I read Ten Count for the first time as it was being released and reread it this weekend in preparation for the upcoming anime - I was not only surprised to find I hadn't reviewed it, but also to find many negative reviews. To me, this is one of those manga that makes you want to cry once you finish it, because you know it'll be years before you read anything this good, an easy 10/10. I hate to be this person, but I can only say the negative reviewers truly don't get it, and so my own review will mostly be about proving them wrong because I can't stand to see this manga's rating dropping so greatly.
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"It's not a comedy / fluffy"
No, it isn't indeed. Neither the cover nor the categories / genre suggest this would be the case.
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Comparisons to Seven Days:
Seven Days is NOT a series by Takarai Rihito, she only illustrated it. Unsurprisingly, I found Seven Days so unremarkable that I had to read my own review, where I say it's "too fluffy", so I guess if you were reading Ten Count expecting that, read my previous point.
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"A lot of sex scenes and not shounen-a"i:
It CLEARLY states it's yaoi.
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Comparisons to Fifty Shades Of Grey:
While that book is not the greatest example of good literature, it's misundertood in the same way as Ten Count. In both cases, it's very important to pay attention to the sex scenes because each time they happen, it develops the relationship in some way, so it's not just smut. With each time Shirotani and Kurose had any type of intimacy, their relationship either got better or worse, and no interaction is the same as before: there's (and I'll be explicit here, beware) jerking off, then a blowjob, then playing with as*, using a toy, regular sex, kissing, and finally sex WITH kissing.
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Concerns about dubcon and possible rape tendencies:
Consent is a key concept of the story: after the very fist conflict Shirotani and Kurose have, before which there had been no physical contact that wasn't necessary, Kurose tells Shirotani he's in love with him and won't be able to stop himself from touching Shirotani if they continue to be in contact - Shirotani willingly agrees to this, so it's to be assumed Kurose will be advancing their relationship, and Shirotani is on board with that. Then, the first sexual interaction Kurose has with Shirotani, which is licking his hand, isn't even SEXUAL per se, it's just made so because Shirotani is so sensitive to touch. Even then, Kurose ASKS if it feels disgusting, to which Shirotani doesn't reply, but gets immediately hard. Kurose then TELLS Shirotani he's going to jerk him off and Shirotani doesn't stop him. Shirotani is so aroused by this interaction that when he's on his way home he's STILL hard. The next time they see each other, Shirotani spends the entire time getting turned on by watching Kurose eat and then proceeds to TELL HIM he can't stop thinking about being touched by him. How is any of that anything less than consent?
So I think the point people are missing, which is leading them to believe it's assault or the same formula that has been done with other BL manga, is that there's a difference here: Shirotani WANTS to be touched, he is sexually attracted to Kurose from the get-go. However, because of his mysophobia, he has hesitations - so there's an internal conflict between his disorder and his feelings.
Thoughout the entire story, Kurose repeatedly asks Shirotani for consent for every single thing he's going to do, even something as simple as the kiss, and gives Shirotani every opportunity to stop him before he proceeds. In fact, this is one of the things I find sexiest about this manga - because Kurose doesn't want to do something Shirotani doesn't want, he frequenly stops what he was about to do and takes things slow, which, in turn, makes him a maaaaaaaaaajor tease and increases the sexual tension to a million.
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"Kurose is not a good therapist"
Kurose has at no point been Shirotani's therapist. Quite the opposite, one of the first things he tells Shirotani is that he doesn't want to assume this role (because he knows from the start he has personal reasons to get involved) and at the first sign that this is unethical and immoral (falling in love with someone you're helping psychologically and can manipulate), he backs out and tries to cut off contact. I'm not saying Kurose is perfect, because it's not entirely true he cut off contact because of those reasons alone, there was also the possessive part of him that didn't want Shirationi to actually get better and interact with other people, but to overcome his disorder only with him, which is hinted at very early on by his statement that "love is a sort of dependency". I find the fact that Kurose is twisted too to be delightful. It would be very boring if he was just a therapist trying to help his patient and then falling in love with him - and, incidentally, that would be even more unethical than the situation they found themselves in without being patient and therapist.
Now, onto my own opinions:
Something I loved about this series is that there aren't any villains - there isn't any cliche of someone else falling in love with one of the characters (Mikami is not just a friend, but a great one at that! And so is Shirotani's boss) or someone trying to separate them. Instead, their own feelings and traumas get in the way, which leads to a ton of miscommunication, lies and fear of admitting it to themselves and to the other one. This is my favorite type of conflict because it generates a lot of angst, and that is my favorite part about BL in general. The only time I wasn't crying reading this manga was when I was feeling... Something else smirks (and more on that later).
Though Kurose thinks the right thing to do is to distance himself from Shirotani, twice, that also causes Shirotani a lot of pain because he sees it as something cruel. Neither of them is right or wrong, and at the same time they're both right and wrong, because these are just different points of view - and isn't that super realistic? That's how life is, you do the best you can and sometimes that means hurting people, even if unintentionally.
To me, Shirotani is more cruel (as Kurose himself says many times), because he denies his feelings and tries to push Kurose away, and makes him patiently wait for Shirotani to come to terms with his own feelings.
I think there's a bit of a contrast of age, too - in spite of some reviewers saying the age gap is only 5 years. Yes, but Kurose is still in his mid-20s and Shirotani is 31. As such, Kurose is more impulsive and courageous, whereas Shirotani is more reserved and afraid of taking risks. I also really love when the seme is younger but has more experience, that's super hot.
On that note, after all these years, I can say I read BL more for the angst than for the smut because rarely do I find something truly sexy, but omg, if this wasn't one of the best sex in manga! I was so pleasantly surprised with how vocal Shirotani was when it came to his own needs! It's very rare to see the uke do that, and it's extremely sexy. I can visit those sex scenes again if I need a little incentive of my own hohohoho
Unrelated, another point I love is how Kurose remarks that progress with mysophobia isn't linear, and it really is the case throughout the story. While Shirotani is able to overcome a part of his list rather quickly, his interactions with Kurose cause him to wash his hands more frequently to the point that they bleed, and when they have their misunderstanding, his dependency on Kurose makes him go right back to zero, as he himself says. As twisted as the dependency is, I love a dark relationship like that.
Of course we couldn't tell this series was going to be 6 volumes from the start, but that in itself can now tell us how slow-paced it is (which is my preferred way for manga), but it was also quite obvious and to be expected: Shirotani had to go down his list; and we had hints since the beginning that both characters found themselves in the position they were in due to past trauma, which had to be resolved.
I was very pleased with the ending, but that's because it fulfills my own personal tastes - I don't like to read about other things that aren't the main characters' relationship when I'm reading BL, and the way Ten Count ends with Shirotani planning on rekindling his relationship with his father and Kurose getting to see what happened to Nishioka after all this time is perfect - I wouldn't be interested in seeing how those relationships progressed, so just the suggestion of closure is more than enough for me. Their pasts were based on those relationships with these people and made them into fully fleshed out characters, but this manga is, ultimately, about overcoming the trauma and getting to lead a normal life, so it wouldn't make sense for it to be brought back.
Similarly, the last chapter is left to our imagination, and while I would be lying if I said I wouldn't be dying to see all the ways that Shirotani would like to be touched by Kurose and how Kurose would make him beg for it (lo and behold, here's the ever-present theme of consent again), it was so in tune with the rest of the series that we didn't get to see it - though I wouldn't complain about a one-shot or some extras witht this content.
Finally, the art style is amazing, but that goes without saying. I think a lot of people didn't get that Kurose's expressionless face and Shirotani's child-like expressions were also key points, for many reasons. Kurose was raised by people who didn't care about him, so he, in turn, didn't care about anything. He is also a psychiatrist, so he obviously can't wear his heart on his sleeve because he can't give away what he's thinking so easily. Even then, if you pay close attention, you can see his smirks or how sad he is in certain scenes. Shirotani, on the other hand, was robbed of a happy childhood by his trauma, and deprived of touch as a consequence, so his expressions reflect that side of him that has never seen the surface until the story of this manga starts. I am so pleased when an author has even her art reflect the content of the manga, it's just brilliant and it bothers me greatly that a lot of people couldnt' see it.
I would definitely recommend this, I will be rereading it periodically until the end of time, as well as watching the anime.
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