I'm an adult male and I like to read romance. Always have. Anyway, I started reading a new series about two childhood friends who don't realize their feelings yet. This is a very common plot line in manga, but it always annoys me. This new title that I've been reading only has 4 chapters out so far but the guy and girl have been together as best friends since birth. They just started high school and started to make new friends and have begun to talk to other members of the opposite sex. So basically the two main characters have spent the last 4 chapters spouting off lines like "Why did my heart beat fast when his face got close to mine", "Why do I not feel right when he talks to other girls", or "Why did I get so pissed off when I saw her talking to another guy", "Why did my chest hurt when he talked about a girl he met".

You know, I remember some of my first crushes from when I was a little kid and I never wondered what these weird feelings were. When I had my 1st crush, I knew right away that I liked her. I didn't walk around for six months asking myself why does my heart beat fast when she's near me. I never went to the nurse because I mistook a heartache for a cold. I just believe that when you like someone, you know it. You don't mope around for months at a time wondering what's wrong. I mean when you think about someone nonstop and you want to spend most of your time with, it means you like them, it's a no brainier.

It irritates me the way that manga drags out the not realizing their feelings thing for as long as possible. To me, it's too unrealistic. Do people that dumb really exist.

After reading this manga I've been talking about, it just started bothering me. I know it's stupid to be bothered by something like this. I know authors dumb down their characters so they can stretch the story out, anyway, that's for reading.

Jeffrey




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Jeffrey

I know, it annoys me too. I mean, if they're in highschool they should know if they love someone or not.

Same here. Very annoying. Almost all manga writters try to write off the childhood friend as just a friend. They come up with some ridiculous reason to seperate them or try to show feelings are not mutual when both go out of their way for each other. Whats more annoying is in almost all manga the childhood friend that is left behind ends up with the the person who is hitting on her constantly when she deserves better instead of waiting for the right person the appear. In manga where where childhood friends become a couple there will be alot of drama alot of which are not realistically possible between close childhood friends.

I am happy with Happy Marriage. That represents how true childhood friends are like.

In reality a childhood friend always has the upperhand in a relationship even if the other doesn't have the same feelings yet or not ready yet. If one confesses the other would obviously oblige and feel its not so bad and try to forget about the crush if the other isn't a jackass.

Last edited by RS456 at 3:04 pm, Dec 31 2012

Bwahahaha! Now that you bring it up: yes, going to the nurse over lovesickness is rock-bottom bad. That's one of those "jump the shark" moments for me. If a series is willing to dumb-down its characters to the extent that they think a crush = a cold, then it's destined to keep making them unforgivably stupid.

But yeah, I totally agree. People figure it out pretty quickly when they've got a crush. If they're going to be in denial, there's got to be a pretty serious reason for it (like having feelings for the same sex when you don't want to admit you're gay, or falling for your best friend's boyfriend, or getting a crush on someone when you're already dating someone else, etc.) Liking someone who likes you back is not a reason for denial.

In my opinion, if a mangaka wants to drag a relationship out, the best way to go isn't to have the characters be in denial forever, but to come up with real-life plot complications preventing them from being together. (And something better than a love triangle, please!) Stuff I've seen that I liked was when the main character had family problems, so that took precedent over him/her figuring out his/her romance problems. Or when both characters no longer live close to one another, so the whole long-distance thing is an issue. In my opinion, those are the kinds of things readers can sympathize with because we've all dealt with them at one time or another. But I don't know anyone who's gone running to the doctor over arousal.