Stop!! Hibari-kun!

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TL;DR: it's good, Far better than a lot of other manga I've read.

very minor generalized spoilers for the rest of the review.

The question of a piece of art aging well is always a loaded one, that includes having to engage with an understanding and egagement of historical and cultural context.

To answer that question is to ask if the problem is miscellaneous content or it isn't just a few tweaks, but the skeleton of "Stop!! Hibari-kun!" itself that is the problem. this is an issue that I find as a casual reader to be conflicted about.
I've found that as a reader, you need to ... add that context, read between the lines and weed through excuses.

The art is fantastic, knows when to go big and strong, and when to pull it back and go light and cartoon-y. The premise of the manga itself is simple yet solid, and most of the characters are at their core, interesting enough to keep me coming back.
Unfortunately the manga has a few cultural hang-ups for the time of its inception, primarily when it comes to handling the themes of gender and sexuality.
Not exclusively, for example, "how NOT to draw a person of color".

The dynamic of Hibari as a trans woman in the early 80's, often comes down to her either simply being a gag in-and-of-herself or groundbreaking for her time with a few asterisks added, which can become a bit muddy at times.

She is dealt sympathy from the author at hand, but more often than not, not enough to be treated with enough sincerity, that she often gets undercut as a joke. She is herself a great strong fun character, but is at times confined to the frames of a gag-manga, that just gives her enough footing to stand out as something more than just a "man-in-drag" gag.

I do not believe that this was done in some intentionally malicious attempt, certainly because it doesn't read that way, but that for the author at the time of creating the manga, this was "simply the norm" of handling a character such as Hibari. Which I don't know how to feel about that type of excuse.

I find it to be lazy, for some ignorance is bliss/past is past, but the consequence of this years later, is that the manga nowadays' leaves a bad aftertaste hanging on several occasions, like a noticeable stain on a white t-shirt that you really loved wearing.

I don't regret having read and finished the manga, but originally just giving it a 6 as a score, and then moving on, in this case, left me feeling incomplete when it comes to how I feel about "Stop!! Hibari-kun!".
There's a great video essay on the manga/anime called "Stop!! Hibari-kun! and Trans Representation in Anime" by Hazel, which has taught me how to better deal with my feelings on the manga, on a whole, over time. It has made me go back and reconsider my original review.
Here's a link for it: ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oa6MK_boub0 )

So reflecting back on it now, I believe I've been too harsh on it from when i first read it. I'll at least give you that. It is still absolutely worth a read just for the art and characters.

More importantly, often the original question of aging well and standing the "test of time" is loaded with boiled down guidelines of weighing pro and cons, understandably so, because it let's the brain shortcut through unnecessary engagement with content/art that outweighs being voids of empathy and consideration.

So if there's One thing "Stop!! Hibari-kun!" still definitely has, it's empathy.

Forty years ago Stop!! Hibari-kun! was firstly released, and Japan received its first manga trans protagonist, with an irreverent comedy and brilliant art by Hisashi Eguchi. An absolute avant-guarde piece that shocks me, because it is still relevant.

The 80s Japanese LGBT community portrait made by Eguchi is hilarious, but not disrespectful. The humor is neither black nor soft. Considering the time and the country, the approach is very unexpected, at such point that not even the European cinema had explored that theme that way. It reveals that Eguchi was very aware of the trans community's anguish, and of the way Japanese society treated it. But ... he hasn't chosen a melancholic or morbid drama, breaking with the traditional approach.

About the characters, it is literally impossible to not laugh with them. The visual gags are very related to Hanna-Barbera's, and the Western reader can feel related to the manga very often. We have a lot of funny surprises that turn into silly jokes we cannot avoid to laugh because of its unpredictability. Hibari's very own personality brings a lot of those gags, flowing from an adorable and erotic girl to a responsible older brother that belongs to mafia.

Another similarity with the Western cartoons are the episodic arcs, that don't last more than five chapters. This makes the reading really easy-going, you don't have to seal a compromise with the manga. (I think the main cause of this style is Eguchi worried about the possibility of being fired next week)

Besides that, the portrait of Japanese society and culture of the 80s is so relevant and so legit that the manga turned into a symbol of J-Pop, and let us not forget of the portrait of sports and yazuka themes.

I see one problem, though: the frequent comments of Eguchi himself in the manga. We can clearly see his personality while he puts himself at the pages, and in the beginning this seems funny. But after 20 chapters, it's already boring, and it's obviously for the sake of Eguchi's laziness and procrastination. And because of that we understand why the manga had such an abrupt end.

This is a fantastic gag manga that makes for an easy and enjoyable read, with a few little flourishes that have helped it stand out 40 years on from its serialisation. It is very much a gag manga, it should be noted. There are overarching plot elements but they're very light - almost every chapter is self contained and every chapter is mostly a vehicle for a smattering of very silly over the top gags. The mangaka brings an incredibly distinct and fun character to the manga: his style of humour is erratic and constantly throws in varying styles of gag, whether it's an absurdist ... reference to some oddity, a (very beautifully drawn) parody of other genres, very aloof fourth wall breaking or just the typical expressive and stylised reaction panels.

Two things, though, distinguish Hibari-kun (actually probably 3 - but I'll discuss that tertiary thing later...): its art and the romantic undertones. The art is, I think, unanimously accepted as being a cut above. While it generally trends towards 80's comedy manga hyper-stylisation, scattered in every chapter are more detailed panels which, along with the chapter covers, reveal the artist's true capacity to draw his characters in a charming and beautiful way.

There's more to say about the second though. Obviously, the conceit of the manga lends itself towards romantic escalation: the character of Hibari is just so beautiful, despite being a boy, that he is irresistable even to the heterosexual characters. This is the source of much of the comedy (though less than you'd think), the characters being conflicted over their attraction to him. But what makes it interesting to me is that it's not something like 'Pretty Face', where we have a beautiful make constantly appealing to other men and horrified at this. Hibari actively enjoys the attention of men - he's gay, basically. And he's not really the butt of any jokes. He is constantly expressing his attraction to our male lead, Kousaku, who rebuffs him. There isn't really much humour beyond Hibari making advances on Kousaku, who is horrified and has an intense negative reaction - this is in almost every chapter and the dynamic never really changes.

I'm not stating this as a critique but an observation of why I think it becomes strange. You eventually just become desensitised to Kousaku freaking out and it stops being funny and it just seems like an actual romance. But because it's an 80's gag manga, there's absolutely no chance of that going anywhere. Which is sad, obviously. Eventually you just wish Kousaku would nut up and raw Hibari.

Unfulfilled romantic aspirations aside, all else I really have to observe about this manga is that it's a bit mean. That can't be counted as a critique, it's a subjective and maybe oversensitive thing - but to explain: yes, Hibari is a gay character who's 'empowered', beautiful and confident, etc. But every other character who might be a little different, like him, be they gay, makeup wearing men or crossdressers, are freaks. Unlike Hibari, they are the butt of jokes. The mangaka isn't really celebrating androgyny or gender transgressions, he's celebrating Hibari, because he's beautiful and flawless - if you're a boy who wants to be like him and you aren't beautiful, don't bother bub, you're just gonna be a joke!

Which brings me on to that third point of note I mentioned earlier. This manga gets hype now for 'positive transgender representation'. This is completely moronic. The only person who could read this manga and come away with this interpretation had it before they started reading it. This is not Wandering Son. It's a puerile, silly gag manga for horny teenage boys with a crass and silly sense of humour. Hibari is not a boy who wants to become a girl, he does not have gender dysphoria because his body is how he wants it to be. None of the difficulty or struggle of being a sexual minority is present, he does not struggle with social rejection or adaption. And, as I have said, those who transgress boundaries without having Hibari's singular beauty are joke characters, weirdos and creeps.

Hibari himself is an unusual character. Essentially, he's a fantasy made to appeal to the audience of young boys, who can self insert as the fairly bland and good natured Kousaku. Hibari is a beautiful girl everyone wants, who also is never the butt of the jokes, dotes on Kousaku constantly and saves him from violent situations. But he's a boy. Nowadays, there's an entire genre dedicated to catering to these fantasies (and increasingly a subculture of people), but it's fun to imagine just what the reaction of the magazine's core demographic would be to this concept. Presumably, not dissimilar to the manga's protagonist - but would they be as obstinate for as long as him?