But anyways I don’t think people should be reading this expecting the story to suddenly be serious about its dark topics. It was hammered in pretty effectively for me seeing Kasuya making Kuzuya apologize for being raped in chapter 4 and everyone watching idly as Reo kisses him as he sobs and struggles. Harada is a uniquely self-aware BL artist and I think she knows very well how constantly injecting levity into Kuzuya’s abuse in a way makes HKL darker than many of her other works.
What I love about how Harada handles the long running Leo/Kuzuya rape joke is that she doesn't minimize the rape. The rape itself is not the punchline. Just look how graphic and violent Kuzuya's class race story is, it makes the viewers wince just as hard as it makes Kasuya wince.
The punchline is the aburdity of how Kuzuya's rape is handled, the way it doesn't get caught or punished, how Leo is so delulu that he thinks it love the whole time, and how because of it Kuzuya ends up screwing the whole family and now works for his rapist
"Comedy is tragedy plus time" (Mark Twain). "Comedy is merely tragedy happening to somebody else" (W.C fields)
Well actually Kuzuya's rape not being punished or caught isn't the comedic part (she doesn't depict that aspect as being funny)... but yeah, Harada's the goat
I agree! The dichotomy between the violence of what’s happening to Kuzuya vs the way it’s been normalized to everyone in the story is a deliberate attempt at absurd comedy on Harada’s part. Personally it’s not very funny to me at all and makes me quite sad, but what is funny is Harada’s commitment to being unserious while delivering such bleak material.
I like how Harada uses Kuzuya's trauma with Reo/Leo as a mirror for Kasuya's shittiness. When Kasuya's laughing at Kuzuya's expense or being envious of his dicking down by Reo/Leo, we're meant to feel disgusted with Kasuya. And it's fantastic when Harada makes a joke out of Kasuya's hypocrisy (Kasuya wetting his pants when actually man handled by Reo/Leo, despite proclaiming to be envious of Kuzuya). It's like a nice rebuttal of all those who minimize SA (kind of like a, experience it yourself and see if you can still feel the same type situation).
As for the other characters that are aware of the situation, namely Reo/Leo's family (or hole-family as Kasuya would say), it's implied that they are apologetic about what Reo/Leo did, hence the willingness to hire a NEET like Kazuya. Obviously that's not enough but it also seems like Kazuya doesn't seem interested in getting the justice he deserves...
Well, I guess the Dad was willing to hire Kuzuya even before finding out but overall based on the reactions during that whole family schbang it looked like they were apologetic (but unwilling to prosecute flesh and blood lol)
Yeah but definitely right that overall weak reactions from other characters to Reo/Leo's behavior towards Kuzuya shows how SA is kind of normalized by the characters themselves. But I'd like to think that Harada doesn't let us, the viewers, forget, because she fully shows Kuzuya's terror and aspects of his trauma. Definitely agree that the juxtaposition makes the manga darker.
I think it’s darkly funny that Harada has shown to have the writing ability to delve more seriously into Reo’s abuse of Kuzuya, since she’s made absolute psychological bangers, but deliberately chooses to keep writing the world’s longest rape joke. Like yes there TECHNICALLY could be a dialogue about how violence reshapes the body and how Kuzuya internalizes it to the point where it’s implied he seeks Reo out for physical pleasure because he’s accustomed to it. But Harada is like “Anyways guys here’s an eldritch god thing granting wishes. Kuzuya’s dick is 36 inches long all of a sudden.”