Ao no Flag - Vol. 5 Ch. 31

[MangaDex]

 

[MrGoose]

Did Mami just go from worst girl to best girl in a single chapter? All of a sudden, even though I still don't really trust her, I gotta say I understand her quite a bit better.

 

[jak]

Taichi and Futaba clearly have some insecurities while dating, but I will say this. I'm gonna be super fucking disappointed if they aren't together in the end even if they break up at some point and then get back together.

 

[Tcof]

"because you're woman"

*insert he right, you know image here*

 

[phoenixir]

Here's hoping Mami is Asexual.

 

[Ceiye]

I feel you, Mami, but to be fair, anyone who just pops in all outta nowhere and is like "hey, I know we weren't that close before, and I was sorta really angry and mean, but let's forget about that and be friends now!" is kinda suspicious, regardless of gender. You gotta be more natural about these things. That being said, I am absolutely rooting for her now. Make some friends Mami!

 

[Nobi]

I'm kinda glad she didn't happen to be the generic love rival, but yet another insecure teenager.

 

[Geany]

@Ceiye
I don't think the boy finds her suspicious, his decision to confront Mami seemed more of a "the girls pressured me to do it, and I'm concerned my girlfriend is misunderstanding".

I was quite sure Mami wasn't going to became an antagonist, due to the fact that these kind of manga usually don't have an antagonist. There are people, each one with their motivations, and, well, that's just how life is.

 

[Ceiye]

@Geany I wasn't really talking about Taichi. Taichi is a good bean. It was more like everyone else who would find it suspicious, both in-story and out. In-universe, it's incredibly suspicious that someone who had blamed the injuries of their crush would suddenly try to be friends with them without really explaining why, even more so if people already had the impression that they were the type of person who would cook up a life ruining scheme. The specifics and how suspicious people become are where gender plays a role, based on preconceptions and labels. Again, Taichi is a good bean and befriended Mami, not because he didn't care what she could do, but because she has shown to him that she is "not that kind of person"

Out of story, the framing and timing was meant to arouse suspicions that this was going to be the case. Most of the comments about Mami prior to this chapter were people stating their distrust. We readers are generally familiar with the usual formula– the couple finally gets together and to spice things up, a(nother) love rival coming to steal one of them is thrown into the mix. Enough so that we wouldn't really expect anything to be different, and it was thankfully subverted this chapter

 

[Neuralhub]

Ah, what a fine mess.
I like this.

 

[femslashfatale]

@Ceiye It may be suspicious at first glance, but I think the reason Mami suddenly became friends with Taichi is BECAUSE he'd gotten together with Futaba. With her frustration at that other guy having romantic interest in her, it seems more like Taichi's new relationship gave Mami reassurance that she could actually be 100% platonic friends with him, without having to worry that he'd start to see her As A Woman TM. Following this line of reasoning, it kind of begs to wonder if her liking Touma is actually because he's gay, and thus doesn't regard her as a romantic interest.

The conflicts in this manga make me anxious every time we're flowing through them, but it's managed to stick the landing really well each time. The writing deserves more trust, imo.

 

[MajorGilbert]

Really Mami becomes a very scary girl when she gets angry. Also that last scene's going to cause some problems.

 

[Dysisa]

I didn't really expect Mami to be an antagonist of some kind, but I gotta say I'm still pretty positively surprised by where this is going. This manga as a whole has been positively surprising me a lot, really good stuff.

Looking back at it, I should have known she'd be a contender for best character when I saw her getting into Monster Hunter. ?

 

[OniBarubary]

Man, this is a really good...not twist, I guess development is the best word. Even if Mami seemed to have some sort of ulterior motive to begin with (as the spiky haired dude seems to imply when he confronted her before) her reactions in this chapter changed all of our perception of her because of how genuine her anger and reactions were. What makes it hit even harder is if you have one or two female friends yourself then this is a VERY real issue that you're probably familiar with in one form or another. We can still be very critical of how Mami acted before but with this new context given to her interactions we can also see why she acted the way she did in certain ways.

This author does such an incredibly good job at setting up tropes people expect and then resolving them in realistic or clever ways. Like take a look at Ken's line this chapter about how he can't stand by while the girl he's in love with cries, which is 100% the type of line that the MC of a romance manga would fucking say in some moment that makes the heroine's heart skip a beat. But it's framed with Mami's immediate reaction and everything around it to make him look like such a piece of shit for saying it. It's a really really good reversal of normal expectations.

This is a very interesting route to take and honestly this might have been the best chapter of this manga in a while, which is saying something considering how close the confession chapter has been.

 

[toru_okada]

Damn this manga hurts. I feel awful for misunderstanding Mami now.

I get Ken, I really do, but man, beating up someone isn’t going to do crap at all. Honestly, I’m peeved witn that kind of attitude. Mami ain’t that helpless.

I see a little bit of Ken in myself, there were times where I put some of my friends in a pedestal or I treated them differently just because they were... girls (doesn’t hurt that they’re really pretty). Thankfully it never became much of an issue haha, they’re great people to hang out with and I kind of shed that attitude as time passed by

What was that paper at the beginning of the chapter? Was that a list of Kuze’s college choices?

This manga really hits you hard...

 

[TamarindoAmargo]

Boy, listen, I was actually fearing that Mami would become the cliché antagonist, I'm just so fucking happy that Touma, Ichinose and Kuze were right about her "not being that kind of person", and now she put this baldy dude (sorry I forgot his name) in his place (I'm hoping he does get it and starts treating her as a human being tbh).

And, like, I don't really think (more like I hope) this will not turn into some "misunderstanding because of lack of comunication" drama.

Rooting for you Mami, go make friends, you go my girl.

 

[Sarsak]

@femslashfatale I think you're probably right about Mami's sudden friendliness to Taichi being that he's now dating someone.

On pg 19, she seemed really shocked that Ken dumped his girlfriend in order to pursue her and lashed out at him, with most of her grievances being about how she doesn't want to be treated as a woman (love interest). I'm guessing the reason she (seems) to have closer guy friends than girl friends is related to how the girls in her school generally treat/view her, as someone who would totally steal someone's boyfriend for her pride and claim afterwards that said boyfriend came on to her. This is also probably another reason why she's pissed at Ken's breakup, for aggravating those rumors.

Either way, it looks like Mami's either ace or doesn't want to be in a relationship right now.
I hope by the end of this manga she has tons of friends

 

[tanteiii-kun]

someone know when the next chapter will come out ?

 

[Vegetablesucks]

Editto

 

[azerez]

lmao classic girls behaviour, when a boy single nobody cared about him but when he date someone suddenly other girls starting to get interested in boy because whats so good about him the girl want to date the boy