Seiho Boys’ High School 7

Kaneyoshi Izumi – Viz – 2011 – 8 volumes

I love this series. It makes me so happy to read it, and it’s so funny and charming that I can’t help but read the newest volume as soon as it arrives. It’s still a series of mostly unconnected short stories about the students in an all-boys high school, but that’s all it needs to be when the characters are as charming as these.

The first story is, unusually, about a character that isn’t in the main group. He’s a freshman, so a year younger than Maki and company. We learn about his self-professed cross to bear: a guy-crazy female friend he went to junior high with. He applied to Seiho, the isolated boys school, as a way to get away from her, but she continues to call him about her boy troubles and comes out to visit in order to hit on the other male students. This drives him crazy, as he has a crush on her and she looks in every direction but his. It’s a sweet and very indirect love story, and the chapter offers no good solution to the problem. The two continue on their troubled way.

One interesting thing about this story is that Maki plays the part of a bully. It almost hurt, seeing him being so cruel, even if it was for a good cause. I have no idea why he had to pick a fight in order to make his point. Uncharacteristic, I suppose, but it was definitely unusual.

Continuing on with stories that feature characters acting off, the next story is about good-looking, popular, dependable Kamiki. He suddenly snaps, and basically acts coldly and rude to just about everyone. He even tells off his girlfriend. We get some backstory about why Kamiki is the way he is, but it’s nothing terribly heavy. Seeing him being so mean is definitely a shock to the system, and it upsets all of the characters a great deal. And again, Maki picks a fight with him and they nearly come to blows. I wasn’t terribly satisfied with the resolution to this story, but I did like that the theme was about how even the perfect guy can have a bad day.

The next story was about a student teacher that all the boys admired for breaking down and raking them over the coals for their poor decision to go to a boys school, informing them that they would emerge tragically ill-prepared to deal with life among women. The boys admire him a great deal for this pep talk (there is a typical panel with the shocked faces of all the main characters thinking “This guy is totally qualified to prepare us for real life!”). Not believing that Maki, Kamiki, and Nogami have girlfriends, he pesters Maki to meet his until the two come to blows. This is resolved wonderfully and very realistically at the end of the story by none other than Erika herself.

The final story is an unusual one, about the friendship between Erika (Maki’s Girlfriend) and Miyaji (Kamiki’s girlfriend). It’s the type of bittersweet story that this series does so well, where Miyaji spends the whole story listing all the things she admires about Erika. In an attempt to make Miyaji feel better, Erika encourages her to repeatedly text Kamiki, and we see the other side of the conversation from earlier that ended with Kamiki blowing up at her. Miyaji then says many hurtful things to the brusque Erika, who refuses to comfort her. It’s al okay in the end, but seeing the friendship between the girls at work, what sweet Miyaji thinks of her wonderful friend and boyfriend, and seeing the other side of what some of the other stories show us is always a lot of fun.

And while these are all good stories, it’s just important to keep in mind that the key to Seiho is that it’s a genuinely funny manga with excellent characters. It knows just what to do to make these guys both funny and touching, and we have very little to work with save for the seemingly boring lives of the students in an isolated boys school. It always makes me laugh, and I love seeing the characters interact in every volume.

Funny, sweet, a little sentimental, and great at capturing the fun things about high school without being overly dramatic or going over-the-top with its jokes. I love it, and I can’t wait to see the next volume. It’s the last, and I’m very curious how a meandering series like this can be brought to a close.

This was a review copy provided by Viz.