overview: this is a shoujo high-school romance about sengoku mei, captain of the kendo team and tomboyish girl who is only focused on strength and training. fuji shirou, a girly boy with girly mannerisms and a cross-dressing hobby, confesses to her. she turns him down initially but they continue to be friends. it’s a classic will-they-won’t-they where you know eventually they will, but in shoujo style it’s drawn out forever and ever and ever. there are lots of rivals in the mix, most notably the third point of the love triangle, nanao manabu, captain of the boys’ kendo team who also declares himself in love with sengoku and demands that they fight a match, which, if she loses, she has to go out with him. there are lots of other characters getting in the way intentionally or otherwise, it’s a very classic long-form shoujo slow burn. there are 10 volumes of this and i’ve read 6 and that is the point at which i am giving up.
available in english? yep! this is an older series, is complete, and should be easy to find online in english.
nsfw? nope! this is a shoujo series.
things i liked: i decided to check this out after the last series i reviewed, suenaga yoroshiku onegaishimasu, since it’s by the same mangaka, ike junko. i really love her art a lot, and that is true of this series as well! i also thought the gender role reversal of this manga was really fun and handled in a way that didn’t feel gross to me. fuji is cute and a lot of fun, and sengoku is a fun protagonist for the most part. in general, i think ‘fun’ is the right way to describe the vibe of this compared to other shoujo series.
things i didn’t like: i’m not reading any more of this after 6 volumes just because i’m sort of tired of it. the pace of the progression of their relationship is glacially slow, with some new manufactured challenge or obstacle every few pages. i know that’s par for the course with a long shoujo series, but it’s personally not my cup of tea (which is probably why i read a lot more josei series tbqh). i’m just kind of tired of waiting for anything to happen between them. i have very little patience for main characters who need several volumes to ‘figure out what their feelings are’ or whatever, which, again, i know is pretty much how it goes with shoujo, but again, is not really my particular cup of tea.
i would check this out if: you like shoujo high-school romance! this is a fun take on the classic format with small twists on the normal character archetypes that make it feel fresh. its very cute.
i would avoid this if: you lack patience, are looking for something unique, don’t like cliched tropes or incredibly drawn out plots, are tired of the same old high school stories
sample pages:
BONUS SECTION:
my all-time favorite voice actor is sakurai takahiro, who apparently voiced fuji-kun in a promotional video (and later a drama CD of this series that came out). i... i might have to track down at least a clip of it, because
does he have a girly voice???? i would never have thought to describe it that way. is he doing a really girly voice? is his voice normally girly? he does a lot of more refined or formal characters i guess????? wild
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