Imasara desu ga, Osananajimi wo Suki ni Natte Shimaimashita - Ch. 41 - Everything, Falling Apart

[Rafalga]

I guess that’s what happens when you try to blend characters who inherently belong to different narrative tones, especially when using an abrupt, unhinted twist to shift the story’s genre. Hikari fits a lighthearted story, while Yami belongs in a drama-heavy one. Yuu is supposed to be the bridge between the two, but he comes across as leaning more toward Yami’s dramatic tone, leaving Hikari feeling out of place.

Yeah that's pretty much the overall issue. I don't really care about the twist since without it, i would ignore it like all the other no stakes get married already comment spam wholesome slop self insert romcoms since i started reading it AFTER the twist wondering what all the fuss was about. If the slop addicts are mad, its most certainly due to a great (often for the better) change. And i know Maruto's previous works.

BUT if the story wants to workout, it needs to lean heavily on each character more. The drama doesn't work if you don't give a fuck about these soulless characters who belongs to different series individually. I think the biggest downside of this is the page count and release schedule which fucks over the pacing immensely. At this point who gives a fuck who ends up with who? No one belongs together.

 

[ErogeMC]

My big takeaway is how Yuu continues to put romance on a pedestal, and gets disappointed when the reality differs. When he asks Yami, post-coitus, if this is just a whim, and she brushes his question off; He should have figured that out beforehand. He could have paid attention and noticed he was getting brushed off, instead of assuming it was 'real love, baby.' He took it hard when Yami finally disappeared, but he had all the clues to see it was coming from the beginning.

Similar to how he made up conditions for his "love" for Hikari, like getting into her school = she'll fall in love with me, for real!

It's the mixture of idealization and projection that scuffs so many teenage romances. Yeah, Yuu is young and inexperienced and an idiot. But so was I at that age. I made many of the same mistakes. I think that even if I read this when I was a riotous hormonal teenage catastrophe, I wouldn't have learned anything. I'd still step in the doo doo.


@story645 I wonder if "Reciprocated" isn't a better word than rewarded, but then I remember that Yuu is meant to be screwing this up. "Rewarded" is appropriate for his dumb ass.

Yami loves him though.

 

[story645]

but now imagine Yami and Yuu's dysfunctional asses both trying to work through there own shit

To be fair here, Yami seems to have started working through some of her nonsense w/ Hikari's help. And Yuu taking the risk to be w/ Yami,( rather than the safe bet of Hikari), would be baby steps towards growth. But I agree that like these two are likely not doing a speed run to the maturity they'd need to make a relationship work.

But it would also make sense for him to worry about her, because he doesn't even know if she's all right or not, especially with his conclusion that she dropped out of the school.

I think this makes him a not great boyfriend/ex, but I think it's mostly b/c this is all status quo. Aya hasn't been in school since they met & the family drama has been in the background the whole time; basically if he was the type to consider that it'd be a problem now than he probably would have flagged it w/ Aya while they were dating.

leaving Hikari feeling out of place.

I've been thinking of Hikari as Naruto to Aya's Sasuke and Yuu's Sakura (who is my fave in Naruto so not a knock on her). Like yeah Hikari's shiny bright joy, but she's also got major "I can fix them" energy. To continue the "we're firmly in a shounen here" theme,
Aya's very much playing the friend/rival/other half role, and Yuu flows between being and needing support.

although before I think she appreciated his tact

I don't think she would have been so resentful over it that she chewed him out if she had appreciated it at the time. But I also understanding how Yuu thought everything was fine - they both defaulted to the communication style they prefer.

"But now, I don't bring her up anymore. Not her, not their time together, not even the middle school they went to or the rough area she lives in." Implying he avoided answering, so she eventually stopped poking him.

I took that as Aya not wanting to hear about it anymore b/c it makes her feel bad, especially b/c in the year later chapter the reason she thinks that Yuu is in love w/ Hikari is b/c Yuu talked about Hikari all the time.

the moment he fell back in love with Hikari

As he says during the confession, It seems like he never really fell out of love - even in this chapter it seemed like he was acknowledging that his whole "never fall in love again" was nonsense he was telling himself.

 

[noleafclover75]

I still can't believe it took Maruto 5 years to come up with this garbage.

 

[Litreara]

I've been thinking of Hikari as Naruto to Aya's Sasuke and Yuu's Sakura (who is my fave in Naruto so not a knock on her). Like yeah Hikari's shiny bright joy, but she's also got major "I can fix them" energy. To continue the "we're firmly in a shounen here" theme,
Aya's very much playing the friend/rival/other half role, and Yuu flows between being and needing support.

Dunno… I feel like the character dynamics worked better in Naruto because, while relationships were important, there was so much more happening in the story. Here, it’s just the characters and their relationships, and Hikari ends up feeling out of place. Since the shift in tone, it’s like she’s too good and too righteous to belong in the same story as Yami and Yuu.

 

[outinthegardener]

So this is what it looks like if you were to look in to the inner workings of a self-insert harem protagonist. Even their lives equally resolves around the love interests and nothing else. Maruto is starting to fail on the over all theme. Why anyone would care about these people? Yuu is an empty shounen romcom MC, Yami is a self destructive dumbfuck (though she has being abused as an excuse) and Hikari is a shoujo romcom FMC (equally worthless).

I think genre criticism is probably one of the main themes of the story, based on what we've been given. It feels like a critique of shallow comic book romance, by showing these clichéd genre cutout characters fail. I am the most sympathetic to Hikari and her shoujo optimism, but I'm more inclined to root against Yuu and Yami.

Why aren't we shown any Yuu POV where he thinks about how to improve himself? Maybe we're not supposed to, and Yuu is a cautionary tale. "Don't be like this guy or you will become a neckbeard." The challenge of this kind of storytelling is, as you say, we stop caring about these people. It feels like an emotional snuff horror movie, all suffering and no reward. That's a difficult story to enjoy, but I have enjoyed discussing it.

I'm putting it in the category of other romance trainwrecks, along Rent a Girlfriend, Domestic Girlfriend, or School Days.

 

[story645]

Since the shift in tone, it’s like she’s too good and too righteous to belong in the same story as Yami and Yuu.

I agree w/ @outinthegardener that Maruto is probably aiming for a critique of genre, but I wonder if it's shounen or shoujo or shounen through the lens of shoujo. Girl stuck in messy love triangle of the sort in this manga used to be super common in shoujo. Which it's not uncommon for a shoujo MMC to basically be a blank slate projection of what the FMC wants, and where this one differs from a lot of shoujo is that Aya is humanized in a way the messy other girl usually isn't. The critique/deconstruction here is then that getting to know more about the guy and his past decreases his attractivness as a shoujo male lead and getting to know the mysterious ex turns her into someone that the FMC would usually heal (and some more modern shoujos like Kimi no Todoke explicitly go this route).

I agree that it doesn't quite work cause of pacing/page - this manga is relatively short so we're told a lot more about the strength of Hikari's friendships with Yuu and Aya then shown them (unlike Naruto or Kimi no Todoke where we get lots of pages of development).

 

[awtystic]

It depends. In my opinion based on my experience with this type of story, if when the main story resumes it has a timeskip where characters avoided each other for a while I think Yami chances are looking rather grim, but if they go straight into the drama things could go either way.

The reason I think this is because it changes who's the active character who's gonna be trying to change things, if we go into a timeskip the other two will be the ones will be likely chasing after Hikari and she's by far the one with the smaller sins, and taking her trust back would go through admitting mistakes and making amends. This makes it hard to write the other couple happening. But if Hikari is the one chasing the other two and seeking conciliation things get way more complex because she's throwing herself in the mud with them.

I like your synopsis the time skip part is plausible and it'd be interesting for them to start anew but i believe that both yuu and Yami should confront together and be honest to her maybe it won't fix things but it's a starting
From where we left off tho it was quite messy with Yami and she said some hurtful things to hikari won't be surprised if hikari slaps her maybe there'll be the drama first and then time skip
I was also thinking maybe yuu might play a role in their reconciliation finally starting to act as an mc instead of a background character all this while he feels like a side character he's literally a main character (ML) who plays as a side character since hikari still somewhat cares about him and likes him and it won't be shocking if he regains back her trust by doing something significant of such
I can see 3 types of ending for this manga/novel
Hikari realising yuu loves Yami more and gives her blessings to both of them
Yami realising yuu loves hikari more and giving her blessings to them
Lastly they all seperate ways and hikari moving on and yuu realised maybe it was a little late but he fell in love with his childhood friend
The title of the manga gives hints whether yuu or hikari getting with someone else and then witnessing and realising they were a little late to be their significant so and so
That's my synopsis and good night

 

[awtystic]

I agree w/ @outinthegardener that Maruto is probably aiming for a critique of genre, but I wonder if it's shounen or shoujo or shounen through the lens of shoujo. Girl stuck in messy love triangle of the sort in this manga used to be super common in shoujo. Which it's not uncommon for a shoujo MC to basically be a blank slate projection of what the FMC wants, and where this one differs from a lot of shoujo is that Aya is humanized in a way the messy other girl usually isn't. The critique/deconstruction here is then that getting to know more about the guy and his past decreases his attractivness as a shoujo male lead and getting to know the mysterious ex turns her into someone that the FMC would usually heal (and some more modern shoujos like Kimi no Todoke explicitly go this route).

I agree that it doesn't quite work cause of pacing/page - this manga is relatively short so we're told a lot more about the strength of Hikari's friendships with Yuu and Aya then shown them (unlike Naruto or Kimi no Todoke where we get lots of pages of development).

This manga really feels like a mix of shoujo shonen and josei I think like you said marutos trying to critique the average romcom of self inserts of shounen and fluff of shoujo with a mix of josei that is ayas story
Let's not forget also in this story that these chapters are from marutos sensei personal experience and self insert and yuu's actually maruto that's why the story writing is so good and spicy i think he's trying to show the reality of these slop romcoms and how irl it's actually quite complex difficult and hard situations

 

[fflogschampion]

and fluff of shoujo with a mix of josei that is ayas story

You guys need to read more of these. We're talking about the type of publication that has a story where:

The main girl meets the main interest and is almost raped by him in their first interaction. Her home situation is bad by the way (not Aya level of bad but still.) She sleeps with her childhood friend and another guy before the main guy. The main guy only half care for most of the story because he's also sleeping around with some bad bitches. They end up together because ????. The fantasy here is being desirable enough to score multiple men including the hot bad guy. This was being published in the same magazine as stories with similar style to Hibi Chouchou or Kimi ni Todoke.

Saranami is obviously being written by a man, for a male audience, in a very specific way to get a specific reaction out of the audience. As for being a critic of shounen romance... yeah, right, when this has been closer to cheating slop such as Aitsu no Kanojo or DomeKano than any of those shounen romance but from the girl perspective.

 

[Catbowl]

These chapters have been pretty much useless in terms of fleshing out Yuu's character. It's just snippets from some key moments of the story and nothing else. Nothing new. They are useless. Yuu is still a prop. Not an individual. You literally give zero fucks about him. It's like reading about a coat hanger in your wardrobe. No one gives a fuck because there is no reason to. I was expecting a proper characterization not this... whatever this is.

So this is what it looks like if you were to look in to the inner workings of a self-insert harem protagonist. Even their lives equally resolves around the love interests and nothing else. Maruto is starting to fail on the over all theme. Why anyone would care about these people? Yuu is an empty shounen romcom MC, Yami is a self destructive dumbfuck (though she has being abused as an excuse) and Hikari is a shoujo romcom FMC (equally worthless).

I still don't get what sort of elaborate expectations people had for the guy's thought processes. We knew he was a shy beta, and these POV narrations line up with his (in)actions and past statements, while revealing formative events in his life. I find the chapters basically fine and, well, sane, with chapter 2 probably being the most interesting due to how passive yet calculating he could be, while hating that about himself. Generally, the added detail and confirmation on some points have been welcome.

 

[story645]

when this has been closer to cheating slop such as Aitsu no Kanojo or DomeKano than any of those shounen romance but from the girl perspective.

I think it being from the girl's perspective is the attempt at subversion. The reader self- inserts into Hikari and then gets their assumptions challenged from that framework. Going by the various discussions, I think it kinda works when the reader isn't that familiar with other genres/older works.

ETA: I think Gal niPA-chan wa Semararetai is probably a better comparison for pure tone shift where the MMC ends up peak trash.

I basically agree w/ you that there's nothing here that's particularly revolutionary for shoujo/josei - that's largely why I don't think the injection of drama makes it more interesting. I think keeping it light and fluffy while still interesting would have required more work, particularly since comedy relies on show not tell to a far greater degree than drama.

She sleeps with her childhood friend and another guy before the main guy.

Which one? I'm very annoyed by how infrequently girls get to sleep w/ someone other than the ml even in modern shoujo (when it's not why choose smut.)

 

[fflogschampion]

Which one? I'm very annoyed by how infrequently girls get to sleep w/ someone other than the ml even in modern shoujo (when it's not why choose smut.)

I don't remember the name, I read it over 15 years ago on Mangafox. It started with the girl being in the swimming club, deciding to check the school indoors pool after club hours and catching the love interest smoking in there, because of course, why wouldn't the high school bad guy who is fucking older women be a smoker too.

 

[awtystic]

You guys need to read more of these. We're talking about the type of publication that has a story where:

The main girl meets the main interest and is almost raped by him in their first interaction. Her home situation is bad by the way (not Aya level of bad but still.) She sleeps with her childhood friend and another guy before the main guy. The main guy only half care for most of the story because he's also sleeping around with some bad bitches. They end up together because ????. The fantasy here is being desirable enough to score multiple men including the hot bad guy. This was being published in the same magazine as stories with similar style to Hibi Chouchou or Kimi ni Todoke.

Saranami is obviously being written by a man, for a male audience, in a very specific way to get a specific reaction out of the audience. As for being a critic of shounen romance... yeah, right, when this has been closer to cheating slop such as Aitsu no Kanojo or DomeKano than any of those shounen romance but from the girl perspective.

What's the mangas name? Sounds like a more josei version of say i love you
True² but cheating drama slop have always been selling heck look at daredemo sold a million copies sometimes I think people can't stop reading these kind of stories is because they're lowkey masochistic i mean ntr reverse ntr sucks irl causing resentment and hate towards each other and the opposite sex but in the end it brings a reaction and any publicity is good publicity

 

[middle-the-nerd]

For now I don't see Yami winning but we'll never know until the manga is back from hiatus

Yeah I really don't see her winning either lol and honestly might crash tf out a bit if she does

To be fair here, Yami seems to have started working through some of her nonsense w/ Hikari's help. And Yuu taking the risk to be w/ Yami,( rather than the safe bet of Hikari), would be baby steps towards growth. But I agree that like these two are likely not doing a speed run to the maturity they'd need to make a relationship work.

Yeah "baby steps" just isn't anywhere NEAR enough- they still have a very long ways to go

As he says during the confession, It seems like he never really fell out of love - even in this chapter it seemed like he was acknowledging that his whole "never fall in love again" was nonsense he was telling himself.

Well you know what I mean lol the moment he basically realizes/confesses to himself that he's still in love with her basically the moment he realises "Ah fuck it didn't work I still love her"

 

[GennArc]

I think keeping it light and fluffy while still interesting would have required more work

Yeah, apparently it's so much work that there are barely any examples in the last 2 decades.

 

[klanco485]

Any one know when the next chapter drop is? I'm giving it 20ish chps to see how it plays out after the twist but with how short the chps are and its release schedule... i might just drop it altogether

 

[outinthegardener]

FWIW I think the genre being criticised is "High School Romance," not shoujo/josei/shounen/seinen. I hold that Shoujo/Seinen/etc are not genres, but marketing directions. Within those categories, you get actual genres like romance, romantic comedy, ntr, battle-shounen, etc. While the marketing direction of the publisher is a superstructure which influences how those genres are presented, and this influence does create shoujo tropes/josei tropes, they aren't genres themselves.

So what genre tropes is the author calling out? Anything that is an unrealistic relationship standard:

Diffident, wet noodle self-insert boys who somehow get a harem. Doe-eyed female leads who romanticize boys who are toxic or abusive. Trauma and negative coping methods becoming attractive qualities. Miscommunication because they're too embarrassed or too stoic to use their words. Idealizing romance as a fix for poor interpersonal skills.

 

[story645]

It started with the girl being in the swimming club, deciding to check the school indoors pool after club hours a

Hmm, if it's the one I think it is than that's an author known for their dramatic smut & that's a whole different kettle then the "pure shoujo heroine".

Yeah, apparently it's so much work that there are barely any examples in the last 2 decades.

That stay interesting? And don't devolve into either 100 chapters of will they won't they miscommunication loop, add yet another love interest to the harem, or infinite "will they/won't they" two steps back shuffle? Hell, a good number of them throw in some normal LI vs broken LI triangle drama - just not in the tone shift way Maruto did.

Though to be fair, the most interesting thing about this manga is what Maruto is trying to say about "childhood romances" & I think that wouldn't work as a comedy.

Anything that is an unrealistic relationship standard:

Throw in the self-imposed artificial barrier to asking someone out. Like the "win the sports festival" is a standard trope & also ridic. It's probably written in the most frustrating way here on purpose to say that these sorts of things don't magically fix the underlying issue (insecurity).

 

[GennArc]

That stay interesting? And don't devolve into either 100 chapters of will they won't they miscommunication loop, add yet another love interest to the harem, or infinite "will they/won't they" two steps back shuffle? Hell, a good number of them throw in some normal LI vs broken LI triangle drama - just not in the tone shift way Maruto did.

Yeah. It's a big challenge to find something light and fluffy that doesn't grow stale, formulaic or doesn't go for artificial "challenge" with the predetermined outcome, and keeps being consistently interesting.