by Dubby on July 13th, 2008, 9:56pm

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User rating of this review - N/A out of 5
Story/Plot - 4.5 out of 5
Characters - 5 out of 5
Drawing Style - 5 out of 5
Enjoyment - 5 out of 5
Overall - 5 out of 5

Click here for series information

Plot/Story

Hana-Kimi is about this Japanese-American chick named Ashiya Mizuki who idolizes this high jumper Izumi Sano after seeing him on TV once. She wants to meet him, but Sano attends an all-boy's school in Japan, so she has to disguise herself as a guy to see him.

Then, hilarity ensues when some people go "OMGLULZ" over her gender, especially Nakatsu, who thinks he's gay cause of it. Fuufuu. I loved the gender bender theme of this manga, and it's what sparked my gender bender obsession~ From what I've seen, most girl-into-boy-school gender benders came AFTER 1996 [when Sano was created], so I like to say Hana-Kimi was the "mother" of them. ;D Horray! I loved this manga's plot, but then again, it wasn't all "OMGWTFSUPERMEGAAMAZING", thus why I'm giving it a happy 4.5. It pains me, but...I must. ;_;

Characters

The Hana-Kimi characters I loved a lot. Mizuki is one of the few shoujo heroines I don't want to strangle to death. She's dense and naive, but there's the cute dense and the annoying dense (Hikari from SA, anyone?). Thankfully, Mizuki doesn't meet the standards for the latter.

Sano... whoa, man. Don't even get me started. I own a Sano pen, and srsly, anyone that touches it gets smacked. And posters of him. Mm Sano~ Yes, I loved Sano. He was by far my favourite character, and still is my favourite male lead in a shoujo. Ever. I thought he was an asshole at first, but after a while, I changed my mind and just wanted to cuddle up with him. He was so cute when he had his "moments". The nosebleed part... WHOAMAN. Total fangirl there yo. ;P

There were barely any characters I didn't like in this manga. They all had their good points. Nakatsu was the comic relief, and unlike many comic relief / stupid characters, he didn't annoy the living *bleep* out of me. The character development was meh, but the characters themselves were amazing enough to begin with that you just gotta love 'em~

Drawing Style

Okay, so, like many, I'm veryyy picky when it comes to art. I dropped many potentially good series cause the art sucked balls really bad [HYD... sorry >_>;]. Hana-Kimi though... it inspired me. ;P Maybe I'm being biased because I love it so much, but I did do a complete 360 on my art style after reading Hana-Kimi. ^^; I loved its art~ I srsly was inspired by it. >_>; I mean, how could I not? Sano was HOT. The males actually looked like males. And weren't drawn over-the-top bishielicious [well, most anyways]. And as the series progressed, the art only got better. ^_^ I just seriously loved the art style. The lines were so cleannn.

ENOUGH OF THIS. Art = good. Me = happy. Therefore, rating = 5.

Enjoyment

Do I even need to BEGIN at how much I enjoyed this series? I was reading this manga while I was on vacation without cash and rarely any Internet access. >_<; 3 weeks of pain that I crammed every single minute I had Internet access of to read this. If it wasn't for that one obstacle, I would've read the series in one sitting.

I wouldn't even be here if it wasn't for my impatience to read Hana-kimi [I did find scanlations in the first place cause of HK ;P]. Well, anyways, I loved this manga. I don't care if people say it dragged on too long. I was sad and depressed when the manga ended. ;_; I wanted MOAR Sano! I was head over heels in love with him. xD Yay for paper love! But I enjoyed this series more than I can express myself. >_< I've read it many many times, and I certainly will read it many many times again. :'D Never get tired of it~

Overall

Dude, if I didn't love Hana-Kimi as much as I do, I wouldn't even be here to begin with. -_- So honestly, if you haven't read it, go read it [I don't know why you'd be reading this in the first if you haven't already, but meh]. For those that have? Go read it again. Just stay away from Sano, or I might have to do something illegal... ;]

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