Ao no Flag

[justforthelulz]

From these comment (and the spoilers), it really sounds like the author suddenly developed schizophrenia.

 

[Blu7]

@Shoker: I personally do not think that you should read that far into it. I mean, éBlue Flag" is by the far the best selling manga of KAITO who so far has known commercial failures after commercial failures (I mean, its lash series in Jump had been stopped even before the date of volume 2 had been anounced). And As they(he/she) stated themselves in one volume comment, they felt really free to for the first time writing this series.
At least, I think that they just didn't know how to tell that part of the story. Well, let's see if there will be additional comments in the volume release. (Sorry for my bad english but I am a French native speaker)

 

[bastek66]

Fucking shit ending, last two ruined whole manga for me.

 

[MarinReiter]

Spoiler

First off, just wanna say that it felt really cringy when Shingou was debating with Taichi, the girls and Kensuke and he pulled a Tu Quoque on the girls - and later it was, of course, justified as the author wrote him making that claim while knowing that Kensuke had a reason to hate gay men, which also felt really off. Homophobic people don't tend to have much of a reason to hate gay people. WHile I agree we should be empathetic with everyone, I dont think we should justify every feeling (unless we go full deterministic), and the action of hitting someone on the basis that they're gay and it disgusts you is not morally equivalent as the action of telling said person that they're being retarded for hating gay people.
Also, to the question that Kensuke made, "Are you not on your guard when youre with your guy friends?", I'd reply "of fucking course not." I'd confidently drop myself naked and amnesiac on the same room with my guy friends for an entire night if necessary. If you can't trust your guy friends not to treat you innapropiately then they're not your friends, are they? They're more people hoping that they can get laid by hanging around with you.

About the ending, it's...eh. I'll be honest, I came here wanting to seeTaichi and Touma togetherbecause that's what interested me about this story, the idea of a non-yaoi manga containing gay men being accurately represented and one being chosen over a main girl was just too interesting in a manga, but I thought it'd be more gradual. I was pretty mad when I realised that only the last 2 chapters would deal with that. And that we wouldn't be getting a previously-thought-as-het protagonist wondering and aaaaangsting about his sexual identity. I guess in the end talking about a guy being interested in the male body still grosses out the majority of the japanese audience base, huh.

Anywho, it's still a great manga. It's wonderfully written, even if by the end the characters did get too "smart" (I think it's mostly that many characters hadn't talked that much before, but that level of discussion is normal for highschoolers. The conversations didn't get unrealistic.) I'm glad the author felt the need to include these storylines and themes. I'd absolutely recommend this manga.

 

[smolbaka]

I think the ending is alright for what it is.

It does seem like tachi did a 180. He didn't really feel at all like he was interested in

Spoiler

touma

those feelings developed very quick over those few years. There was no indication he was even into

Spoiler

guys

I feel like the author could've set it up better prior to it's conclusion.

 

[chickennuggets]

masumi...

Spoiler

why couldn’t they write her off with having a wife...

 

[Ceiye]

I have so many mixed feelings. I think they can be best summed up as being amazed by the ending, but feeling that everything else was lacking. Like wow, that's so much symbolism, hints, and the "twist" in the last five pages. Emotionally, I am extremely fulfilled, and it's going to be hard to find an ending better than that

The problem is the rest of the story. It was like KAITO knew what ending they wanted, put a lot of effort into making it, but was left with no time to build the support around it. I blame this probably having been axed for having too many hot takes, but still. There were so many characters they could go into, so many events that could have happened in between, so much of their relationships to explore, so many ways to make the ending feel surprising but obvious.

TLDR, amazing ending, lacking buildup

 

[vitalez06]

I liked the ending, but like what the other people said here; it lacked buildup. Things just happened here and there on your face, and you have no clear idea why. They could've made a wonderful end with what they're planning, but it's still lacking. Wasted potential.

 

[jameaney]

Uhh that makes no sense didn't they just defeat the whole purpose of the story? Like living with people that don't want the same thing is you? And in the end the straight guy became gay or bi and the gay girl became bi. It seems like everyone folded on what they wanted. If this is what the ending was supposed to then the author should have been pointing towards this ending. I don't even care that he broke up with Futaba, that's realistic, highschool sweethearts rarely last. Its that this whole story has been about coming to terms with who you are and what you want irregardless of what other people think or want for you and in the last chapter everyone is like, nah nevermind I changed my mind.

 

[havelmom]

the last three chapters of this manga drop hard on quality

- pacing is destroyed
- character building is destroyed
- there is a nonsensical plot at the end
- lack of logic
- lack of real world knowledge by the author concerning the subjects he is portraying

this dropped from a 7/10 to a 2/10 for final score

 

[Christopher]

I had started reading this from the beginning, but stopped at some point early on with the expectation that I'd come back to it. But now that I've read the comments, I don't think I will.

 

[muteprophet8726]

Spoiler

Where's the shounen ai/yaoi tag?

 

[Darklight99]

Saw the rating drop from 8.8 to 7.9 after a single chapter, haha.

 

[Hurgh]

I really enjoyed this up until the end. The sudden change to two major characters was a major loss of points. All I'll say. It was REALLY good until then. I almost regret reading the whole thing. Almost.


Watch that rating continue to plunge, boys.

 

[Raycu]

Art is nice to look at. Dialogue is flowery, pretentious, and the story is your standard melodrama. I didn't hate it, and I definitely enjoyed some parts, but the author really seemed like he was trying to impart some deep wisdom upon me that he didn't actually have or know how to say naturally.

 

[OriginalSYN]

Absolutely nonsensical ending, the only explanation i can find is that the author had this ending in mind but they cut him short and just said fuck it and did a time-skip.

 

[amanimal]

The ending got me confused. I really liked this manga, but the end kinda just randomly slapped me. There was no foreshadowing, there wasn't even an idea of a hint. It was so good with the message and realistic until the last chapter. They really threw a curve ball with that one.

Spoiler

does this mean he ended up with Touma? How did that happen anyways? But it was pretty obvious that Itachi was bi but not Ichinose.

I felt like the conclusion was rushed and really kind of ruined the message that the story was supposed to send sadly. But i still liked it i guess.

 

[Getsu]

What an absolutely trash ending. Think of the worst manga ending you can think of - this is worse. Stop at the second to last page of chapter 53 and don't read 54. That would be a better ending than 54. It's worse than a cliff hanger axed ending. Absolutely nonsensical.

Spoiler

Straight out of the Legend of Korra ending book.

Went from a top 5 series down to bottom 5 for me. 9/10 to 3/10. Appalling.

 

[Ceiye]

Okay, I was on the side of

Spoiler

"there were no hints of him being bisexual, this was kind of surprising"

but after rereading this, man I do not know how I missed that. Now that I know I didn't need to dismiss the glaring signs, it was so, so obvious. Just look for any time he is being cool in front of him

 

[Ayayayayayayaya]

@Getsu nothing can top it off as Pika Ichi that manga ending is still worse than this one lol smh