Issho ni Neyou yo

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STORY:
My initial expectations for this manga were low. I thought it would have a bunch of cliches, annoying love rivals, but syrupy-sweet shoujo moments. This surprised me with few cliches, sincere love growth, and a likable love rival. I wouldn't even call him a love rival; he was more of a playboy with a heart of gold. I was pleasantly surprised by the characters and story.

However, this manga desperately needed a supernatural, horror, and tragedy label. Issho ni Neyou yo got so DEEP! I mean deep as in “dark.” Once the manga reached a certain number of chapters, junk got serious. It made me whine, ... “Can a scene stay happy for more than three pages!?” The child abuse scenes were a bit jarring. I NEVER saw the dark scenes coming! One moment everything would be fine and, the next, the mom would be trying to drown her baby alive. Many of these scenes could possibly be triggering. One time a sweet hug turned depressing fast. Of course, a scene of a gun placed to Ichiko's head, and Kohaku wanting to beat the gunman senseless was hard to watch. Another scene where a boy being beaten with high heels and a wine bottle was a bit brutal. There was even a subverted suicide attempt. Even submerged in the darkness, Issho ni Neyou yo never lost its lightheartedness and humor. The bonds between the tenants were heartwarming to watch.

The main premise is the small mismatched family of tenants who all have their reasons for staying there. Besides Kohaku, everyone had fairly normal, non-feels-inducing backstories. Ichiko's reason for leaving was a bit over-dramatized. I guess the mangaka wanted it to be so over the top to showcase her innocence. Anyone who has had younger siblings or taken care of babies will understand Ichiko's so-called unforgivable mistake. Thankfully, that plot was cleared up quickly. I am so glad because dragging it out longer than five chapters would have been ridiculous.

CHARACTERS:
I enjoyed all of the characters except that demonic teacher. I wish Tsumoto and Haruka would have stopped with those groping moments. I swear neither of them had personal spaces issues. I guess there had to be some fan service.

The main character, Ichiko, was my favorite. It's so rare for me to like the main character more than the side characters in a manga. She was sweet as candy and a bit mousy, but I love that she had a feisty side too. Ichiko was such a hard worker and so loving which was why everyone called her motherly. I adore that she was so honest. She always kept it real with Kohaku even letting him know he scared her at times. She called him out when he needed discipline but never shunned or hated him. Ichiko did cry often, but, with all the horrifying events that happen, her tears are justified.
Kohaku was a close second for favorite. Honestly, his character development and the BURNING DESIRE to see behind his mask kept me hooked.

RELATIONSHIP:
The love story between Ichiko and Kohaku (and the love rival) was placed in a slow cooker until the final arc. I like how things had to develop and how shy their love was. This love made Kohaku want to stop his arrested development and be a doggone man (i.e grow up).

ART:
The art was great unless there was a close-up on someone's eyes, especially Ichiko's. In close-ups, the eyes were so lifeless—They just screamed yandere. On a positive note, I loved Ichiko's outfits! They weren't overly frilly and looked comfy.

OVERALL:
Such a brilliant read from beginning to end. The reveal of Kohaku's face was well worth the wait. The characterizations, Kohaku's back story, and the light humor balanced with darkness made this a favorite of mine. My only semi-qualm was I waited forever for the big kiss, and it wasn't that “big.” On the other hand, I liked how the kiss was gentle and subtle. The exact type that fit those two well. I enjoyed reading this manga over two days. I recommend reading this underrated manga.

I will finish with this:

“I will not be unhappy.”- Kohaku

This may seem like an unnecessarily harsh rating for this series, but I was very disappointed.

Story: 4
This seems like the best place to tackle my issues. The writing style is extremely haphazard. Even if I take translation errors into account, there just aren't enough dialog or thought boxes to make up for the lack of explanations. If a manga is comparable to a storyboard, this one would be sent back for rework. The gaps between frames are difficult to interpret, and I found myself helplessly scrolling through multiple chapters, grasping for concrete actions. The conclusion of the series follows in ... this same vein, wrapping up with repetitive conversations between characters and then vaguely answering the main question.

Art: 6
Certain frames showed noticeably disproportionate features on characters, but overall it's suitable to shoujo. It's also a little light-handed for my taste.

Character: 4
The author overstretched herself on this count. She introduces a house of around six people, each with a seemingly distinct personality, but Kohaku is really the only one who gets any character development. The other housemates only show up in flashbacks briefly (if at all) as they overlap with Kohaku's story.
Furthermore, the premise of the manga is resolved within the first few chapters, which makes the story description misleading. It's less about the unimpressive female lead and more about the very bizarre male lead.

Enjoyment: 5
I read it and I laughed a couple of times, but I was generally bored due to the lack of character development and disjointed storytelling style.

Overall: 4
Again, this rating may land on the harsh side, but I feel the need to counteract the overwhelmingly positive vibe coming from other reviews.

When I first read a summary about this manga it piqued my curiosity and I began to read it.

Story: 8
Ichiko did something terrible and ran away from home only to be found by a masked stranger and taken to his home where she is offered to live if she does the work of a maid.

Each of those living within this household alll have their reasons for doing so, none moreso than Kohaku, the masked stranger.

The story seems fairly normal, if a bit dramatic in regards to Ichiko's reason for fleeing from her home. There is a nice build up and you are lead to ... be curious about why Kohaku wears a mask. I will warn you that you will not his his face till almost the very end of the manga, but the scene where he reveals his face is a powerful one.

Art: 9
The artwork is fine, though I personally did not care much for Ichkio's hair style, but that is simply personal taste. The eyes are not drawn successfully in a few 'close up' frames making them appear almost hollow while a character's facial expression shows one of joy, giving a weird creepiness when these close ups occur. That being said there aren't too many of these and after a while they aren't nearly as distracting as you progress through the manga.

Character: 10
I love all the characters in this manga! While many of the support characters don't have their backgrounds explained, they are still wonderfully developed characters with an important background role to the main characters. Kohaku's personality is incredibly complicated but this is only ever explain through the support characters.

Enjoyment: 9
This is a manga where I would read it again (and there are only a few that make me do this). I was never bored with a single chapter or volume as there aren't too many 'filler' moments.

First of all, Issho ni Neyou yo gets big points for originality. I can honestly say I've never come across a protagonist with a problem like Usami Ichiko's. It's pretty bizarre, but also pretty interesting. And, certainly, the same could be said of Kohaku's entire character.

That said, while reading this, I spent a lot of time sitting there with a giant question mark over my head. There were times when I had a hard time catching on to the tone of the scenes I was reading, understanding what was happening in the plot, and (a big pet peeve of mine) ... knowing who was speaking. Needless to say, it was pretty frustrating. I'm not sure if it's because I got ahold of a bad translation, if I'm accustomed to a less subtle style of storytelling, or if the characters are just so strange that they're supposed to confuse the reader. Maybe all of the above. From what I understand, the mangaka had to go on hiatus while it was still being published, so that might also have something to do with the oddly disjointed story progression.

Despite the confusion, though, I still enjoyed it... for reasons that I still can't entirely pin down. The characters are very endearing and unique, for sure, and there are a lot of very funny and touching moments. I'm a sucker for toddlers and eccentric people, so I'm sure that had a lot to do with it. The art is lovely, if a bit odd at times. Considering how short it is, I'd definitely recommend it to anyone who's looking for something a little different.

Story 8: The story was rather unique. I honestly have never really read a story quite like this but it isn't uncommon for a character to be picked up by a house (though it is more often a boarding house). I felt the plot was somewhat slow moving and that some of the information was forced in and there was a particular event involving Kohaku and the school (no spoiler- you'll either agree or disagree if you read it yourself) that I felt was thrown in to be some type of character growth but I felt like that flopped as well. Otherwise the way the ... supernatural aspect was incorporated (not too strong, not to mild) and the psychological scare the characters all faced made the story very interesting and binge worthy. I really wanted to learn about Kohaku, why he acted the way he did, and how he would grow.
Art 10: Not much to say because this is just my biased opinion of loving the art- specifically the way they draw eyes. Everything was in order and there was none of the dreaded same face syndrome. I think the are is very distinguishable to being from this artist as well, wouldn't confuse it with any other mangaka (that I know of).
Character 8: There was a diverse cast of characters and I loved the way they interacted with each other. The biggest problem would be that mainly Ichiko and Kohaku were the ones that had character building and the other characters only got background if it was somehow associated with Kohaku. HOWEVER, I would argue that this manga's focus was on Kohaku and Ichiko so there wasn't a need to do a deep dive into the other characters as much and that there personalities played a big role in accenting our main characters and moving the plot forward.
Enjoyment 9: An easy binge and I read it over and over. Plot was a bit slow like I said before but I loved watching our characters interact with each other! I recommend just binging through all 35 chapters! Enjoy!
Overall 9!

I really wanted to love this manga. There were a lot of things I liked about it, but there were things that were disappointing. Maybe the other reviews had me believing it would be deeper than it was, I'm not sure, but I was sad after I finished reading it and couldn't say that I loved it... Let's talk about the good/ bad!
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STORY 5/10: As the other reviews said, there isn't really any story like this one, but it isn't completely new either. While I love unique stories, I had to rate this one much lower because I didn't understand exactly what was happening half ... the time.

As someone who is also a comic artist, I saw there were many flaws in the way the artist did the panels, making it hard to follow along. The issue was that there were NOT ENOUGH panels to clearly understand what was happening in each scene, and this was happening all the time! I kept going back to previous pages to closely analyze them in an effort to understand, but I still couldn't always. I could get the gist of the story, but if that is the case, it makes it much less enjoyable.

There were interesting things in the story, but others that seemed randomly thrown in without anything leading up to it or even hinting at it, like Kohaku's issue with one of the teachers at school. The way that Kohaku's power seemed out-of-the-blue was a little off-putting. There was no indication of anything supernatural before getting into his backstory, which I believe was a big mistake. Even just a small incident with Kohaku, showing there was something supernatural about him before uncovering his backstory would have been compelling! However, waiting to show his face until the final chapters was a great decision! It was much more impactful that way. There was also a good reason for him picking up Ichiko in the beginning of the story, like he saw himself in her. So you can see... there were decisions that the mangaka made that I loved, while others, I wondered why they made them?


CHARACTERS 6/10: First, the character designs were great! An adorable, petite bob-haired girl and a tall, long-haired guy who always wears a mask and never shows his face... I LIKED that! I think those two had really great chemistry when it came to romance. I wished it was explored more, though.

*SPOILERS* (you can skip)
I liked the idea of Ichiko running away from home because of her loneliness and unease in her own home. The reason for her leaving, which was accidentally kicking her sister's baby, causing fear/anger in her home, was a unique idea! I liked that! However, I think it was over-dramatized and I thought if they had just taken it a step further, it would have been more interesting. For example, if the baby was actually very injured, or if the baby died because of her, there would be much bigger trauma and reason for her to stay in that house with the other characters. It still would have been an innocent accident, but it'd be a much heavier burden on her and would match her situation more to Kohaku's so that they could connect more as characters.

For Kohaku, the idea of him wearing the masks because of his abilities was a good move! BUT the manga didn't make it clear why exactly he needed it? I thought it kept him from seeing spirits, but then he was still acting like he could see/talk to them... Maybe it was because he resembled his mom and they were trying to hide that? The manga shouldn't make me question the reason of that so much. It's not bad to leave things open-ended, but when the reader is just confused, that's no good either. It would have been nice to see more development in Kohaku's character, from a scared child into a man. That development was not very clear to me.

The love rival... gosh... the love rival. I don't even remember his name, and on top of that, I didn't even realize they were rivals in love! I could tell he was flirty with Ichiko, but he seemed like that with any girl? I could tell Kohaku would sometimes get jealous, but he didn't do much other than get a little jealous. At the very end, when the love rival was like "I lost." I was thinking, "What?? You were fighting to begin with? When did you develop feelings for her?"
*END SPOILERS*

The other characters were okay, but they probably could have been taken out (or at least some of them) and it wouldn't have affected the story.


ART 7/10: The art style was pretty good. I especially loved the way the author drew faces and eyes. The outfits looked cute too! When Kohaku took off his mask, I was enamored by his face and eyes!! The author made him so handsome and I took screenshots so I could try out that art style myself. When a manga does that to me, then the art feels unique!

On the other hand, the way they decided to draw some scenes were just so confusing. As I mentioned, there were not enough panels to show exactly what was going on. On top of that, the positions of the characters were not always ideal to understand the situation or feelings. I found myself staring at one panel for a while trying to figure out what was happening in that panel. It needed more dramatic poses, more close-ups to convey emotions, and a little more life to it because the characters felt a little static as far as movement goes.


ENJOYMENT (5/10): I spent hours on this manga, but I couldn't really enjoy it. I was struggling too much to understand what was going on. Maybe some of it had to do with the translation, but I just think it also has to do with the layout of it. The story could have been far deeper, which is what I was expecting, but it didn't get there. Not only was the pacing frustrating, but the mood was just all over the place. The most enjoyable moments, to me, were the romantic moments between the two MCs. You could feel their love for each other in the way that they always embraced one another for comfort and they were there for each other. That's why I'm so sad I didn't enjoy it like I wanted to.

There were good an bad ideas, but I think it didn't reach it's full potential with any category.