Marsh's manga / #comedy(43)

Phenomenal art, interesting and captivating characters, incredible flow to the plot, a bit silly at times but it's well-balanced by the more serious and heavy moments. Definitely one I'd read multiple times.

This was incredible. Beautiful art, as per usual with this author, and a story with a wonderful constant, underlying bittersweet feel to it. We learn a lot about the characters, and their interactions feel natural and organic, the realistic feeling peek into the world of sex work was refreshing and entertaining. The ending was phenomenal however, with all but one member of the cast moving on with their lives, and then later they reunite and we can see how that final person's perspective had been changed due to their unwillingness to move on, allowing them to start a new life though it will never be quite the same. Bittersweet is a perfect word to describe this story; nothing is too gritty and nothing is ignored for the sake of positivity, we as the audience can see both the good and the ugly sides of these characters and their lives and behaviours they exhibit, how they affect the world around them and in turn are affected by the world. I can see myself coming back to read this one again.

All in all a good story, though it didn't quite manage to grip me due to how the pace was kind of slow with not that much growth or development in the story. The couple is nice, the story is good, I like seeing the return of a couple from another manga, but it just struggled to keep my attention since the story was just strolling from chapter to chapter. He revealed his crush in chapter one, and then every chapter after that is him trying to give excuses for why his crush likes him back and doubting the other boy's feelings, and since it's all kind of one note it just wasn't that gripping. There are fun moments which made picking the story back up worth it though, but I can't in good confidence give it more than a 3 stars just due to how mild the story is.

The story started out decent and promising, but it reached a point where the quality just started careening off a cliff. Plot points get ignored and forgotten left, right and centre, and the ultimate chemistry between the 3 characters isn't fleshed out or satisfying. The main character is so hot and cold with whether he's competent or an idiot, whether he's tolerant or fed up, he's just wishy washy all over. Any depth of the father and son's history and relationship gets thrown out the window, any possible built-up intrigue is left to rot, and in the end they feel so flat and almost even regressing in quality. The story starts trudging through dramatic obstacles, like a trashy soap opera which throws spanners into the mix because they can't be bothered or know how to write anything with a satisfying build-up and pay off. I swear the art also started dipping in quality as well, and the art is the only positive thing saving this from a 1 star. It can be a funny read at times but not in a way that hooks me, and that sucks because initially this story was very fun to read.