note: this review will contain some general spoilers for the series. click the spoiler tag below for detailed trigger warnings that cover the series but contain more significant plot spoilers. if youre especially sensitive to this stuff be careful because this manga packs a real emotional wallop. now onto the review: from the very beginning of this manga i was skeptical. more than skeptical i was prepared for the worsti only picked it up out of morbid curiosity of sorts. now after my second readthrough this time in the original japanese ive decided to finally give this manga the review it deserves. from the description alone this seemed like it would be at best a tepid psychosexual lolita narrative. it set itself up that way at first in retrospect very purposefully soit is a deconstruction at heart after all. the first couple chapters give relatively little insight into hibari as a character the opinions of the people around her are essentially presented as facts about her. when her adult cousin mentioned early on that hibari had a crush on him i took his word for it because well thats what happens in these kinds of stories isnt it? perhaps im jaded from too many disappointing romanticized incest subplots but i couldnt even bring myself to be surprised. and yet there is something deeply ominous stirring between the lines from the very beginning. the unsettling looming shadow of a man on the very first page of the story. her cousins retrospective mantra: i always overlook the important stuff. i could sense that something was a little different here. so i kept reading. and then at the end of chapter two the reader gets their first insight into the actual personality of the supposedly shy sensual hibarichan: 500https://66.media.tumblr.com/d3fdd840bf97ef4c0a95b4b033c1a713/tumblrpp5sl5ZsNW1rsbiwyo11280.png yeah. and things only get darker from there. this story goes on to explore the variety of roles that adults play in the sexual victimization of young girls both through their actions and more strikingly their inaction. women see hibari as the other woman an object of jealousy and competition. men see her as the quintessential slutty schoolgirl an object of desire and temptation. no one sees her as a child in need of protectionat least no one who bothers to take responsibility and act on it. unfortunately everything about this rings disturbingly true to life. one of the most remarkable things i noticed about this manga was how organic the characters voices felt. huge kudos to the translators for this tooyamashita obviously has a real gift for writing natural dialogue and using it as a tool to delve into the intricacies of her characters psyches but that sort of thing is very often lost in translation. this wasnt at all the case here though. all the grammatical and tonal nuances were kept remarkably intact across the language barrier: the fearful hesitancy the lackadaisical teenaged chatter the dissociative apathy the vindictive anguish. as someone whos dabbled in manga translation myself i know exactly how hard that can be so color me impressed. another thing i want to bring up is the artwork. while for the most part the style itself is fairly standard for josei the mangaka pays very particular attention to the facial expressions and body language of her characters. hunched shoulders fidgeting hands thousandyard stares. this is especially significant for this story where so much is being left unsaid and what is said is often based off of misinterpretations of facial expressions and body language. appearance is everything here: what we choose to see is what we believe. so when people talk about how hibari looks a certain way the author takes care to explore what that actually means. its lampshaded quite clearly with this line when a male character finally comes to realize in hindsight that his belief in her sexual attraction to him was entirely the product of his own delusions his sexualization of her making him see desire where there was none. https://66.media.tumblr.com/048b202ac8b4f52e4efa3b128a46141b/tumblrpp5sl5ZsNW1rsbiwyo2r11280.jpg honestly this is the only manga ive ever seen explore the issue of the male gaze with such clarity. there is a significant flaw that comes to mind however significant plot spoiler below: like i said in the beginning i was expecting this manga to rely on schoolgirl sexuality for psychological titillation like so many other manga and anime and books and moviesthis isnt just a problem in japan have before it. instead it turned out to be a chillingly realistic tale of the deep tole that institutionalized misogyny and rape culture take on young girls. in a medium that is especially rife with the hypersexualization of schoolchildren this is the first manga ive seen take such an explicitly condemnatory tone on the matter. it is heartening to see that there are such talented and opinionated creators doing their part to push back against this issue. make no mistake thoughwhile this story makes no secret of its social commentary it isnt some sort of lifeless cardboard cutout social awareness piece. its a deeply nuanced incredibly moving strikingly wellwritten and wellillustrated story. it just happens to also be a story with something very important to say.