beta
Just want to list out some negatives to get them off my chest because I was quite hopeful about this and have ended up disappointed. I know a lot of people are enjoying this and I don't want to dampen your enjoyment (nor be disrespected for validly expressing my opinions).
- Why does the solution to a problem with a man (the stalker) have to be solved by relying on a man? Urgh. Not just within the story, but as a plot decision at all. I do get that manga creators are always coming up with ridiculous reasons to throw the main couple together, but this story is making a big deal about men looking down on women and having a strong female lead, and then makes this fake marriage the premise for the rest of it. It's also a really bad trait that many men have to not respect women saying no unless they already have a boyfriend - as if we're obliged to be with them unless another guy already has dibs. So, I doubly would've liked to see her solve that problem on her own, even if it was because she gained some support when she returned to her family home. I'm honestly not really enjoying them having to pretend to be married at all, I think they could've had a good cohabitation and faux-to-real family story without it, but at the least they could simply have had Futaba somehow misunderstand and then they went along with it so she felt secure, rather than have it start as a solution to get a stalker off her back.
- There hasn't been a character so far in this story who doesn't just jump around doing and saying whatever they want or deciding what others are like without considering anybody's feelings. It's really frustrating. Don't drag people into a lie, throw don't throw people about if you don't like what they're doing, don't force people to be together, don't force people to hug/kiss etc. MC, ML, child, brother, friend, neighbours, media people etc etc. It's making the story feel really rushed and inconsidered.
- Uh. She's fallen in love with him why? Because he's a rude, discriminatory, uncommunicative, judgemental prick but he cares about tea and threw her one or two unsexist comments. Guess that's one way to get her to lower her standards. And yes, I know he's of course a good guy because he's the male lead, but I'd like to actually properly see it if she's going to become devoted so easily, not just him mostly being awful but - oh, he meant well. This manga is like some self-conscious feminism from the 80s written by men. It has well-intentioned ideas, but it thinks by showing how men can discriminate against women, by having a plucky "strong-willed" female lead, and then having a guy say one time that he doesn't care about her being male or female he just looks at her as a person, suddenly we've achieved some wonderful equality. In the meantime the female lead has fallen in love and is only motivated 40% by fixing her family legacy and 60% by impressing the guy she loves and supporting him in his work. Which is always a FINE option for a woman to choose, but hardly a new or particularly empowering path to show. I'm just a bit disappointed. (As a side note, I kept hoping she'd come along and have insight and skill from growing up in a tea-making family that she could use to teach him what he's still lacking in tea-making. But oh well.)
- Can we just SLOW the hell down a little? One of the reasons I have all these issues above is that there isn't a lot of time spent on anyone's thoughts or reasons, apart from the MC's recent reflections on her unconvincing new feelings of love and devotion. It feels like they only met four days ago and he's barely treated her like a person more than a few fleeting times. Merely being treated like a person is just basic, it's not romantic. I don't know, everything just feels really rushed and chaotic. I wouldn't mind some if the actions and decisions characters are making if I could see a little more intelligence, common sense and consideration.
I think there are probably more things and things I could have explained better, but I'm just sort of thought dumping in an effort to process why I'm a little disappointed in this. I can see its potential but sadly this is not it for me.
If you actually read this, um...good job? I'm sorry? If you disagree, that's fine, I don't really mind, it's perfectly valid for people to take different things away from the same piece of media. I'm happy people have something they enjoy reading and that the the scanlators' efforts haven't gone unappreciated.