Generic shoujo imo. I mean, don't get me wrong - it's cute. But the tropes...well, they're not all necessarily bad tropes, but they're old, and stale.

Cute aspects:

- their friendship. Take the "romantic" parts out, and their bond is heartwarming and very nice to see in action. If they were the same sex or gay, then their relationship would be a very sweet, supportive, caring friendship.

- the panda dog.

- the fluffy art, which looks very 2010ish.

- the adults are pretty good adults, so far. Excluding the perv moments with his dad when they were ten.

Hackneyed aspects:

- The main character. She's a cute female lead with a good heart. Her redeeming qualities are her kindness and friendliness. She has terrible grades, and terrible logic/reasoning skills. She's slow when it comes to love, and just dense in general. She's also incredibly pure and innocent, to the point of naïveté, which contrasts with the "knowledge" and maturity of the male lead(s). She often needs someone to rescue her from unfortunate situations, and it's usually the love interest(s). She is short/small/petite, and often mistaken for a child.

- the sexualization of minors and lowkey sexual harassment. The male lead displays an interest in gravure/magazines with nudity when they're ten. Ten years old. And thus begins the MC's complex about being "flat chested" as he teases her and she frets over not being curvy before even hitting puberty. I'm not even going to touch on the uncomfortable scene with the high school girls and the male lead flipping their skirts. Not to mention the scene where the male lead is framed to "rescue" her from a potential, adult pedophile. They're both ten. Anyway, the "flat-chested" jokes continue into high school, as does the body complex.

- the comedy and impotence of female fury. This is a thing in shounen, seinen, and josei, too, but it's still frustrating to see. Whenever the lead gets offended by something the male lead says, she "cutely" rages and hits him.

- the "walk into bathroom while they're showering/getting out of the shower" thing. Old, overdone. So many better, more nuanced ways to cause the love interests to see each other as more than friends, but instead...this trope.

- the physically-assault-her-to-prove-how-defenseless-she-is trope, where the guy gets jealous and/or angry and pretends to attack her to prove a point. Usually comes right after he sees her with another guy, as it was in this series. Kind of like a "See? You need me" and a "this is how scary boys can be" thing when the female lead says she can take care of herself.

- the depiction of boys being overly focused on the female body, and boobs being the only thing they care about. The encouraged alienation of boys and girls, and the idea that they're irreconcilably different is stupid and damaging, to all parties involved. I'm not saying youngs boys/girls don't have hormones and don't think about bodies sexually, especially when hormones kick in, but there's this exaggerated focus on women's bodies as objectified parts to be fetishized (boobs, legs, arse, etc). It also contributes to the desensitization towards sexual harassment/assault, bc "that's just how boys are/how boys think" and you can't change that. But I'll stop myself here. Basically, the male lead is shown as thinking about boobs whenever he's not rescuing the female lead or making fun of her figure.

And there's more, but...it's basically just exactly the same things we've all seen in older shoujo. Which sucks, because this is marketed towards young girls, and some of these tropes are genuinely screwed up and harmful.

Stale ideas and harmful tropes, but there's not anything particularly bad about this series. Unfortunately, there's nothing particularly unique about this series, period, good or bad.

... Last updated on April 28th, 2018, 3:37pm

I feel for the mc in this manga. She is earnestly trying to earn the male lead's affection but it's hard to read when the boy is showing affection for someone else. I've been there before and yeah it hurts. But since it is shoujo you can say without a doubt they will be together and I thank the scanlations for doing so much thus far. I look foward to seeing the main characters growing individually and also as a couple.

... Last updated on March 15th, 2015, 2:47pm

I've read up to the latest raw released of this series and the heroine's situation is totally opposite of what is stated in the summary (except the lover part I guess... and the childhood friend).

Anyway this is another childhood friend unrequited love story BUT at the same time it is not your typical childhood friend love story because the author (thanks goodness) decided to replaced what you usually detest on those stories and replaced it with good stuff.

As of chap11, I'm really loving this. Koharu is lovable. I like that she doesn't dwell much on the negative part of her unrequited love but she tries her best to find the positive part on it. The main hero Natsuki is also a great guy, we might not know if he loves Koharu or not (that's not a fault, everyone is free to love whoever they want, that not a crime, don't hate him for it!) however he had proven multiple times that Koharu is a very important childhood friend. The side cast are also wonderful and interesting.

What I like most in this series is that the pacing is good, the story doesn't dwell much on the usual drama this type of stories faces but shortens it and takes on a positive root. I really can't tell how this story will end, the author has shown so many possibilities with the plot and right now I'm just looking forward to the next released.

I recommend this to people who likes this type of stories because you will enjoy reading this! And to people who read this type of stories in the past but got tired of all the cr*p the heroine normally has to take from the hero and now stays away from it. Don't worry Natsuki is awesome, he acts the way a friend is supposed to act, he really cares for Koharu.

... Last updated on November 1st, 2012, 4:58pm