Jan 31, 2022
**MINOR STORY SPOILERS**
As a transgender individual, I have a certain affinity for the protagonist character, Hibari, who is particularly relatable to me. I genuinely feel bad for her whenever everyone deadnames her or makes fun of her or tells her to stop trying to be a woman and to "be a guy" whatever that means. I feel like Hibari is probably one of the more realistic depictions of transgender individuals in media from her time, though her character is obviously not without flaws.
I, for the life of me, cannot understand what she sees in Kosaku. Kosaku is the male protagonist of
...
the series and the love interest to Hibari. He is a cisgender male who finds himself attracted to Hibari, but he sees Hibari as a guy, and as a result, finds himself sexually frustrated. He sees Hibari as a pervert and thinks that there is something wrong with her or that she should be changed.
He does gradually get better and improve as the story goes on sure, but I don't understand why Hibari is attracted to him in the first place. As soon as he finds out that she was assigned male at birth he tries to treat her like a male pervert and puts her identity down. There's also nothing particularly special or impressive that I could see drawing her to hm. Her attraction to Kosaku just feels very forced to me.
Asides from her attraction to Kosaku, Hibari is generally a playful but realistic (for a gag manga) character who I find to be really likable.
The manga also just generally hasn't aged well from a social perspective, with depictions of black people as large intimidating brutes and the manga failing to make it clear whether or not Hibari is valid in her identity, although they do show her some sympathy.
Ultimately the manga is a product of its time, but for the time it was made, it is a very progressive manga, that affirms the validity of same-sex relationships and depicts a transgender character in the most accurate way that I have seen up to the date of publishing. (which is rather odd for a gag manga).
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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