Dagashi Kashi

Edit

What would you like to edit?

SynopsisBackgroundAlternative TitlesPictureChapters/VolumesPublishing DatesRelationsTypeExternal Links  

As if Japan didn't have everything already, they also pride themselves on having a HUGE selection of candy and sweets at your nearest convenience stores, and this manga is almost like a throwback to most of the popular sweets in our childhood.

Dagashi Kashi (rough translation) "Cheap Sweets", is an episodic manga about Shikada Kokonotsu, a wannabe-mangaka that is against his father's wishes of managing the town's sweet shop, and Shidare Hotaru, a fan of her father's store and his reputation who also has an (insane)fascination for sweets.

Filled with puns and sweets, each chapter works with a single popular candy to tell the story. From sweet ... drinks, to gum, to cellphone's filled with candy, to yogurts, Hotaru uses each sweet as an excuse to explain the greatness of candy's existence in the world and to convince Kokonotsu of taking over his father's store. This can bring back many memories if you ever experienced having some of the candy that are brought up in this manga(or lookalikes) and it's a fine way to keep the readers engaged with the story.

The comedy fits the art-style, even if it does feel too rough in some parts, but the characters' eccentricities and quirkiness are well portrayed through the comical expressions and faces the often show.

Dagashi Kashi does not depend on the character development but rather on the ridiculousness of how the candy involved affects the daily lives of our characters, and the shortness of each chapter works as a way to not bore the reader, even if sometimes the story feels lacking.

Very enjoyable and very short, but with tons of sweets, candy, and jokes. This manga is worth following if you have a strong appetite for sugar, sugar, and sugar. (kids don't forget to eat your broccoli!)

By all means, this is not a serious manga, and I can certainly expect some people to just scoff it off. However, this has honestly been one of my favorite mangas I've read recently.

I was first hooked by the design of the female lead-Hotaru. In essence, she is a Yandere, only directed towards sweets and not anyone in particular. Smart, charming, enthusiastic, ditsy, funny, all packed in an infinitely sexy body, with a great closet of clothes that still manages to retain her signature look. Oh, did I mention the JoJo poses?

I also found myself intrigued by the explanation of sweets each chapter. It's practically ... useless, and I'll probably never eat 90% of the foods introduced, but it's fun dammit. Of course Hotaru's antics probably plays a large role in it being enjoyable as well.

As time went on, I found myself rooting for romance development between our male protagonist Kokonotsu and Hotaru. Although honestly, the childhood friend Saya makes a very compelling case for support as well.

Speaking of which, all the characters are lovable in their own way, and the side character story arcs are fun as well

The little shakeup in the middle of the series was interesting to say the least..although personally I'm thankful for picking up this manga after it had already ended. Otherwise I would probably by extremely fustrated by the turn of events.

As for cons....since the manga is done in bite-sized formats, each chapter is only half length of what you can normally expect. This means that the pace is very quick, and each "gag" comes and goes fast. Some people might like this kind of pace more, but I wish the story had a bit more multi-chapter arcs.

The ending also feels just a tad rushed.


At the end of the day, this is a manga that has 8~10 pages a chapter, that's focused on a very specific subset of sweets. Don't expect major development, or an epic story arc, as that's just not what this is. However, rating it for what it is, a casual comedy that teaches some knowledge, I think you can't get much better than this.

Overall 9/10

P.S. The anime takes some generous liberties with the story, changing around the character interactions, and also condenses an already condensed format, leaving it even more rushed. I don't particualrly like the adaption, but I guess it is the only way to see my favorite characters in action.

Absolutely loved reading this manga! All the characters are very unique and the art is drawn great. The majority of the manga are skits about many types of (real) old and familiar Japanese snacks (dagashi) with almost each chapter dedicated to one specific snack. What makes this fun to read is the interactions between the characters around the snack with humor that is generally fun. However, this manga is not solely about dagashi, the main character is faced with a difficult choice, of which he holds onto throughout the story. In my opinion, there is a good balance between the dagashi, and the main characters' ... story with a pinch of romance. My enjoyment reading this manga was high and consistent from beginning to end.

New characters are introduced around the middle of the manga. This is also where the development of the characters start to take more of a priority. There may only be a few characters, but each of them get enough time to become relevant.

Unfortunately, the ending felt more like a cliff-hanger instead of a true ending. Although, the main character did reached the next step toward his goal, no major change was made to the characters. It is, however, still satisfactory. It just made me want more.

Overall, I highly recommend this manga for the great characters, fun story, and the dagashi. Some people may not be interested in reading about dagashi, but Kotoyama makes doing so fun and interesting!

It's a manga that I can't bring myself to say I don't like, because it's a lie. However, it has more negative than positive points: the characters are wonderful, but they do not have a development, their magic lies in knowing them when they are introduced to the story and adapting to it, than seeing them in their day to day. The characters are not explored, not even Hotaru, only Kokonotsu (the protagonist), in a period in which it is easy to empathize and care for him, and there is a development, however this happens only once. The finale is disappointing, it makes you understand ... what is going to happen, but after watching so many chapters, I felt it was not worth it. It's great to learn about Japanese sweets, but having such nice characters, I'd rather see them in important situations than arguing over sweets. So that's why I don't recommend Dagashi Kashi, I enjoyed it but it wasn't enough.