you don’t even notice it.

Now here’s where the plot starts to thicken or get interesting — it gets … psychological? I don’t think that’s the right word to describe it, but there’s a turning point and foreshadowing around the midway point where you can tell something’s going amiss.

As for the resolution of it itself, I find it being written pretty well; it’s one hell of a surprise, and I sort of like that — this manga presented itself as unpredictable with its plot, and it did just that.

This may be a bit off putting to some, as the manga slowly stepped away from the genre of “fluff” and took a more direct route to … a deep, plot twist manga, but the writing and explanation of everything has been as good as it gets for what the author is trying to execute. I still love it; you might not.

PS: is one bad arc or moment in a manga enough to completely discredit what the author has built? I don’t think so. I also don’t even think the dark route is even a bad arc, as it’s well-written and explained. It’s more so of a surprise that you didn’t want. I mean, the essence of the story is still there. The characters we love are still there. I don’t know, I’m just rambling at this point. I’m trying to defend this with my life, but I can understand why there’s a hatred for what the author has done.

Reading Rankings (Portnoy inspired + A Huang-Teizan Original)
10 - God’s penmanship
9 - Must-read. Drop everything else.
8 - Instant bookmark
7 - Entertaining
6 - Good to pass time
5 - Why are you reading this?
4 - Bad.
3 - Typical garbage.
2 - My head hurts.
1 - Retirement is a thought.
0 - “Did they even give you a story?!”

An author tries to be innovative with his work and give more depth to romcom manga and he gets crucified for it...

This manga is great, don't let the softies that reviewbombed it tell you otherwise, life isn't always a clear straight line, love is COMPLICATED, this manga didn't "betray" anybody, god forbid a manga try and be interesting. Go back to your rent a girlfriends and dress up darlings tourists...

Is what I want to say, but let's keep things objective.

The art is great, it's about as good as you could have it for a romance manga, it's clean and simple, easy to look at and ... soft on your eyes, perfect for the atmosphere this type of manga wants to set. The characters are good, there aren't too many, as it mostly revolves only around the two main characters, and occasionally the FMC's friends, the main selling point of this manga really was the story being seen through the FMC's perspective, and seeing her brave herself to confess to her childhood friend whilst cute and awkward situations between the two keep arising, seeing her be so self-conscious about everything is really adorable, and can make you feel all giddy, you can't help but want to root for her and be on her side of the corner throughout the whole manga. But unfortunately, this author, and manga for that matter, didn't take the simplest, "vanilla" route that most mangas of this genre tend to take.

By no means are the recent chapters "bad", or are the recent developments of the story "bad", a lot of people just don't like it when things get complicated in love, but can you blame them? The first 20 chapters of this manga basically invited those types of people to read it, the type that reads these types of manga to feel all giddy and happy inside whilst they read about this girlfailure gush about her childhood friend for the millionth time. The low score and reviewbombs are a result of the audience this manga has gathered. But please, give this manga a try, and don't get offput by the low score, it's fake and this is genuinely worth reading.

This manga isn’t particularly bad, but I cannot, in good conscience, fully recommend it. At this point, it feels like a poorly executed bait-and-switch. It’s clear that the author intended to build up a readership before abruptly and disruptively changing the manga’s tone purely for shock value.

To be clear, genre shift isn't a bad thing. In fact it's a trope that was present in some of the best medias that came to us from Japan. However, those shifts require a good execution to avoid alienating your audience. In most successful examples, the tone shift typically respects some or all of the following principles:
1. The ... tone shifting is gradual
2. It’s foreshadowed in some way.
3. The initial tone represents only a small portion of the overall story.

None of these principles apply here, although the third one could still be salvaged. The tone shifting in this manga was extremely brutal. It's so drastic, that you could likely make two separate mangas out of the different parts, each of which would appeal to a specific audience. But right now ? the content would not be satisfying for either of them.

It's hard to tell what direction will be taken right now. the story could end up being extremely good that it would make us forget how the story initially started, or it could become a bigger trainwreck than it already is.