stressedpenguin's manga / #not BL(84)

It's like... a found family but the found family kinda sucks? The ending was super solid and sweet and I did cry. But I also couldn't shake just how selfish and genuinely mean the cats have been to Yukiharu like this whole time? They really do treat him like a servant and have only made his life miserable... Also his dad really sucked Idk man. Wasn't really what I'd hoped it'd be. 5/10

Country boy's bias from his favorite idol group moves in next door suddenly. It's clear the idol is burnt out and our MC wants to help. After a bit of a rocky start, they start becoming friends. Update ch 15. THAT'S THE END?? Okay. Okay ima rant for a sec cuz that's wilddddd Personally, I really like the friendship as a friendship and wouldn't have minded that it stayed that way IF the story wasn't relying heavily on classic BL tropes especially in those last few chapters. Escpailly the takeout girlfriend. The ending only felt abrupt to me because they were setting up a confession that never came. If the author never intended this to be a romance... I guess you could still argue it is, but because every romance story has a confession, not having one or at least an equivalent act becomes disqualifying... Anyway. After centuries of romance coding everything, we've all been trained or hardwired to read romance into everything. It's why characters that dont remotely interest or genuinely despise each other get shipped. People are just like this. Authors have to actively counterbalance tropes that are romantically coded to temper their readers expectations, not lean into them. At least half of us shouldn't be expecting a BL when it's a story about friendship. I prefer platonic relationships and think it's a shame that intimate male platonic relationships are so rare in stories of all mediums. I would've love this story if it was clearly about that. But it wasn't. This was just bait Ummmmm so that leaves me conflicted for the score. On the one hand I really enjoyed this cute, slice of life, friendship and healing story. But on the other hand, this wasnt just delusional yaoi fans thinking it was BL, in story elements were telling you it was BL. So like...mmmmmmm 6/10. Would've been a 7 or 8 but the ending realllly pissed me off

Did not expect that to go as hard as it did when I clicked on this. Banger. Fucking banger of a story. I'm so glad I gave this a shot. 8 or 9/10

Hitman turned otaku, the wacky group of just as dangerous characters who gather around him. We stan Viviana, work life balance QUEEN and audience surrogate fujoshi. AND there's no cannon romance ️ This was fun and a little sweet 7/10

Simultaneously adorable and wholesome and really fucking dark. 8/10??? 9/10???

That was not what I was expecting. That kinda... hit me harder than I expected?? Aikawa was really, truly keeping himself safe by having these silly, spontaneous phone calls with a friend he's known since elementary school. The chase sequence was a LITTLE goofy compared to the tone set, but it still made my stomach drop. Aikawa lived a hell of a life This was good. 7/10

Hardass CEO turns out to be a major masochist and really wants his happy go lucky new secretary to step on him. Pretty cute ye 6 or 7/10

Wow. That made my heart ache in a way I wasn't prepared for. The manga is generally about the lives and struggles of various women. The stories are tied together by the women's connection to Yukko (Yukiko?), our focus character, one way or another. And it's just raw. Like it's just so...human. and so its messy and raw and painful at times but highly cathartic. Warning for chapter two (?). It's definitely a story of its time. One of the male characters is sexually assaulted by a female student, and the story doesnt even recognize that its sexual assault. It was pretty rough to get through. Though the manga isnt ABOUT misogyny or the patriarchy or living as a women in a man's world, those things have a tangible impact on these women's lives. This story is about showing you the women as people, and the problems a misogynist society are just there because they're there. I'm struggling to articulate my thoughts, but hopefully I got it out clear enough that you'll understand. 8/10

Last read ch 2. It is what it says on the tin I don't really have much to say about this one.