Stop!! Hibari-kun!

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Okay, listen. Hibari-kun isn't going to be the #transRepresentation you desire. It certainly wasn't for me. It will not be that. But there's something indelible about who she, Hibari, is as a person. She's confidant about who she is at every turn. She's stylish. She can handle herself and all the wacky hijinks just fine. Rather charmingly, she has a very real, consistent infatuation with Kohasku.

This is a wildly transphobic manga, but I kind of recommend it to my fellow trans folk? Hibari is, despite the intense nature of this gag comic, someone who anyone would want to be. We aspire to being the weird, ... messy, stylish gremlin that she is. The romantic tension between her and Kohsaku is the cherry on top of all this.

I gave this manga a 4 initially, but it's stuck in my brain in a way that other manga simply aren't. Though, while reading this, I recommend occasionally checking in with people who love you, because WOW! Some of the jokes are so so mean.

Also the art is fantastic. That is all.

Stop!! Hibari-kun is a gag manga. In my opinion it has some really good jokes and some that overstay their welcome (and some that overstayed their welcome on their first appearance...). All in all, I quite enjoyed this manga and I'm reviewing it on my second read-through as I remembered having positive feelings about it. But while I liked the manga overall, it is far from perfect. As you get closer to the end of the serialization, the writing does definitely get lazier. Less focus goes on developing the drama/relationships of the characters and just the same gags get repeated over and over. A lot ... of the jokes show how dated this manga really is, but I would still say I recommend this as a read since it's an important piece.

Stop!! Hibari-kun's titular character Hibari Oozora is a transgender girl who presents as a girl when she goes to school. Being a gag manga, there are a ton of jokes which are just a character being shocked by her existence. But in my opinion, even though this manga is a product of an older time, I believe Hibari to be good representation of a transgender character.
Hisashi Eguchi writes her as a normal person, her character is not treated as a joke.

She acts in a reasonable manner (other than being a bit overly flirtatious, though maybe that's common for female leads in rom-com manga in the first place...) and is very convincing in her presentation as a girl. To where all characters who didn't suddenly happen by chance to "find out the truth" just see her as your average girl. (albeit exceptionally beautiful, strong, and smart, lol). So while almost all the characters in the manga are transphobic people by modern standards (though judging by the era they were written, it was the norm to not be educated about transgender identity), the author clearly isn't. Hibari is treated very seriously by the author in her identity, so I think she is quite good representation. Because there's not very many stereotypes in her character I find her trans representation beats even a lot of modern trans representation in how positive it is.

So what will you get however if you read this manga? All I've really done is give you some lame historic rundown of the manga's cultural importance. Probably sounds quite boring at this point. So here's the deal. Stop!! Hibari-kun! is a sometimes funny, sometimes sweet, sometimes dated manga with good trans representation. That last part is the part that probably makes it the MOST unique for it's time. But I'd still say even if you ignore that aspect, the manga is still generally good. It's not too long, and it's quite an easy read so give it a shot! If you're used to old-timey manga humour you'll probably do just fine enjoying this manga.

TLDR:
Stop!! Hibari-kun! is a sometimes funny, sometimes sweet, sometimes dated manga with good trans representation.

Characters: STARTS AT A 9 ENDS AT A 7
Story: 7.5
Art: 8.5 <- character designs are beautiful, but there's rarely a panel that makes you go wow
Comedy: 7
Drama: 8
Cultural importance: 👍

Final score: 7.7

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.