Koibumi to 13-sai no Actress - Vol. 3 Ch. 12 - Product?

[balenol]

This is ridiculous, if most kid had at least half of her sosial skills, I'm sure our govt would be ran by children.

 

[sirmidor]

Brutal empath mogging yet again.

 

[dementati]

This feels like the perfect setup for a drama where what she actually wants is parental affection and is immaturely mistaking that for romantic love. But then his sister's like "it's perfectly fine for them to date even though she's 13 as long as they don't fuck until she's older", which is both kinda bizarre and also indicating that there actually will be a romantic conclusion. How accepting this manga is of their romance makes me feel kinda uncomfortable reading it.

 

[UhhExi]

SHE KNOWS.

SHE HAS HIM ON HER HANDS. ALL FOR HERSELF.

 

[Chernobyl_dudes]

This is a problem I've noticed, yeah. Cause at its heart, I think there's something here, a story about a kid who wants an adult that actually cares about them and that adult struggling with where to and what lines to draw as her manager. But even though he's been pretty normal about all this, just sometimes going through trauma, being confused as to how to proceed, or being surprised by her actions, everything is cast in this skeezy light because the idea that he can just genuinely like this girl and want to help her is out of the question.

Like... here. There is actually a reason to not go in after she asked like that: she's specifically asking it as if he owes her a favor for her replying to his letters. That's something you don't want to encourage, he should go in because she's a kid and she shouldn't be alone when she's sick. While he can be clear about what he's doing and why, it's going to be hard for her to not feel like she made a point and that this was an exchange of favors.

But the depiction shows the danger being horniness rather than a loss of control and turning something he was using as a way to bond with her as a favor she's doing him. What would not be an erotic situation in the slightest is depicted as an aggressive move. It'd be a surprise, and a realization that he's not getting out of this passively, but not in any way erotic. The bits of his thought train re-enforce this, too: the first thing he notices is that she's burning up from the fever. He's concerned, not enticed. Why's it framed like he is?

But again part of me finds this fascinating, because we don't have a full perspective on any of this. Cause to her it IS an aggressive move. This is her throwing everything she's got to keep him with her when she's sick and she doesn't want to be alone. One of the things about this manga that's so interesting to me is how confused Ayano is about what she wants and how earnestly the manga delves into it. She basically just wants an older brother or dad when she describes her ideal relationship with him, but she's looking up dating advice and her friends are telling her she's exchanging love letters. We bounce back and forth between people, and are we seeing Ayano being desperate or Isshiki being flustered? One is interesting. The other is annoying.

Fundamentally

is the core problem. Because I'm genuinely intrigued by the premise, but it feels like people around them are just like "oh, they'll marry in like 10 years that's gonna be great, good on you two" when the actual story that's being told here is an adult trying to figure out how to best help a lonely kid, and that kid trying to understand what it is she's actually looking for.
And sure maybe I'm giving it way too much credit and I'm gonna look back on these posts and sigh. But there's something really compelling here!

You know, you voiced everything i thought about this manga so far, kid who's desperate for attention so much that she'll break any rule just to be seen or heard or basically be accepted, dude who simply can't accept how everyone use her as thing or product and trying his best to be a parental figure. What i can't put my finger to is why his sister goes "Oh yeah go get 'im gurl", maybe this is just a gag and there's nothing more to it, i can understand his team getting all tense because he does something more than management but they kinda allow him this behaviour because "product" doesn't spoil too much as it should.


But this smels Usagi Drop so much... No, i have hope, hope that this author is not go that way, they shouldn't.

 

[Weoooo]

What i can't put my finger to is why his sister goes "Oh yeah go get 'im gurl", maybe this is just a gag and there's nothing more to it, i can understand his team getting all tense because he does something more than management but they kinda allow him this behaviour because "product" doesn't spoil too much as it should.

I do, now, actually. Should I do a spoiler? I should. This is still a comment on an earlier chapter.

We saw a hint of it during her introduction chapter, but she was the one who found him and rescued him from his depressive spiral after he just sort of let his life get crushed into dirt in the fallout from Akari. Finding someone who seems like they're a day from killing themselves changes your perspective a lot. Because she is, at first, very suspicious and critical of Fumi's actions and why Ayano is there. But when she sees the way Ayano looks at him when he trips and almost falls on her, her whole demeanor changes.

Cause she does the math, and sees that like in 5 to 10 years, they can get together and it'd be good. Doing that math involves a situation where her brother is around and doing okay in 5 to 10 years, and is one where a famous actress cares deeply about him. This is, well... a comforting scenario. Because after seeing him the way she saw him, she may even have trouble imagining a scenario where he's still around 5 to 10 years later.

It's still not a good or smart plan, because Ayano is a kid and her love for him shouldn't be thought of like that, nor is there any guarantee that she'll still feel the way she does now after, like, 6 months, let alone all the time she's imagining. But it recontextualizes her cheering for Ayano from "nice one, bro" to "oh thank god;" from cheering for something obscene to seeing Ayano as hope for the future that she didn't necessarily have before.