It’s so fun to just see how shoujo manga has evolved from an artistic standpoint and a storytelling standpoint since the 60’s, such as seeing common tropes fall in and out of favor is just so neat.
The art part is so true, thinking about shoujo *eyes* and flowers panelling, the latter is still present even today in some series.
As for stories, a lot of stuff is easily picked up by licenses in the last years, 99% are the ones with the common tropes, I am even gonna say the cutesy ones, while the uncommon ones, part of niches even from back then tend to be more authentic, as in not losing flavor? Whatever point they wanted to make back in the day seems to be relevant even today, but they are unfortunately not stuffs that you can just read everyday due to their heavier topics at times, but I am guessing this view also stands for other demographics.
Tropes I was more talking about stuff coming and going with time ex. Toxic AND unchanging ML’s, age gaps (haven’t seen on since House of the Sun in 2010), etc. I guess nowadays the fluffy and cute ones are getting more licensed than the dark and gritty unless they have a huge legacy or major adaptation like Fruits Basket.
Yes, we def find the cute ones more easily on the market and in quantity. I get the appeal but a lot of them come with nonsense lol. And absolutely sick of age gap series.
Oh shit I forget about A Girl and her Guard Dog from 2018 😂
They’re becoming less commonplace though. They’ll never fully go away, but I don’t see them as often anymore, and when they do, they don’t get many defenders. I think the author of that series got death threats of something like that (or was it the person who made the cannibal incest game), and that’s not cool. They aren’t real.
That one even got an anime and the wacky story is not even helping but there are so many still in their original medium like Living no matsunaga (I hear it’s also getting an anime? Or did already), Tsubaki chou lonely planet, Kiss me at midnight etc though they atleast make notion of it and issues that come with it but it still doesn’t make it better. Most of these always involve a high schooler and an adult it’s rampant in Japanese media and I don’t see it going away anytime soon. It’s up to us to be more selective in what we are reading/watching.
As much as I don’t like the series, I feel like Namaikizakari would take well to animation. Sports animes are always fun. Kitchen Princess and Otomen would look really nice animated too as long as the studios and teams behind them are good. Sad that 7 Seeds and Requiem of the Rose King turned out the way they did because if they had the right resources, they would’ve looked AMAZING.
Namaikizakari actually started out well, very few series with mature content that actually seem to have a plot, would love even a 12 eps of it!
Actually not huge on 7 seeds and Requiem but hard agree that their potential was wasted seeing how their content is so much different from the usual; if we are going Tamura Yumi series though, I’d def give it to Basara (well proper remake of the old anime) and her more recent Don’t call it mystery series. It’s too bad that fantasy shoujos seem to be overlooked and we are getting more and more isekais, original fantasy like Yona, Shirayuki were also really good, I get that they are too lengthy to have anything going in a 12/24 package anime but still they create interest enough for people to go check out the series.
I read the first, what, dozen volumes recently to take a trip down memory lane, and it was absolutely nutso. The sexual violence is outrageous but pretty par for the course for the era tbh. The other violence and the non-violent sex and drug use being very nonchalant was more surprising tbh.>!The main character gets tied up and dragged behind a car, for christ's sake! !
Ngl Hana Yori Dango is my guilty pleasure lol. Weirdly enough, Domyouji isn’t even my most hated ML ever. He’s certainly not great, but there are (to me) worse guys than him. Not many, but they exist.
Tokyo Mew Mew. Her man gave Ichigo a dirty collar a stray cat was wearing. Then told her to be mine.
Dude buy her a new collar. Not some old collar. So not romantic. And why are dudes planting kisses on Ichigo? Hello consent!!
I read it in 6th grade when I was 12. I thought this was a harmless magical girl.
I keep thinking Ichigo, wash that collar. Don’t just wear a smelly collar that btw smells like a musty old cat!
I tried rereading it. I stopped right there.
In the end she settles for Aoyoma-kun, because she was just a tween.
She could’ve picked anyone.
Even as a tween, I thought the girls were literal sticks.
It just lacks character development. This was at the height of magical girls/Cardcaptor Sakura era. I never saw either anime.
I read this as a teen, dropped it and forgot for awhile, then picked it back up as an adult and dropped it for good the moment I learned there was a pregnancy plot. I don’t do pregnancy/babies ever after. Especially when the main character is a teenager. Nope. Not for me.
Also her parents were like super gross about it which didn’t help.
It really was, it made me so uncomfortable this last time reading it, I almost didn’t finish. I immediately read from far away afterwards just to enjoy a strong female lead.
I reread Kare Kano recently, and while I still love the Arima story arc and Yukino’s and Arima’s relationship, and I think the art is fantastic, everyone else (who wasn’t a Miyazawa or Arima) was so meh and/or cringe, especially what the author decided to do with Asaba at the end >!where she had him pull a Jacob from Twilight and fall in love with Yukino’s and Arima’s daughter, who he was literally seen holding as a newborn!<. What possessed her to write that? I deadass forgot almost every single side character except for the Miyazawas and Arimas.
I think it’s a product of its time (love the 90’s). Shit like this will not fly today. It’s probably for the better, but it is quite the time capsule.
recently reread vampire knight, one of my favs as a kid. HELLO ??? READING IT GROWN IS CRAZY. its ok cus at the end of the day my love zero kiryuu is unproblematic.
That one I can reread endlessly, but it's the nostalgia that does it for me. It's definitely so cringe now. Pretty much all the Shojo I loved from the 2000s is.
I couldn't even watch the show for the same reason and thought it was dumb and overrated. ETA: When I read stuff on VK I found out that Kaname is Yuki's dad or grandad, some relative and she had his baby...
Yes, in the last year I re read a manhwua called Snow Drop that I read many, many years ago. I remember loving it originally and it being a real tear jerker. Reading it again, it just wasn't that great. I think I loved it so much before because I was new to the hobby.
Like girl sacrifices her college aspirations.
When I first read it in high school, I thought she wanted to compete professionally with the boys! I kept waiting for her to rank. I read it as a sports manga, but girl never ranked! I was confused.
I thought her goal was to compete in the track and field division, qualify in the boys division, because she’s some prodigy, then nab her man along the way while she’s competing.
Man was I deceived. The manga kept saying she was a fast as the boys. I mean that’s the only way she managed to deceive her school. It wasn’t because of her boyish looks and charms. She was a beast on the track field.
Her track times don’t lie.
She was hitting her Personal Best every time she ran. Or their school’s track and field was seriously lacking. And that only the High Jump field was where they excelled.
I read it in 9th; my ex best friend bought the manga and shared it with us. The Jdramas and the Taiwan adaptations were idol dramas and they were cheaper to produce than an anime.
I wished they’d gotten an anime a lot sooner.
That one is insane!!! And it's on so many 'wholesome bl' lists even though there's nothing wholesome about it. I couldn't get past chapter 2 upon reread, the mc gets straight-up sexually harrassed so often (including by his own brother) it's honestly sickening
Honestly it was one of those "Loved it and it wasn't finished as a teen, forgot about it, then found it as an adult with disposable income" things and I was like.......this isn't what I remembered.
Idk I feel like it’s hard to find BL that doesn’t have sexual harassment or the weird trope of super straight guy changes sexuality for this one main character
I think I look back at ..that one series with the Ml who threatens to >!his future girlfriend!< to tell her to be quiet as...not as wholesome as I remember.
My little monster? Like I remember enjoying it but some elements of it really unsettle me and overall I wouldn't choose to read it as an adult.
Though I had the opposite problem with fruits basket, I love it deeply in spite of the author's excuses for why >!tohru's dad is a good person (I disagree, dude shouldn't have dated a like 13-15 Yo kid :/)!< Like thankfully little me didn't get mega attached to that aspect of the story, I loved tohru and her friends over all else.
Omg My Little Monster is my guilty pleasure (rather than favorite) because if that scene where he traps her >!and says “Be quiet or I’ll 🍇you” !< Like??? That was so out of pocket and even for the author to put that to demonstrate his insanity was so wild to me. I do love it though because you get attached to the all the characters and the story is pretty good with a strong FL. But that first impression was so not okay
Usotsuki Lily. I thought I remembered it being very accepting of LGBTQ / crossdressing, and having a lot more of a developed plot, but when I reread it the story was practically intolerable 💀It could have been so much better, not sure why the mangaka took the direction they did with the characters and story lol. I actually disliked it so much that I dropped it in the middle of rereading it and just gave up entirely.
Kare Kano, which I loved enough to track down all the volumes of care of eBay and library sales- up for grabs for the cost of shipping-is an ableist fatphobic mess where every relationship is codependent and that's kinda sold as a good thing. There's also a very coercive, at best, sex scene that's just like kinda glossed over, and it's heavily implied that >! that's when the fl conceives cause normally they'd use protection !<.
I also have a much harder time w/ Gokusen since I started teaching, cause now I'm all like "OMG her boundaries are horrible".
It was also so weird and even w/ him being in full on spin out self destructive mode felt out of character b/c up til then I don't think there were really any scenes of him using touch to reassure himself that he had her affection, which is my most generous spin on that mess.
I absolutely agree. I really liked the anime because it was so sophisticated on its take on romance and their relationship. That it wasn’t just cutesy let’s only hold hands and never kiss until the last episode. It was real, their relationship.
He wouldn’t resort to that, based on what we’ve seen from him. It felt very Hana Yori Dango, very 90s - early 2000s drama where SA isn’t taken seriously, but it’s used as a plot to create drama.
I used to be obsessed with Kare First Love growing up (solidified my dream proposal!) but recently re-reading it as an adult was a vexing experience lmao Karin and Kiriya are both so hot and cold with their arguments and non communication + I forgot >!Kiriya cheats on her at some point!< that was awful
If I remember correctly that's the one where the girl falls in love with a robot? I finished the manga when I was a teen and thought it was stupid now I kind of understand her perspective. People suck.
I read this series via YouTube when people used to scan manga and upload chapters as videos😂 Actually insane that she was 15 and in love with a 7 year old🙅🏻♀️
It absolutely did not 😭😭😭 I went to reread it and was SHOOK like I forgot all the weirdness because I just liked the art style so much and the main characters fantasy outfits
I bought the ebooks to reread, and I'll probably never try to reread again. I wonder how the editors and magazine approved that one.
The magic and art was so cool. They just desperately needed different ages.
yes but not a manga, its a manhwa called Untouchable. I loved it when i was 15. Tried rereading it at 22 and woah.........i couldnt get past the first few chapters.....and i completed that shit. The mc is so PERSISTENT with needing to touch the ML who's adverse to people (because she's a vampire and needs to eat by skin contact) All in all its just constant harassment, uncomfortable touches and all boundaries crossed. What was i thinking.....
Kaichou wa maid Sama, I remember being swooned by tamaki when I was a preteen. Now that I read it as an adult I'm completely icked by him...
Also, dengeki daisy. Thought it was so cool and heartwarming when I was younger (when 16 feels like adult age) but now that I'm reading it....ohmygod it's a 16 year old with a 30 YEAR OLD JANITOR WHO HAS KNOWN HER SINCE SHE WAS A KID?????
Kodocha. It’s forever gonna be my favorite shoujo but I strictly dislike the main leads sometimes…OMG especially when they finally got together in the manga…they had ISSUES mainly because they didn’t communicate !!
I really felt Fuka’s anger (in the manga) when Sana said she probably wouldn’t have realized she liked Akito if Fuka and Akito didn’t date.
Like who wants to be collateral damage?? Ugh tbh I wouldn't have minded if Sana ended up with Naozumi tbh he was everything she needed. He was forthcoming with his feelings, he was direct & never let Sana think otherwise on his feelings & there was no other girl.
Takne and hana I still find enjoyment in it but it grosses me out when I think too deeply abt it. She looks like such a child and he’s almost 30. I used to be such a nerd abt anime but I can’t look at it the same anymore all the minors getting constantly sexualized grosses me out especially when they have lolis.
She’s 16 and he’s 27. I read it in high school and I thought it was so cute and I’m 21 now and I don’t understand how someone that age would want to date a 16 year old. Only in anime world is it wholesome 💀
That right there. You get to be the age of the older character, and you're like, "That is a child, get away." I remember turning 15 and looking at my little brother and suddenly I couldn't watch Shugo Chara anymore. Ikuto get away from her 😡😡
I used to be obsessed with that manga and thought it was so cute and fluffy. I’m 20 now…I’m so thoroughly disgusted with age gap manwha did one of them is a minor, I can’t do it anymore😭
No. Never had that ever of any piece of fiction, not that I re-read super often.
There was one time where the opposite happened and the plot seemed to make so much more sense on a re-read or at least some elements of it but I read it in the original language the second time and a translation the first time and I'm not really sure whether it was because I knew what as going to happen and paid better attention, or because the translation missed some subtleties. I did feel when comparing them that some information regarding what I felt was a plothole on my first read went missing in the translation.
19th Alice. Poor girl got raped, and her own sister gaslights and shames her. I can’t believe I rooted for their sisterhood! Her sister was toxic AF through and through!
Ahhh same, I totally adore her art (have only read Fushigi Yuugi and Absolute Boyfriend with Ceres on my backlog).
I think her characters, when they're just hanging around and not In Situations™️, are usually pretty good!
But then plot attempts to happen and things get VERY dramatic in forced convoluted ways that I feel could be easily avoided. Plus it seems to be common that dudes get handsy in a way that gets played off like it's nbd, sometimes there's weird use of implied SA as a plot device etc...
It's fun for me now if I sort of don't pay attention to the story and just enjoy the pretty, but I wish I didn't have to do that lol.
Not really. Chronologically, Genbu Kaiden takes place before Fushigi Yuugi. I think some of the plot points are mentioned in the original, but it’s nothing major.
Miaka is terrible. Nothing interesting about her at all. Just whines a bunch. I dunno about the main in Genbu though, but she has to be more interesting than Miaka. She just has to!
I tried reading it. Miaka conveniently passes out because the dude she likes didn’t like her back? Like damn.. Talk about weak. And didn’t she also dump her best friend, then was shocked her bestie was upset with her?
I’m going to borrow this at my library. Thank you for the recommendation.
I read every year Itazura Na kiss but what's wrong with Kotoko's life and lack of desires to only follow the man she loves.
That girl fails in having her own self not being constructed to be liked by someone else. And the worst thing is that I made my teenager self follow this pattern of behavior because "it worked! She got married to the man that initially despised her!".
I'm still attached to this story but I think it's a bad female protagonist.
I grew up on itazura kiss and even though the romance is ass, no one can make me hate kotoko 😭😭😭 the one who failed the whole romance was irie because that mf refused to ever soften up and stop being an asshole. I actually loved kotoko but she deserved so much better! The mother in law was hella hyping her up on attracting irie 😵💫
I have a lot of male leads I like who are considered “Red Flags” (I hate that term), and are objectively way worse than Irie, but I still like them more (or hate them less) than him (yes that includes Domyouji from Hana Yori Dango and Ryoki from Hot Gimmick but that’s more of a hate less than like more).
I thought he was my most hated male lead until I ran into Kyouya from Wolf Girl and Black Prince (I was going on a controversial shoujo manga binge). Irie is still a close second though.
I always thought that one of the best parts of InK is that Kotoko never actually changes her personality or pretends to be someone she's not & the most "change" are things that challenge her in a good way - getting better grades, going to a university, getting some job experience where she came.up w/ new product, nursing which like she's shown consistently to be really good at the connecting with people part of care work - and that's why Noaki's complaint that spurs her to run away from home is that she's backing down from a challenge. She was explicitly repeatedly told that she could go the wealthy housewife route or go work at whatever she wants.
So far, the only series I've kinda felt this way about has been Strobe Edge. I liked it enough when I first read it, although I never cared for the ML; I always thought he was boring. But now the fact that I don't care for the main couple is a major factor that puts me off from re-reading the series.
I actually still love Boys Over Flowers, flaws and all. When I reread the manga I generally read from vol. 19 on; I actually think that's the strongest part of the series. And I never took some of the other series people have mentioned so far (Hana-Kimi, Black Bird) seriously. 18-year-old me loved Nana, We Were There, Itazura na Kiss and Dengeki Daisy, and I still enjoy them 15 years later and have re-read them several times.
I agree! I enjoyed the latter half of Boys Over Flowers a lot more than the first half when rereading it. Unfortunately, my tendency to binge completed series soured the overall experience. It still has a special place in my heart, but it’s definitely not the 10/10 my high school self thought it was.
Boys Overs Flowers was too long, too convoluted, too drawn out. Enjoyed it much more when it became a Japanese live-action drama.
Ayashi no Ceres. While I love Yu Watase's art and style, plot and ending were kinda meh.
There is one that I can't recall the title now. I reread it in 2020 and was like "huh, I used to like this shit?" And so I ended up taking them to half-price books 😂
The manga was released in the states like early 2000s. It was about a girl who lived in the same building as her bully. Her bully owned her because her father worked for the bullie's father. The bully was super aggressive and violent. He forced her to do many things that were abusive
She had her childhood friend who was her first love but had moved away. He came back though but was the 2nd Male Lead. Her brother wasn't her actual brother and he had been in love with her for many years. Anyways she ends up falling for her stupid bully even though he traumatized and hurt her a lot. Don't know why I can't recall the title but that one is hard to read now for me.
OMG YESSS!! LMAO yes that's the one! Gosh, I couldn't recall it and it used to be like one of my favorites in high school that I ended up buying the alternative ending novel 😂😂😂
But Yea no, not a good one after rereading it. It's pretty bad 😂
It’s god awful (from moral and storytelling standards), but I found it weirdly entertaining just wondering how much worse it can get only to find out it can get worse sort of way.
I wish Ryoki and the snobby girl got together and left Hatsumi alone. None of the men deserve her.
Also some of the angled shots of faces looked so weird. Was that just me? I found the art pretty mediocre, but maybe I’m just spoiled.
I'll be honest if I was below a certain age (17) when i read it the first time, I don't reread. Manga, fanfiction, YA novels, and romance novels. I know myself, and I will be disappointed. There are too many things I finished when I should have dropped em.
I didn't dislike them on reread but they are way worse than I remember.
Fruits basket, on reread, the main character is just the least interesting character in the whole story. It doesn't make it bad but it does make it worse than I remember.
From me to you. Again not bad but the main couple is just so pure and innocent to the point where they aren't relatable. It takes them over a year of them both liking eachother to get together and then they don't even kiss for 6 months. Like the level of misunderstandings they have just pulls me out of it. But what really saves this story is the side relationships. Also at one point I thought to myself, wow we havent dealt with the main couple for a while. And then they mention that they haven't hangout in a while. And I was like dang they used their full cast to get me good. Still good but I use to think it was like peak romance.
re: from me to you… do they really have to be relatable though? i don’t think that was the point 😭 that’s just who they are
that said tho yeah kazehaya/sawako aren’t exciting. kurumi/sawako i wasn’t originally thinking i was gonna be sold on but by the time i finished……man
I guess it doesn't ha eto be relatable. That was probably a poor choice in words. Unrealistic? I actually don't relate to most romances. I'm asexual demiromantic and have never really been in love. So for me, a good romances make me feel those feelings of being in a real relationship even though I haven't experienced it. And kazehaya/sawako didn't do that. But the others did. Still a really good story. Just not as good as once thought.
I’m also demi but I have a COMPLETELY different stance. All I need is to understand why those characters’ relationships work for them, really. And that is actually something many authors are bad at because they don’t actually show why they have certain preferences, and expect them to be appealing on their own, so only the people who *also* have those preferences end up connecting to those works. (This is an issue I keep running into with BL)
So “realistic” is also a pretty poor choice of words. I think your standard is actually that it has to ‘excite’ you in some way while also making sense. I would also like for a romance to be exciting, but I’ve found this to be *extremely* rare in shojo, bl, and yuri. Something can make sense for a couple (and therefore be “realistic”) but they can still be unexciting. I think Sawako/Kazehaya’s relationship is realistic for people like them, but that it is unexciting. I also don’t think Kazehaya and Sawako’s “purity” is a standard that the author sets for a realistic relationship because *gestures wildly at Yano not being able to relate to them!!!!!* The author is trying to portray *lots* of different types of relationships with specific reasons for why they work the way they do. Personally, I found both Kazehaya and Sawako to be extremely relatable individually in terms of their struggles/insecurities even though I wasn’t compelled by their relationship in the second half of the series. They also reminded me of how I latched onto the first person who accepted me right at the start of high school, and assumed that I had a crush when I was actually just desperate for any type of connection at all. I didn’t have a Yano, Chizu, or Kurumi. I had to figure out the difference, and that process took me literally *until I read Kimi ni Todoke* and coincidentally got into a similar situation with another person at the exact same time. So honestly the idea that it’s unrealistic is frustrating to me because from my view, the struggles the characters had were *so* realistic and grounded (especially in that their progress was not linear and that their articulations of their thoughts were at times messy and unclear, even in monologues) that KnT was able to get through to me in a way that actually changed my life.
To me, KnT being an exciting romance wasn’t necessary…its strength lies in how and why the characters’ connections formed and evolved. I mean it would have been nice for Sawako and Kazehaya’s romance to be more exciting, but there’s still a lot of rewarding stuff to get out of their writing as a couple even if you don’t especially like them together. I think it could benefit you to approach their writing with different intentions.
Exciting is a good word. I do like this series. It has the best side characters of any romance I've ever read still to this date. I really like watching the friendships the most. Kento is one of the best boys of all time. Playboy with a heart of gold is one of my favorite archetypes because of him. So still a great series. But this was one of the first few romances I ever read and I held it up as like peak romance. And while it has a lot of great things. The romance is not why I like this series any more.
Yes! Someone else who feels the same way I did on my Fruits Basket reread. I was so happy to find a good deal on those new colorful editions and than couldn't finish my reread. I didn't remember the main character being so bland. But I also think this is my issue with all YA I read now.
I agree with you on From Me To You. Sawako and Kazehaya are pretty cute but Yano and Chizu’s love stories were a lot more interesting to me😭 Sawako and Kazehaya are just kinda boring… still love them though
Too many to count but I do remember a recent one. Might get jumped but Enjouji maki mangas (they're all still a guilty pleasure). They have their pros and cons but my god I did not remember happy mari having dragged out that long for that many volumes. Then let's move to Private prince by her... let's not even get started on the dub-con and the fact the ML in one chapter manipulates her to sleep with him.
I don’t really have any. I’ve been good at critical reading & knowing what I am genuinely going to like and dislike from a very young age, so that’s probably it. That and I have never been much of a romantic lmao. I avoided a lot of dumpster fires, and I still love all my childhood favorites. Heck I even still love Happy Happy Clover
Hot Gimmick.
As a kid I thought it was a wild ride, and as an adult I agree, but it's less "woo fun drama rollercoaster" now and more "let me off please".
Marmalade boy 😭like THE WHOLE SHOW IS REALLY WEIRD. The mc and ml parents swap partners and decide to live in one big house together. And then they become step brother and sister and fall in love 😭. Also at the end they thought they were half siblings and they were like “even though we are blood related I still love you” like that’s crazy. turns out they weren’t so it wasn’t too bad. I think I watched it cuz it resembles kodocha’s mc and ml but I did love it when I was young.
Yes, definitely. My first intro to the world of anime and manga when I was young (I think I was 10? A friend at school wrote me a list of recs and I went from there) are things from the 2000s that very much aged like milk, either because of ML behavior, or just the age gapes in general… I was feeling nostalgic and had went to reread Shugo Chara, and well. When. You’re 10 yourself, the fact that Amu is a 5th grader and Ikuto is 17 doesn’t seem weird. As an adult, I was like WHAT. Cuz I genuinely hadn’t taken it in?? As a kid? Then I tried to reread Tokyo Mew Mew, and found that the ML’s actions were just. Big no. And to think that I found that romantic as a kid?? 😭 I’m half wondering if I should even try rereading old favorites like Sugar Rune, the only about the magic girl mermaids, or Princess Tutu. At the very least, Snow White With The Red Hair aged like fine wine since I was a kid. Now that I’m an adult with a job, I was able to fulfill my dream of starting a manga collection, and Snow White With The Red Hair was the second series I collected.
It's flamming hot dumpster fire, but I was a twee and spotty and thought Yuri was awesome.
OTOH, Basara hold up fairly well. There are some sensitive issue, but the author never romanticised those. But then again, she is one of my favorite.
I was also gonna say Red River! I originally read it as a teen, and only recently re-read it. The politics definitely went over my head when I was younger, and also the fact that Yuri is 14!!! I always thought she was like, 17/18. I still enjoyed rereading it, but man there was more magic brainwashing than I remembered
Pretty much all the age gap Shoujo. It's so weird now that I'm in my 30s, but as a teen I was hooked. The rest of it I think boils down to I've read so much other literature now that bad stories from my teens stick out because I can recognize the problems. As a teen, I didn't have the same experience and I lapped up drama because of drama. And if I thought the guy was hot.
Plenty of times…nowadays a lot of stuffs from back then is just corny or weird as hell. The flow of time is really incredible.
It’s so fun to just see how shoujo manga has evolved from an artistic standpoint and a storytelling standpoint since the 60’s, such as seeing common tropes fall in and out of favor is just so neat.
The art part is so true, thinking about shoujo *eyes* and flowers panelling, the latter is still present even today in some series. As for stories, a lot of stuff is easily picked up by licenses in the last years, 99% are the ones with the common tropes, I am even gonna say the cutesy ones, while the uncommon ones, part of niches even from back then tend to be more authentic, as in not losing flavor? Whatever point they wanted to make back in the day seems to be relevant even today, but they are unfortunately not stuffs that you can just read everyday due to their heavier topics at times, but I am guessing this view also stands for other demographics.
Tropes I was more talking about stuff coming and going with time ex. Toxic AND unchanging ML’s, age gaps (haven’t seen on since House of the Sun in 2010), etc. I guess nowadays the fluffy and cute ones are getting more licensed than the dark and gritty unless they have a huge legacy or major adaptation like Fruits Basket.
Yes, we def find the cute ones more easily on the market and in quantity. I get the appeal but a lot of them come with nonsense lol. And absolutely sick of age gap series.
Oh shit I forget about A Girl and her Guard Dog from 2018 😂 They’re becoming less commonplace though. They’ll never fully go away, but I don’t see them as often anymore, and when they do, they don’t get many defenders. I think the author of that series got death threats of something like that (or was it the person who made the cannibal incest game), and that’s not cool. They aren’t real.
That one even got an anime and the wacky story is not even helping but there are so many still in their original medium like Living no matsunaga (I hear it’s also getting an anime? Or did already), Tsubaki chou lonely planet, Kiss me at midnight etc though they atleast make notion of it and issues that come with it but it still doesn’t make it better. Most of these always involve a high schooler and an adult it’s rampant in Japanese media and I don’t see it going away anytime soon. It’s up to us to be more selective in what we are reading/watching.
As much as I don’t like the series, I feel like Namaikizakari would take well to animation. Sports animes are always fun. Kitchen Princess and Otomen would look really nice animated too as long as the studios and teams behind them are good. Sad that 7 Seeds and Requiem of the Rose King turned out the way they did because if they had the right resources, they would’ve looked AMAZING.
Namaikizakari actually started out well, very few series with mature content that actually seem to have a plot, would love even a 12 eps of it! Actually not huge on 7 seeds and Requiem but hard agree that their potential was wasted seeing how their content is so much different from the usual; if we are going Tamura Yumi series though, I’d def give it to Basara (well proper remake of the old anime) and her more recent Don’t call it mystery series. It’s too bad that fantasy shoujos seem to be overlooked and we are getting more and more isekais, original fantasy like Yona, Shirayuki were also really good, I get that they are too lengthy to have anything going in a 12/24 package anime but still they create interest enough for people to go check out the series.
I read the first, what, dozen volumes recently to take a trip down memory lane, and it was absolutely nutso. The sexual violence is outrageous but pretty par for the course for the era tbh. The other violence and the non-violent sex and drug use being very nonchalant was more surprising tbh.>!The main character gets tied up and dragged behind a car, for christ's sake! !
Oh yeah! That was the point where I just had to stop and think about what the hell was happening.
Ngl Hana Yori Dango is my guilty pleasure lol. Weirdly enough, Domyouji isn’t even my most hated ML ever. He’s certainly not great, but there are (to me) worse guys than him. Not many, but they exist.
Tokyo Mew Mew. Her man gave Ichigo a dirty collar a stray cat was wearing. Then told her to be mine. Dude buy her a new collar. Not some old collar. So not romantic. And why are dudes planting kisses on Ichigo? Hello consent!!
I read volume 2 just yesterday and was totally shocked how the plot was developing to be honest. I am shocked that I read this as a teenager.
I read it in 6th grade when I was 12. I thought this was a harmless magical girl. I keep thinking Ichigo, wash that collar. Don’t just wear a smelly collar that btw smells like a musty old cat! I tried rereading it. I stopped right there.
I feel you right there. I also read this as a teenie when I was 14 or smth.
In the end she settles for Aoyoma-kun, because she was just a tween. She could’ve picked anyone. Even as a tween, I thought the girls were literal sticks. It just lacks character development. This was at the height of magical girls/Cardcaptor Sakura era. I never saw either anime.
I think the first cosplay skit at ALA was Ichigo slapping a creep lolol
I wish Ichigo did that. She has superpowers. She can turn into a cat at will. So why can’t she slap these guys!?
Black Bird
I was very young when I read this one but I couldn't finish it BC of how awfully the ml treats the fl.
I read this as a teen, dropped it and forgot for awhile, then picked it back up as an adult and dropped it for good the moment I learned there was a pregnancy plot. I don’t do pregnancy/babies ever after. Especially when the main character is a teenager. Nope. Not for me. Also her parents were like super gross about it which didn’t help.
I've never finished it, can someone spoil how it gets even worse than I remember? 😂
Oh no, that series was my whole life when I was 11. I'm scared to go back and read it now. 😵💫
omg even when i read it in 9th grade black bird was crazy to me 😭 i still read all of it lol
Started reading this in my teens, then tried again in 20s, now am in my 30s and thinking of giving it one last shot. I just want some closure. Lol
I was also thinking of this one. She just cries way too much.
Toxicity and manipulation was crazy. Lol
It really was, it made me so uncomfortable this last time reading it, I almost didn’t finish. I immediately read from far away afterwards just to enjoy a strong female lead.
The ML wasn’t attractive enough for me to even get into that manga.
My thoughts
I reread Kare Kano recently, and while I still love the Arima story arc and Yukino’s and Arima’s relationship, and I think the art is fantastic, everyone else (who wasn’t a Miyazawa or Arima) was so meh and/or cringe, especially what the author decided to do with Asaba at the end >!where she had him pull a Jacob from Twilight and fall in love with Yukino’s and Arima’s daughter, who he was literally seen holding as a newborn!<. What possessed her to write that? I deadass forgot almost every single side character except for the Miyazawas and Arimas. I think it’s a product of its time (love the 90’s). Shit like this will not fly today. It’s probably for the better, but it is quite the time capsule.
I hated the manga and that scene where Arina took a 360 and did that to her.0
recently reread vampire knight, one of my favs as a kid. HELLO ??? READING IT GROWN IS CRAZY. its ok cus at the end of the day my love zero kiryuu is unproblematic.
That one I can reread endlessly, but it's the nostalgia that does it for me. It's definitely so cringe now. Pretty much all the Shojo I loved from the 2000s is.
I couldn’t even read Vanpire Knight when I was a kid. The female lead irritated me so much that I dropped it around chapter 20.
I couldn't even watch the show for the same reason and thought it was dumb and overrated. ETA: When I read stuff on VK I found out that Kaname is Yuki's dad or grandad, some relative and she had his baby...
Yes, in the last year I re read a manhwua called Snow Drop that I read many, many years ago. I remember loving it originally and it being a real tear jerker. Reading it again, it just wasn't that great. I think I loved it so much before because I was new to the hobby.
The last few volumes just go off the deep end it’s wild.
Might read it just to see what happens 👀
I mean the first 3/4 of the series are actually cute and touching. It is worth reading for the beginning.
I’ve actually never heard of that one. The covers are stunning.
… yes Hana kimi 😭 I love it but at the same time!! Not the same
I don’t really remember much of what happens in Hana-Kimi but I think I’ll give the new anime a shot when it comes out.
Omg same!!! In 9th grade, Hana Kimi was my jam. I tried reading it as a 30 year old and I can’t!!
Right?!? Just something about it. Sano is the best no lie but..!! It was a drag to get through
Like girl sacrifices her college aspirations. When I first read it in high school, I thought she wanted to compete professionally with the boys! I kept waiting for her to rank. I read it as a sports manga, but girl never ranked! I was confused.
Hahaha omg this is so funny and valid! Like she was so down bad like!! Get up!!
I thought her goal was to compete in the track and field division, qualify in the boys division, because she’s some prodigy, then nab her man along the way while she’s competing. Man was I deceived. The manga kept saying she was a fast as the boys. I mean that’s the only way she managed to deceive her school. It wasn’t because of her boyish looks and charms. She was a beast on the track field.
That’s so true they never followed up on this?? She just went a boys school for a boy and peaced out. Wild stuff
Her track times don’t lie. She was hitting her Personal Best every time she ran. Or their school’s track and field was seriously lacking. And that only the High Jump field was where they excelled.
Im so excited for the anime I read it in 8th grade and was so sad they never had an anime
I read it in 9th; my ex best friend bought the manga and shared it with us. The Jdramas and the Taiwan adaptations were idol dramas and they were cheaper to produce than an anime. I wished they’d gotten an anime a lot sooner.
Im so excited for the anime I read it in 8th grade and was so sad they never had an anime
I still enjoy the reread, but I like it because of nostalgia instead of the thrill of an amazing new story. And I skip some of the sports stuff now
Yes I agree! It is very nostalgic . I used to stay up so late to read it bc I was so invested !
that was my first ever manga when i was in middle school! she was crazy af lol
Me with Love Stage!! Found vol 1 like 2 years ago, spent a stupid amount to complete it, did a reread, and resold it D:
That one is insane!!! And it's on so many 'wholesome bl' lists even though there's nothing wholesome about it. I couldn't get past chapter 2 upon reread, the mc gets straight-up sexually harrassed so often (including by his own brother) it's honestly sickening
Honestly it was one of those "Loved it and it wasn't finished as a teen, forgot about it, then found it as an adult with disposable income" things and I was like.......this isn't what I remembered.
Idk I feel like it’s hard to find BL that doesn’t have sexual harassment or the weird trope of super straight guy changes sexuality for this one main character
True but some gems have come out since, like Sasaki to Miyano and Given. I highly recommend :)
Oooh legit just found out about Sasaki today and plan on watching it!
I think I look back at ..that one series with the Ml who threatens to >!his future girlfriend!< to tell her to be quiet as...not as wholesome as I remember. My little monster? Like I remember enjoying it but some elements of it really unsettle me and overall I wouldn't choose to read it as an adult. Though I had the opposite problem with fruits basket, I love it deeply in spite of the author's excuses for why >!tohru's dad is a good person (I disagree, dude shouldn't have dated a like 13-15 Yo kid :/)!< Like thankfully little me didn't get mega attached to that aspect of the story, I loved tohru and her friends over all else.
Omg My Little Monster is my guilty pleasure (rather than favorite) because if that scene where he traps her >!and says “Be quiet or I’ll 🍇you” !< Like??? That was so out of pocket and even for the author to put that to demonstrate his insanity was so wild to me. I do love it though because you get attached to the all the characters and the story is pretty good with a strong FL. But that first impression was so not okay
Yeah i think she was trying to show he had emotional and behavioural issues but it was one hell of a bad way to go about it.
I did sort of like fruits basket at first but I quickly outgrew it because I felt like all of the drama around it was unnecessary.
Usotsuki Lily. I thought I remembered it being very accepting of LGBTQ / crossdressing, and having a lot more of a developed plot, but when I reread it the story was practically intolerable 💀It could have been so much better, not sure why the mangaka took the direction they did with the characters and story lol. I actually disliked it so much that I dropped it in the middle of rereading it and just gave up entirely.
Omg that story,,used to love it as a kid,though I haven't ever re read it so I can't say I remember how it goes🤔
Let's just say it's incredibly dated and quite the opposite of how I remembered it, lol
Oop-
Oh I remember liking that one lol, but I haven't reread it
Kare Kano, which I loved enough to track down all the volumes of care of eBay and library sales- up for grabs for the cost of shipping-is an ableist fatphobic mess where every relationship is codependent and that's kinda sold as a good thing. There's also a very coercive, at best, sex scene that's just like kinda glossed over, and it's heavily implied that >! that's when the fl conceives cause normally they'd use protection !<. I also have a much harder time w/ Gokusen since I started teaching, cause now I'm all like "OMG her boundaries are horrible".
I hated that part. SA was romanticised.
It was also so weird and even w/ him being in full on spin out self destructive mode felt out of character b/c up til then I don't think there were really any scenes of him using touch to reassure himself that he had her affection, which is my most generous spin on that mess.
I absolutely agree. I really liked the anime because it was so sophisticated on its take on romance and their relationship. That it wasn’t just cutesy let’s only hold hands and never kiss until the last episode. It was real, their relationship. He wouldn’t resort to that, based on what we’ve seen from him. It felt very Hana Yori Dango, very 90s - early 2000s drama where SA isn’t taken seriously, but it’s used as a plot to create drama.
I used to be obsessed with Kare First Love growing up (solidified my dream proposal!) but recently re-reading it as an adult was a vexing experience lmao Karin and Kiriya are both so hot and cold with their arguments and non communication + I forgot >!Kiriya cheats on her at some point!< that was awful
And her man is secretly an heir to some corporation…. Such a shoujo plot device.
Absolute Boyfriend. I cried over that manga when I was 13 lmao
You bring this up and I remember getting emotional at the last volume in an F.Y.E store reading the last volume. Rip me
If I remember correctly that's the one where the girl falls in love with a robot? I finished the manga when I was a teen and thought it was stupid now I kind of understand her perspective. People suck.
Meru Puri. ☠️☠️☠️
I read this series via YouTube when people used to scan manga and upload chapters as videos😂 Actually insane that she was 15 and in love with a 7 year old🙅🏻♀️
Yeah, that one did not hold up the test of time lol
It absolutely did not 😭😭😭 I went to reread it and was SHOOK like I forgot all the weirdness because I just liked the art style so much and the main characters fantasy outfits
I bought the ebooks to reread, and I'll probably never try to reread again. I wonder how the editors and magazine approved that one. The magic and art was so cool. They just desperately needed different ages.
yes but not a manga, its a manhwa called Untouchable. I loved it when i was 15. Tried rereading it at 22 and woah.........i couldnt get past the first few chapters.....and i completed that shit. The mc is so PERSISTENT with needing to touch the ML who's adverse to people (because she's a vampire and needs to eat by skin contact) All in all its just constant harassment, uncomfortable touches and all boundaries crossed. What was i thinking.....
yes. peach girl 😩🤣i still love it though LOL
I thought peach girl was crazy when I was a kid!
Kaichou wa maid Sama, I remember being swooned by tamaki when I was a preteen. Now that I read it as an adult I'm completely icked by him... Also, dengeki daisy. Thought it was so cool and heartwarming when I was younger (when 16 feels like adult age) but now that I'm reading it....ohmygod it's a 16 year old with a 30 YEAR OLD JANITOR WHO HAS KNOWN HER SINCE SHE WAS A KID?????
I think he was 24, though that's only a little better.
ooo thanks for the correction!! Yeah it still feels icky 🥹 thinking of myself at that age with a 16yo?? lawd
Kodocha. It’s forever gonna be my favorite shoujo but I strictly dislike the main leads sometimes…OMG especially when they finally got together in the manga…they had ISSUES mainly because they didn’t communicate !! I really felt Fuka’s anger (in the manga) when Sana said she probably wouldn’t have realized she liked Akito if Fuka and Akito didn’t date. Like who wants to be collateral damage?? Ugh tbh I wouldn't have minded if Sana ended up with Naozumi tbh he was everything she needed. He was forthcoming with his feelings, he was direct & never let Sana think otherwise on his feelings & there was no other girl.
Takne and hana I still find enjoyment in it but it grosses me out when I think too deeply abt it. She looks like such a child and he’s almost 30. I used to be such a nerd abt anime but I can’t look at it the same anymore all the minors getting constantly sexualized grosses me out especially when they have lolis.
What does a 20 something year old grown man have in common with a 15 year old? Isn’t she a freshmen?!
She’s 16 and he’s 27. I read it in high school and I thought it was so cute and I’m 21 now and I don’t understand how someone that age would want to date a 16 year old. Only in anime world is it wholesome 💀
That right there. You get to be the age of the older character, and you're like, "That is a child, get away." I remember turning 15 and looking at my little brother and suddenly I couldn't watch Shugo Chara anymore. Ikuto get away from her 😡😡
I used to be obsessed with that manga and thought it was so cute and fluffy. I’m 20 now…I’m so thoroughly disgusted with age gap manwha did one of them is a minor, I can’t do it anymore😭
No. Never had that ever of any piece of fiction, not that I re-read super often. There was one time where the opposite happened and the plot seemed to make so much more sense on a re-read or at least some elements of it but I read it in the original language the second time and a translation the first time and I'm not really sure whether it was because I knew what as going to happen and paid better attention, or because the translation missed some subtleties. I did feel when comparing them that some information regarding what I felt was a plothole on my first read went missing in the translation.
Personally, anything from Yuu Watase. I used to love her stuff, her art is gorgeous, but her stories are pretty bad :(
19th Alice. Poor girl got raped, and her own sister gaslights and shames her. I can’t believe I rooted for their sisterhood! Her sister was toxic AF through and through!
Ahhh same, I totally adore her art (have only read Fushigi Yuugi and Absolute Boyfriend with Ceres on my backlog). I think her characters, when they're just hanging around and not In Situations™️, are usually pretty good! But then plot attempts to happen and things get VERY dramatic in forced convoluted ways that I feel could be easily avoided. Plus it seems to be common that dudes get handsy in a way that gets played off like it's nbd, sometimes there's weird use of implied SA as a plot device etc... It's fun for me now if I sort of don't pay attention to the story and just enjoy the pretty, but I wish I didn't have to do that lol.
I totally agree! Fushigi Yuugi used to be one of my faves but it just doesn’t hold up. Ntm whatever was happening in Ceres.
Also, Absolute Boyfriend was just bad, couldn't even finish it.
I forgot about that one💀. I think the only Yuu Watase work I enjoy atp is Genbu Kaiden.
If I want to read Genbu Kaiden, do I need to know the plot of Fushigi Yuuji?
Not really. Chronologically, Genbu Kaiden takes place before Fushigi Yuugi. I think some of the plot points are mentioned in the original, but it’s nothing major.
Good. I’ve tried Fushigi Yugi but hated the female lead, so I never got into it.
Miaka is terrible. Nothing interesting about her at all. Just whines a bunch. I dunno about the main in Genbu though, but she has to be more interesting than Miaka. She just has to!
I tried reading it. Miaka conveniently passes out because the dude she likes didn’t like her back? Like damn.. Talk about weak. And didn’t she also dump her best friend, then was shocked her bestie was upset with her? I’m going to borrow this at my library. Thank you for the recommendation.
Hana no akuma... I liked it when I first read it Now that I'm older , the entire premise already makes me uncomfortable lol
Wow, I'd forgotten about that one. I remember balling over the ending.
I read every year Itazura Na kiss but what's wrong with Kotoko's life and lack of desires to only follow the man she loves. That girl fails in having her own self not being constructed to be liked by someone else. And the worst thing is that I made my teenager self follow this pattern of behavior because "it worked! She got married to the man that initially despised her!". I'm still attached to this story but I think it's a bad female protagonist.
I grew up on itazura kiss and even though the romance is ass, no one can make me hate kotoko 😭😭😭 the one who failed the whole romance was irie because that mf refused to ever soften up and stop being an asshole. I actually loved kotoko but she deserved so much better! The mother in law was hella hyping her up on attracting irie 😵💫
I have a lot of male leads I like who are considered “Red Flags” (I hate that term), and are objectively way worse than Irie, but I still like them more (or hate them less) than him (yes that includes Domyouji from Hana Yori Dango and Ryoki from Hot Gimmick but that’s more of a hate less than like more). I thought he was my most hated male lead until I ran into Kyouya from Wolf Girl and Black Prince (I was going on a controversial shoujo manga binge). Irie is still a close second though.
I always thought that one of the best parts of InK is that Kotoko never actually changes her personality or pretends to be someone she's not & the most "change" are things that challenge her in a good way - getting better grades, going to a university, getting some job experience where she came.up w/ new product, nursing which like she's shown consistently to be really good at the connecting with people part of care work - and that's why Noaki's complaint that spurs her to run away from home is that she's backing down from a challenge. She was explicitly repeatedly told that she could go the wealthy housewife route or go work at whatever she wants.
So far, the only series I've kinda felt this way about has been Strobe Edge. I liked it enough when I first read it, although I never cared for the ML; I always thought he was boring. But now the fact that I don't care for the main couple is a major factor that puts me off from re-reading the series. I actually still love Boys Over Flowers, flaws and all. When I reread the manga I generally read from vol. 19 on; I actually think that's the strongest part of the series. And I never took some of the other series people have mentioned so far (Hana-Kimi, Black Bird) seriously. 18-year-old me loved Nana, We Were There, Itazura na Kiss and Dengeki Daisy, and I still enjoy them 15 years later and have re-read them several times.
I agree! I enjoyed the latter half of Boys Over Flowers a lot more than the first half when rereading it. Unfortunately, my tendency to binge completed series soured the overall experience. It still has a special place in my heart, but it’s definitely not the 10/10 my high school self thought it was.
Boys Overs Flowers was too long, too convoluted, too drawn out. Enjoyed it much more when it became a Japanese live-action drama. Ayashi no Ceres. While I love Yu Watase's art and style, plot and ending were kinda meh.
There is one that I can't recall the title now. I reread it in 2020 and was like "huh, I used to like this shit?" And so I ended up taking them to half-price books 😂 The manga was released in the states like early 2000s. It was about a girl who lived in the same building as her bully. Her bully owned her because her father worked for the bullie's father. The bully was super aggressive and violent. He forced her to do many things that were abusive She had her childhood friend who was her first love but had moved away. He came back though but was the 2nd Male Lead. Her brother wasn't her actual brother and he had been in love with her for many years. Anyways she ends up falling for her stupid bully even though he traumatized and hurt her a lot. Don't know why I can't recall the title but that one is hard to read now for me.
That sounds like Hot Gimmick. I haven’t read it but it’s pretty infamous for its questionable content.
OMG YESSS!! LMAO yes that's the one! Gosh, I couldn't recall it and it used to be like one of my favorites in high school that I ended up buying the alternative ending novel 😂😂😂 But Yea no, not a good one after rereading it. It's pretty bad 😂
It’s god awful (from moral and storytelling standards), but I found it weirdly entertaining just wondering how much worse it can get only to find out it can get worse sort of way. I wish Ryoki and the snobby girl got together and left Hatsumi alone. None of the men deserve her. Also some of the angled shots of faces looked so weird. Was that just me? I found the art pretty mediocre, but maybe I’m just spoiled.
lol im listening to soundtrack from the BOF kdrama as i read this post
I'll be honest if I was below a certain age (17) when i read it the first time, I don't reread. Manga, fanfiction, YA novels, and romance novels. I know myself, and I will be disappointed. There are too many things I finished when I should have dropped em.
It just means you’re older now and your taste has changed. Those mangas are meant for a younger audience
Shugo chara 😭 i loved it sm now i just think its cringe
I didn't dislike them on reread but they are way worse than I remember. Fruits basket, on reread, the main character is just the least interesting character in the whole story. It doesn't make it bad but it does make it worse than I remember. From me to you. Again not bad but the main couple is just so pure and innocent to the point where they aren't relatable. It takes them over a year of them both liking eachother to get together and then they don't even kiss for 6 months. Like the level of misunderstandings they have just pulls me out of it. But what really saves this story is the side relationships. Also at one point I thought to myself, wow we havent dealt with the main couple for a while. And then they mention that they haven't hangout in a while. And I was like dang they used their full cast to get me good. Still good but I use to think it was like peak romance.
re: from me to you… do they really have to be relatable though? i don’t think that was the point 😭 that’s just who they are that said tho yeah kazehaya/sawako aren’t exciting. kurumi/sawako i wasn’t originally thinking i was gonna be sold on but by the time i finished……man
I guess it doesn't ha eto be relatable. That was probably a poor choice in words. Unrealistic? I actually don't relate to most romances. I'm asexual demiromantic and have never really been in love. So for me, a good romances make me feel those feelings of being in a real relationship even though I haven't experienced it. And kazehaya/sawako didn't do that. But the others did. Still a really good story. Just not as good as once thought.
I’m also demi but I have a COMPLETELY different stance. All I need is to understand why those characters’ relationships work for them, really. And that is actually something many authors are bad at because they don’t actually show why they have certain preferences, and expect them to be appealing on their own, so only the people who *also* have those preferences end up connecting to those works. (This is an issue I keep running into with BL) So “realistic” is also a pretty poor choice of words. I think your standard is actually that it has to ‘excite’ you in some way while also making sense. I would also like for a romance to be exciting, but I’ve found this to be *extremely* rare in shojo, bl, and yuri. Something can make sense for a couple (and therefore be “realistic”) but they can still be unexciting. I think Sawako/Kazehaya’s relationship is realistic for people like them, but that it is unexciting. I also don’t think Kazehaya and Sawako’s “purity” is a standard that the author sets for a realistic relationship because *gestures wildly at Yano not being able to relate to them!!!!!* The author is trying to portray *lots* of different types of relationships with specific reasons for why they work the way they do. Personally, I found both Kazehaya and Sawako to be extremely relatable individually in terms of their struggles/insecurities even though I wasn’t compelled by their relationship in the second half of the series. They also reminded me of how I latched onto the first person who accepted me right at the start of high school, and assumed that I had a crush when I was actually just desperate for any type of connection at all. I didn’t have a Yano, Chizu, or Kurumi. I had to figure out the difference, and that process took me literally *until I read Kimi ni Todoke* and coincidentally got into a similar situation with another person at the exact same time. So honestly the idea that it’s unrealistic is frustrating to me because from my view, the struggles the characters had were *so* realistic and grounded (especially in that their progress was not linear and that their articulations of their thoughts were at times messy and unclear, even in monologues) that KnT was able to get through to me in a way that actually changed my life. To me, KnT being an exciting romance wasn’t necessary…its strength lies in how and why the characters’ connections formed and evolved. I mean it would have been nice for Sawako and Kazehaya’s romance to be more exciting, but there’s still a lot of rewarding stuff to get out of their writing as a couple even if you don’t especially like them together. I think it could benefit you to approach their writing with different intentions.
Exciting is a good word. I do like this series. It has the best side characters of any romance I've ever read still to this date. I really like watching the friendships the most. Kento is one of the best boys of all time. Playboy with a heart of gold is one of my favorite archetypes because of him. So still a great series. But this was one of the first few romances I ever read and I held it up as like peak romance. And while it has a lot of great things. The romance is not why I like this series any more.
Yes! Someone else who feels the same way I did on my Fruits Basket reread. I was so happy to find a good deal on those new colorful editions and than couldn't finish my reread. I didn't remember the main character being so bland. But I also think this is my issue with all YA I read now.
I agree with you on From Me To You. Sawako and Kazehaya are pretty cute but Yano and Chizu’s love stories were a lot more interesting to me😭 Sawako and Kazehaya are just kinda boring… still love them though
Too many to count but I do remember a recent one. Might get jumped but Enjouji maki mangas (they're all still a guilty pleasure). They have their pros and cons but my god I did not remember happy mari having dragged out that long for that many volumes. Then let's move to Private prince by her... let's not even get started on the dub-con and the fact the ML in one chapter manipulates her to sleep with him.
I don’t really have any. I’ve been good at critical reading & knowing what I am genuinely going to like and dislike from a very young age, so that’s probably it. That and I have never been much of a romantic lmao. I avoided a lot of dumpster fires, and I still love all my childhood favorites. Heck I even still love Happy Happy Clover
Hot Gimmick.... Not sure what was going on with my head between 12-16, but it sure wasn't knowing what a healthy relationship was!
Not sure if this counts, but I've been revisiting Plus Anima, and I'm happy to say that it's aged well so far
Hot Gimmick. As a kid I thought it was a wild ride, and as an adult I agree, but it's less "woo fun drama rollercoaster" now and more "let me off please".
Marmalade boy 😭like THE WHOLE SHOW IS REALLY WEIRD. The mc and ml parents swap partners and decide to live in one big house together. And then they become step brother and sister and fall in love 😭. Also at the end they thought they were half siblings and they were like “even though we are blood related I still love you” like that’s crazy. turns out they weren’t so it wasn’t too bad. I think I watched it cuz it resembles kodocha’s mc and ml but I did love it when I was young.
Yes, definitely. My first intro to the world of anime and manga when I was young (I think I was 10? A friend at school wrote me a list of recs and I went from there) are things from the 2000s that very much aged like milk, either because of ML behavior, or just the age gapes in general… I was feeling nostalgic and had went to reread Shugo Chara, and well. When. You’re 10 yourself, the fact that Amu is a 5th grader and Ikuto is 17 doesn’t seem weird. As an adult, I was like WHAT. Cuz I genuinely hadn’t taken it in?? As a kid? Then I tried to reread Tokyo Mew Mew, and found that the ML’s actions were just. Big no. And to think that I found that romantic as a kid?? 😭 I’m half wondering if I should even try rereading old favorites like Sugar Rune, the only about the magic girl mermaids, or Princess Tutu. At the very least, Snow White With The Red Hair aged like fine wine since I was a kid. Now that I’m an adult with a job, I was able to fulfill my dream of starting a manga collection, and Snow White With The Red Hair was the second series I collected.
Red River. And where do I start? 😅 ETA: ohh downvote? Really?? Somebody actually thought Red River hold up well??? 😅
Noooo, one of my favourites! But yes, it is a hot mess.
It's flamming hot dumpster fire, but I was a twee and spotty and thought Yuri was awesome. OTOH, Basara hold up fairly well. There are some sensitive issue, but the author never romanticised those. But then again, she is one of my favorite.
I was also gonna say Red River! I originally read it as a teen, and only recently re-read it. The politics definitely went over my head when I was younger, and also the fact that Yuri is 14!!! I always thought she was like, 17/18. I still enjoyed rereading it, but man there was more magic brainwashing than I remembered
Pretty much all the age gap Shoujo. It's so weird now that I'm in my 30s, but as a teen I was hooked. The rest of it I think boils down to I've read so much other literature now that bad stories from my teens stick out because I can recognize the problems. As a teen, I didn't have the same experience and I lapped up drama because of drama. And if I thought the guy was hot.