Fujiyama-san wa Shishunki

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Amazing. Unbelievably, unexpectedly – amazing. And the most surprising thing is that I can say it without any concessions to the romance genre. Fujiyama-san wa Shishunki is a manga you want to dissolve in, to live in, so consistently good its writing and its art are.

Lemme start with the characters, after all, the premise of a romance between a short guy and a tall girl is what would make the synopsis of this manga anywhere. But it’s not Love Com, and the difference in height quickly becomes secondary for their budding feeling. Boy, do the characters feel human, do they feel alive. A big chunk ... of characterization is indirect, comes through art and little details, and it works wonders, you recognize human types and millions of little qualities that they imply. It is especially true for the titular Fujiyama-san, who we study and admire. The male main character, whose pov we follow, is more of self-insert (that made me think that the author is male at first, but nope, it’s a woman), yet very down to earth and a bit of an underdog, which makes donning his skin inviting and rooting for him easy. The rest of characters fall to the background, but not having a secondary friend romance or triangles in this case is a bless. The “farthest” cast, people defined by few characteristic features, are also done perfectly, very readable. The supporting, closer characters are, perhaps the weakest in terms of personality, but can hold their own in most cases.

Fujiyama-san wa Shishunki excels in its depiction of Japanese life and life in general. The art for the world is stellar, the detalization is beyond anything I could expect when I picked up this manga – some pages are hard to turn, so lush and vibrant they are. You may doubt me because of the covers, but they’re painfully non-representative, the one and only thing that isn't drawn amazingly. The amount of graphical content and skill here is close to the current Asano, on the level of the best modern movie-like seinen. Since we've touched the topic of art - art-wise this manga has it all: striking two-pages spreads, powerful facial expressions, good anatomy, beautiful landscapes, clever mood-setter panels, steady panelwork.

The author creates beautiful genre scenes, brimming with life in its little details. The winter scenes in the house of Fujiyama’s grandmother stood out for me – it felt as if you could smell and touch the things in this warm older lady’s home, with its carefully kept old things in covers, neat mementos on shelves, stale candy and, of course, festive cooking. A year goes by, scenes change in small beautiful vignettes, mundane life distilled and turned by the author’s love and effort in eternal moments – a shrine in autumn covered in gingko leaves, a neingbourhood city’s summertime empty library, a schooltrip to Kyoto, city streets gone empty because of a typhoon. Usually it’s about Fujiyama, her family, while she herself is a quietly shining presence, and the main character, who we follow, enters her life and learns about her through this life, carried in by his love and sudden admiration and desire.

An important side of Fujiyama-san wa Shishunki is that the whole story is permeated with beautiful eroticism. It’s perfect – healthy and tasteful. The two teens start to enjoy their bodies, learn about attraction, try touch. They don’t even kiss, be warned, but the existing erotic subtext is substantial and enjoyable nevertheless. You desperately want them to have sex, but for once not only to ogle, but because you believe that this couple will manage to turn it into a moment of absolute happiness.

What is stronger, slice of life or romance? Perhaps slice of life, though the two merge and suppost each other. The characters seem to be embraced by the immence world, they grow out of its soil and are carried by its currents. Yet their love colors and makes the world too in return.

Of course, some parts are simplified. Fujiyama is teased, but both characters are perfectly adjusted in school, even the somewhat lame male main character. The school life is glorified in a way. The interactions are specifically cut off from the modern tech. But fiction always morphs reality in order to achieve its goals, and here it obviously succeeds, creating a timeless, healing, human love story.

The plot follows the slice of life staples, with status quo changing rarely, if at all, until near the very end. Some chapters may be a tiny bit strained, there’re some fluctuations in the mood (from a somewhat messy teen romance to a happy family-like romance), but overall the high quality of writing is maintained.

Normally I have a policy of limiting time for long romance manga, dropping it after a while – it’s just too much of the same wasting my time. But with Fujiyama-san wa Shishunki I am sure I will come back even now that it's finished. It offers the full package – great art, lovable characters, heartwarming story. But then it gives you even more – a spirit of humanity and care, fragrant depictions of life, intelligent writing. I can’t recommend higher, please, just go and read it.

This piece is really something. I can really recommend it to people who love romance and even more so if you love the process of falling in love. The main protagonists have a really innocent relationship with the occasional goofy moments that could be considered ecchi. The characters are extremely likeable especially Fujiyama Makio with her everything is cool personality. The story kept me on the edge most of the time because the atmosphere is always like "this is the time they make finally the next step" and then it descends into the same pattern, but it is still really good. I am looking forward ... for more stories from this mangas author.

(TLDR Review at the bottom, as always, thanks for reading)

Before I say anything, maybe this isn't the correct thing to say, but Ojiro Makoto has this trilogy of manga that are so simple that they are some of the best things one can read in the romance genre. The three I would like to call out are (from earliest to latest):
- "Fujiyama-san wa Shishunki" / "Fujiyama's Adolescence"
- "Neko no Otera no Chion-san" / "Cat Temple's Miss Chion"
- "Kimi wa Houkago Insomnia" / "Insomniacs After School"

All three of these are highly recommended by myself. Do yourself a favour and find time to *binge* them.

Now for the ... review.

There is something about simplicity that clicks with me and many others for that matter as something that is just so easy to enjoy, so easy to sit back to, so easy to get invested into that you don't really care about too much as you are just finding yourself to enjoy what is in front of you. Countless times I have seen people "overhype" a multitude of stories for reasons so basic you get a failing grade any day of the week if you were to send that off as analysis. Horimiya, Demon Slayer, Solo Leveling, Your Name. But when you condense things down. We are just simple people. As much as it is easy to implode every detail on a base of mismatching superimposition, people do usually, sometimes only, look at the superficial qualities, because most of the time, stories don't go deeper than what can be seen.

Some stories don't get this attention, however. I have seen some hidden gems out there that would probably get the same amount of appreciation on a larger scale, as the stories I have mentioned above. But considering that is not the case, they end up being on the quieter end of the scale with a few people who will praise this indefinitely. But the similarities are there. No matter how large or small something is, most simple things tend to get the better of us. For good reason and good intention too.

Fujiyama's Adolescence, a somewhat hidden gem, is a part of that band of simplicity that we all love to take some time on.


Narrative:
Fujiyama's Adolescence's story is pretty much null. There is zero viable story to actually speak of with this manga, which leads to the question of, "what does it do with the characters then?". Before that, something I do want to say is that when I say it has "zero viable story", I mean in the same sense people would describe s.o.l plots. Though, to some extent, I would say that this story takes that too extreme because the "plot" is forever changing and it is really just the development of a relationship.

Before that, I must speak of the characters. The characters are the selling point of this story. I find no problem with them, and scratching down on the surface you begin to see some light on how simple "simple" is. The tl;dr of it is that these characters are legit people, legit humans probably on a relatability scale that hits closer than anything I have seen before. It's weird because what also makes these characters so good is that they undergo very implicit development, to the point where it flows with little notice. Their writing here was made in a way that makes it seem like nothing happens. Which is true. Not a lot of change happens. Nothing too drastic from what my memory serves. But that is what makes them so well, in real life, change happens over a long period of time. Average lifestyle, at least from what I know of Japan, doesn't consist of loud crashes and bangs like anime, specifically s.o.l romcoms, will tell you, people doing the stupidest of teenage things every moment, or some other nonsense that should only exist in a fictional atmosphere. Fujiyama and Kanba are perfect representations of this, they are the kind of people you could probably draw a parallel to someone you know, or have seen, in real life in a school environment. Whilst the two don't have anything of some really deep and intricate development, they are undoubtedly perfect in character representation. People in real life have a simple style of life; it is all the more enforced in this manga. Fujiyama is your athlete kinda girl, a little popular, outgoing-type and aggressive too. Kanba, the less popular childhood friend, is a little more lowkey, perverted, but still quite boyish to some extent. You can't tell me these people don't seem realistic. It isn't just that flat description I have just given, they also have their own motives and emotion to call their own using it to do stuff that may look like a universal action, but still gives them a sense of their solid character to claim as their own. We aren't so different from one another, but we still have something that makes you "you". I would never say that these characters do something for the sake of moving the plot forward either, none of this pointless drama or spontaneous burst random feelings. These characters are what they say they are and it is like that throughout the entire thing. You want some consistent characters? Here are some.

I need to talk about the relationship a little too. Fujiyama and Kanba are young people new to this world of love they have allowed themselves into. With young love comes really dumb behaviour on both sides. Like the first being in the very first chapter where Fujiyama just says yes to wanting to go out with Kanba. No question. Just yes. Why? Maybe it is because she wanted to know what it felt like being in love. But I honestly have no clue. What I do know is that it can be looked at as a real response, because, teenagers will do dumb things. The relationship has its times of ups and downs, mostly ups, with it centring around school outings and experience. One or two downs due to teenage struggles. I think it had a real take on the situation of young love quite like something you don't see too often in animanga. It genuinely makes for a really simplistic but absorbing experience to follow up upon because you want to see how it plays out and how nice it is at the end.

Other side characters, admittedly, are forgettable. However, I do remember character actions rather than faces. There are some characters in this manga that have little to no importance but you would remember them as "oh yeah, Fujiyama was associated with the girl that did this" or "oh yeah, that guy did that". I would say that they have good treatment to them despite being of little relevance. There is this one thing that happens to side characters but I won't get into it due to spoilers. Basically, it is realistic and something that makes sense.


Art:
Ojiro's art style is very simple, don't consider this a bad thing though, it makes sense for this to be simple as it ties in quite nicely to the story's representations. To some extent, it might be a little too simple, with there being some lack of background detail at times. It doesn't really add to the simplicity and the worst-case scenario comes off as a little lazy. But these aren't excessively prevalent, they just come up quite a bit but I would imagine it wouldn't hurt anyone. Character design is in the same boat only that seems to have more detail than that of the surrounding. It would actually be more accurate to say that the backgrounds have less detail relative to the character design because character designs are fixed and don't expand or fold really. But hey I promise everything here is pretty good and the background won't hurt to see.


Enjoyment:
I enjoyed this quite a bit. It was a very easy read to go through, it was generally inoffensive and most of all it was very wholesome. However, I have one major complaint with the character that affected my enjoyment. Kanba. I like the dude, and I have nothing against him, but when he changed his character so implicitly that it was borderline camouflaged, the kind that you wouldn't have got even with sharp eyes, I drove forward into the story thinking is this guy going to get out of this behaviour or what? The guy is your average teenage perv, not hating on that, it was just how with the consistent lewd panels, incredibly consistent, I didn't know if this guy was going to stay that way or if he was going to change because it was all over the place, I didn't know what to believe about this dude. It killed a wholesome vibe at times. Looking back at it I think it was just because male teenagers are still going to be interested in the female body regardless. It is surprisingly easy to forget so don't do what I did and hold that against him. The dude genuinely is a good man, he just can't help it at times.

Overall - 8.25 (8)
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TLDR Review:
Story - 7: No "real" story, just the relationship between middle schoolers, which is presented quite well.
Art - 8: Very simple art. Maybe a little too simple due to lack in background detail. But otherwise very good.
Character - 10: Perfect presentation of real characters.
Enjoyment - 8: Very wholesome. Don't do what I did and hold Kanba's perviness against him. It happens with young people.

Overall - 8.25 (8)
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I originally tried to make this review shorter than I should have. But then I ended up writing too much lmao.

Going into this story and I thought it would be about a tall girl short guy relationship. But it didn't even care about that, almost like it didn't exist. Realistic? Probably is. I know someone in my school in the same position, maybe with not a huge gap in height but one regardless. Maybe it isn't realistic tho. The only perception will create what we think we know. And I have no intention of linking stats in this review lol. Recommend? For sure. I mean, I did nothing but mostly praise this in this review lol. Ojiro's "trilogy" are one of a kind, and even with them not being vastly different, Fujiyama's Adolescence has its distinctions. Well, we will just say it does lol.