This one got me a few times.
Don’t let the cute style fool you, this is a legit tragedy.
The story follows life of Mii-chan through eyes of Yamada. Yamada is a college girl that’s also working in a hostess club, when Mii-chan comes to work there.
Mii-chan is…. Special. She is 21 and what you would call an arrested development person. But she’s also eternally positive, cute, authentic, silly, childish, and as result, she is popular enough to keep working in the club.
Through the chapters we learn more about her life and past.
I liked the art. It may be simple and a bit crude, but it’s cute, and this cuteness only plays in the tragic backdrop of this manga.
Mii-chan’s character design is also spot on, cute and tiny but with wide lost eyes and a mischievous rabbit lip, she is one unique character.
The nature of tragedy in this manga is the looming sense of dread what is going to happen to Mii-chan as she cluelessly and positively waltzes through life, completely oblivious and naively forgiving of the dangers around her. She is even incapable of drawing conclusions from her past horrors. And that’s the saddest thing.
In Cutie-Mutie, another cutely drawn but tragic manga, the characters at least had a normal presence of mind to understand their own situation and some to try to fight. But Mii-chan doesn’t. she’s not born with the capacity to understand and capacity to fight. It’s like her mind is frozen at 5 years old in a positive mindset.
And Yamada and manager of the club find themselves powerlessly watching from the sidelines as Mii-chan slowly dances herself into danger, not being able to really do anything.
Tragedy in this manga hits faster than Truck-kun. You will NOT see it coming. One page is normal, another is – boom.
Oh and the manga ain’t shy about this being a tragedy. End of ch. 1 already spells it out clearly, to the point i was wondering why.
But for all her cuteness and innocence, sex plays a big role in Mii-chan’s life. She has a very casual and nondiscriminatory approach to sex.
She is also working as a prostitute on the side whenever money is tight, increasing the danger factor due to her own gullibility. >!
But whats truly heartbreaking are her quotes:
I know everyone is looking down on me. Only during sex are we equal.
They tell me nice things and praise me and tell me i’m soft.
I just gave him a blowjob and problem solved, no police (for shoplifting).
UGH
!
Anyways, this one gave me mixed feelings because i don’t like tragedy.
But I gave it an 8 because it truly deserves an 8, from the topic itself, it's main character being so unusual, to mastery of dread and cuteness that pulls at the heartstrings of anyone with a conscience. While not a top-notch manga, it is definitely a very good one, regardless of whether I liked the genre or not.
for anyone looking for similar manga, I can recommend (from most to least dark) "Dansei Kyoufushou datta Watashi ga AV Joyuu ni Naru made no Hanashi", "Ai to Yoroi", "Cutie Mutie", and even Former prostitute becomes a rich wife". But beware, first two are really really dark and desperate, they make Mii-chan look like a school field trip.
ADDENDUM:
Azuki Nene, the manga-ka, worked in a hostess club herself and said that "while there was a Mii-chan that serves as inspiration for the character, everything else about the story is fictional."
Um, I'll go and doubt that. Unless she is dark inside, I find it hard to believe that our young author would be like: ah yeah, i remember this quirky girl from the club, let's make a characted inspired by her and make her suffer horribly and make a tragedy out of her life. why? dunno, i just felt like it."
As someone who red "Former prostitute becomes a rich wife" and "Ai to Yoroi", i have a nose for autobiographic manga. And this feels very biographic in it's details. Not completely, perhaps, but definitelly some 40-50%. which is a lot, when you look at the content. Plus, being set in 2012 is a dead give-away: why anchor a fictional, non-nostalgic story at an exact date in the past? why not make it contemporary? the date is a second give away in my opinion.
So, i think most of this stuff really happened to real Mii-chan, this story IS Mii-chan's life story as well as a hommage, only the author said it wasn't (for now) because she didn't want people sniffing around her past and the hostess club and the like and trying to find Mii-chan's grave.
This is only my speculation, but it seems plausible.
(+4)
