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Pumpkin spice coffee? The tan tomboy has some Stacy in her, it seems.
Kusunoki-san wa Koukou Debut ni Shippai Shite Iru - Ch. 43 - Keisuke-kun... seeing me that way... I’m just overthinking it... Right?
- Thread starter MangaDex
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TIL that Hebikawa means "Snake River", and that Hebikawa's resemblance to a snake was the author's intention.
For the longest time I thought it was just us gaijins associating her with snakes
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they kinda screwed up making Kusunoki too perfect, in terms of athletics and academics - and even in this chapter, the moment she opens her mouth she magically immediately makes friends with any person she's around for any period of time.
Makes her very "flat", compared to Hebikawa who has all that depth of character borne of her vices and "darker sides".
I was reading back through from the start looking for some other bit, and I kinda wonder if Keisuke only fell for Kusunoki because she was so oblivious and inept at the start that she "broke the rules" of how social settings go, and was super forward and blunt with him right at the start, wanting to only be friends with him and no other guys, and all that initial focus and attention just swept him along.
Maybe if they spend time apart and he's around other girls (hint hint Snake-chan), he'll lose some of that doe-eyed enamored crush he's got going on, or see it tempered a bit.
Just in time for Kusunoki to see her own feelings awaken, of course.
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Shizuka making a new BFF through sheer force of Otakudom is pretty amazing.
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6/10 chapter due to lack of Hebikawa. Would've been 3/10 if Otobe wasnt present.
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I know for me personally it's due to the trajectory potential for their characters, in terms of progression and growth from the start of the story to the end.
Kusunoki is smart, athletic, imminently likeable the moment you take a moment to talk to her, and can clearly make fast friends with just about anyone as soon as she opens her mouth. The only thing she had against her was being bullied in middle school and seeking to reinvent herself for her high school debut.
Which...arguably she's done, now with the conclusion of the festival play. She's very much a known quantity now among the school outside her class, and even those who were iffy on her are warming up to her now that they've had a chance to actually interact with her a bit.
She doesn't have too much in the way of "bad sides", as a result, which makes her feel relatively 2-Dimensional in terms of the depth to her character. She cute, smart, bright, kind, and effectively the 'idol' of the class, a role historically known for just being "the most perfect girl in the class hierarchy", which doesn't allow for a lot of three dimensionality in terms of personality and quirks.
Hebikawa, by contrast, is also cute, but has an entire side of her that's just the obsession with image and the veneer of "perfect people" and a desire to see them torn down from the pedestals and exposed. She's manipulative, more than a little two-faced, and conniving in using her looks and mask to get what she wants. And she has her whole home life as a contrast to the image she presents at school.
Comparatively, she has much more room to grow as a character than Kusunoki, to reach a similar position within the classroom, especially if others knew of who she was under the mask like Keisuke does.
That makes her more "interesting" to me, than Kusunoki.
Not "the better person" or "the one I'd rather hang out with if I were in that class", but definitely more compelling from a narrative standpoint.
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Is it just me or are Otobe-Stocks really high lately?
Maybe it's just cope as an Otobe-head, but I just can't see Keisuke with either Kusunoki or Hebikawa
Maybe it's just cope as an Otobe-head, but I just can't see Keisuke with either Kusunoki or Hebikawa
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if she Botans this series I'm gonna be over the moon.
I'm hoping for "Hebikawas" to become a verb
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sadly she'd have to do something noteworthy enough outside of her presented archetype to be remembered in such a way - either positively or negatively.
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It's too quick for me desu. I was hoping Kusunoki would get it right after the end of this arc.
Right after Hebi is more than half way hissing around with Keisuke.
btw, mgs3 remake will be releasing in the next few days. are y'all excited?
too bad its ue5 slop.
Right after Hebi is more than half way hissing around with Keisuke.
btw, mgs3 remake will be releasing in the next few days. are y'all excited?
too bad its ue5 slop.
Yeah, like win for example. Botan is not notworthy enough by herself, but all it took for her to become a verb was winning
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well, yeah - she was one of the first notable side characters of a reasonably known title to beat the trope and take the romance win.
If Hebikawa (or Otobe) does that here....then she'd just be Botaning it. Hence why I said "she needs to do something noteworthy enough", and simply getting Keisuke over Kusunoki wouldn't be that, in this context.
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Thanks for the chapter.
I did like her realisation of how distancing herself so her "flaws" dont become obvious just hurt her reoutation just as much as them getting discovered.
Ill be honest, in my ideal world keisuke becomes/stays friends with both hebikawa and kusonoki and gets romantically involved with otobe. I like their chemistry the most and i feel like what hebikawa needs the most right now is a close friends who can see past her bullshit and i dont necessearily think having that friend be her boyfriend is a good idea or needed. As for why i dont want him to date kusonoki.... ok a large part of it is because i think her archetype is kinda overplayed and im not really all that impressed by her interactions with keisuke. It feels like this chapter is kinda hinting that she does have feelings for him and judt never did anything with that because of anxiety and fear, just like keisuke but that is again a story that has played out a thousand times so i dont want that to be it.
I did like her realisation of how distancing herself so her "flaws" dont become obvious just hurt her reoutation just as much as them getting discovered.
Ill be honest, in my ideal world keisuke becomes/stays friends with both hebikawa and kusonoki and gets romantically involved with otobe. I like their chemistry the most and i feel like what hebikawa needs the most right now is a close friends who can see past her bullshit and i dont necessearily think having that friend be her boyfriend is a good idea or needed. As for why i dont want him to date kusonoki.... ok a large part of it is because i think her archetype is kinda overplayed and im not really all that impressed by her interactions with keisuke. It feels like this chapter is kinda hinting that she does have feelings for him and judt never did anything with that because of anxiety and fear, just like keisuke but that is again a story that has played out a thousand times so i dont want that to be it.
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It was me, Barry, I confessed to Moe-chan. I love tanned flat chested girls.
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I think you have the right of it. That little flashback to the boy(?) saying to her that "no guy can be friends with Kusunoki" seems like she's either suddenly re-contextualizing every interaction with Keisuke up to now, or she's suddenly aware of the fact that she's subconsciously repressed any feelings beyond friendship for him because of the bullying in middle school that *resulted from the end of primary school that included things like that flashback line of dialogue.
Both are very telegraphed "Ah!" moments, but it would at least get that particular plot point moving again after she's almost aggressively stalled it out this whole time.
I have no particular feelings about Otobe and Keisuke, but I do think Hebikawa needs him to be her best friend and not romantic interest (though I'd love to see them "try" and then fail, realizing they're better suited as good friends and not intimate partners).
That said, I do think that Hebikawa's relationship with Keisuke is important for both the two of them, and for Kusunoki - I'd bet my lunch money that she'll see Keisuke drifting away from her a bit and toward Hebikawa, who will still be in the middle of her "I'll use Keisuke to break Kusunoki" arc at that point, and Hebikawa will incite Kusunoki to action in some manner.
As for how Otobe factors in, I kinda wonder if she's gonna be a tool for Kusunoki to actualize her feelings on romance, both in general and in terms of whether she feels that way to Keisuke. Having both Otobe and Hebikawa gunning for Keisuke's affections would be an interesting double-rival setup - one duplicitious, one earnest - but I'm still not certain how she fits into Keisuke's life, as I'd have to reread all of their interactions to see if she's on his radar at all in that way (or even as more than a slightly-less-than-a-friend, if I'm honest).
We'd need a fair bit more narrative and plot for Otobe to get to the same level as the others on Keisuke's radar, I imagine. But I'd be down to see it, all the same.
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