Itazura na Kiss 3

Kaoru Tada – Digital Manga Publishing – 2010 – 23 volumes
This is an omnibus collecting volumes 5-6.

As I was perusing my to read pile, it occurred to me how lucky English-language manga fans are now. These Itazura na Kiss volumes are such a good value, and it makes me happy to be reading this series, with admittedly low consumer appeal, two volumes at a time for a few dollars more than one volume of most other series. I’ve heard people say that the US manga industry is in quite a slump, but if omnibuses of series like Itazura na Kiss (old), Inu-Yasha and One Piece (long), Fushigi Yugi (out of print), or Gunslinger Girl (just plain value and speed) are the result; I sincerely look forward to what the other side of a slump looks like after this.

Anyway, this is such a sweet series that it’s hard not to look on the bright side after finishing a volume. Not everything is rosy just yet, though. Kotoko and Naoki still aren’t a couple, and quite honestly, Naoki’s rudeness is starting to wear me down. Even Kotoko almost gives up on him towards the end of the volume when it turns out he may be moving out of the family house and in with Kotoko’s romantic rival Matsumoto. That is some serious stuff, and it gets even the cheery Kotoko down. Not even four years of constant rejection get to her like that does.

I felt bad for Kotoko throughout the volume. Naoki shows his human side a few times (helping her out at a part-time job, saving her from a yakuza-like thug after she’d been following him on a date, taking her on a date of her own, et cetera), and he does seem to silently take Kotoko’s feelings into consideration much of the time, but man… he can be really mean. I think this is the start of a turnaround, because he admits somewhere in the first half of the book he’s going to accept the Kotoko challenge head-on, and he is looking out for her. But it wouldn’t kill him to be nice to her. After four years, unless he really doesn’t like her romantically at all, you’d think he’d agree to take her out at least a few times (in his defense, he does this, but it’s usually an accident). Unless he really does take pleasure in her longing, in which case he’s an even bigger creep than I thought initially.

If Kotoko makes me feel bad, I feel even worse for her potential suitor Kinnosuke. He’s a gag character, mostly just there to be loud and annoying about Kotoko, but at this point he’s been after her just as long as she’s been after Naoki. And at the end of the volume, he winds up almost freezing to death in a blizzard while looking for her (admittedly for very selfish reasons). This is passed off as a joke. Perhaps the theme of the relationships in this series is that the chase is more meaningful, in some way, than the catch. Which puts it in the same category as Happy Mania. Happy Mania and Itazura na Kiss are two series that should never come up at the same time, but there you go.

I’m still enjoying the one-shot chapter nature of the stories. Each “volume” has four stories, and the omnibus has eight. The whole plotline is usually resolved in one of these, with some circumstances carrying over into multiple stories. The second volume is all about Naoki moving away and Kotoko dealing with not having him in her life anymore and putting up with her horrible rival, but even there, there are stories about Naoki’s job, Kotoko getting sick and Naoki taking care of her, new student recruitment at the tennis club… things like that. It’s a fun format, and the stories are always super-sweet, which is why I spent so much time complaining about the dark stuff here. It just doesn’t go with the general upbeat nature of Kotoko and the stories.

Charming series like this are few and far between. Even though I complain, the characters in this series are easy to like, and it’s so much fun watching Naoki and Kotoko getting badgered by meddling parents, harassed by the anime club, or just to see the lengths poor Kotoko will go through to get a glimpse of Naoki. Actually, the latter is quite sad and depressing in this volume. But I’m hoping her luck will turn around soon, along with Naoki.