My favorite manga. The first reading comes at you like a train. Just constant dread and discomfort with barely any pauses at lightning speed. 10/10 page turner drama. Again you cant look away, just like a trainwreck. It captures the mood it was trying to give perfectly and its even more enjoyable if you can relate.Theres even more in store for rereadings, even when you already know how it all plays out and it loses that suspense. You gain a deeper understanding of the characters and their choices, mindsets, thoughts in certain moments. Stuff you didnt have time to think about while you were marveling at that train wreck. Passionate, emotional, sincere. Nice allusions to the actual Flowers of Evil book of poems too. Motivates you to read it. The payoff for the main character's developed was amazing and executed in an extremely satisfying way. Thank you Shuzo Oshimi my GOAT. This is definitely your magnum opus. Will be thinking about this one for some time.What are your thoughts? I hear a lot of people dropped it (especially because of the anime) but I honestly believe if you have, you should give it another shot with the manga. It would be a waste not to.
Aku no Hana*
>>282939179*Les Fleurs du Mal
The anime was more impactfulSaeki best girlSchizo Oshimi's best manga even though I like Okaeri Alice more for Yui and Mari because she's pretty and the twist appealed to my tasteThe second half with redemption was pretty good
>>282939311Kasuga didnt even like Saeki, just the idea of her he had in his head of an "angel". And he could never be authentic with her anyways since he was an empty human. Just like with Nakamura and books. Sad how she ended up though. Guess she was like a reflection of Kasuga if he never faced his past in the second half there.
>>282939311Also I didnt really like how they adapted the anime. It definitely made you feel the boredom of living in a small town with how it dragged on, but it lost the ceasless lightning pace that made the manga so memorable. It also only adapted up to the part where they tried to go past the mountain. Just by virtue of that its worse.
>>282939097>haha woman panties>haha woman panties>haha woman pa-I hate wagie "humor" so fucking much
>>282939436
>>282939097watched the anime, really intense, such a simple silly story turning into a sort of thriller. It was eerie in a way, but realRedhead bitch a total psycho, good cautionary tale since girls like that actually do exist
>>282939458Isn't this a manga where MC is obsessed with woman underwear so yandare forces him to wear it?
>>282939535No. She's not even a yandere. Read it bro.
>>282939436That's all that the japanese do man
>>282939097>Just constant dread and discomfort with barely any pauses at lightning speedMaybe for you but all it did was constantly annoy me.>Passionate, emotional, sincereWhiny teenage angst probably does feel emotional and sincere at the time but that doesn't necessarily mean there's anything interesting about it.>The payoff for the main character's developed was amazing and executed in an extremely satisfying way.I don't know, I still despised the MC at the end. It felt unearned. I got the impression that he was still too focused on his own feelings and didn't reflect enough on how horrible he and Nakamura were and how much trouble their actions caused to others.
>>282939521>Redhead bitch a total psycho, good cautionary tale since girls like that actually do existI'm not sure it was intended as a cautionary tale since apparently Nakamura is based on Oshimi's own wife. It kind of felt like it was romanticizing girls like her.
>>282939599>It kind of felt like it was romanticizing girls like her.It wasn't. The message was literally that nobody can become "special". For better or worse youre gonna have to accept your "mundane" life. Even Nakamura gave up. Reread Saeki's talk with Kasuga before she turns herself in. The Chapter's name was literally "By tommorow morning, you wil have accomplished nothing".If they succeeded in their double suicide and the manga ended there, you'd have a point.
>>282939586>Maybe for you but all it did was constantly annoy me.Its not interesting if the MC instantly knows the right course of action. And it would make no sense either since he didn't even have his own identity at the beginning. So how would he know what he wants? His whole arc was about that and coming to terms with his past mistakes. Did you want him to get tarred and feathered or something?Without teenaged angst there would be no story. >>282939652Well not THE message but it hammered that one in pretty hard.
>>282939652>The message was literally that nobody can become "special". For better or worse youre gonna have to accept your "mundane" lifeThat's kind of what I mean. Accepting your mundane life wasn't really portrayed as something good (nor do I think it should) so much as something necessary. Nakamura represented the desire to be special, so there's something to yearn for there even if it's impossible. If it was really a cautionary tale, it should've driven home the point that Nakamura is just a psycho bitch and nothing good can come out of getting involved with her.
>>282939652And its not like Nakamura was a fit for him either since he was just faking being a pervert. Just like he pretended to understand Baudelaire just because his dad read him books, and when he didn't "need" them anymore because he found something else to fill his empty self, he threw all his books away and stopped reading. Which is why she prevented him from commiting suicide with her, she knew he could probably live on and find happiness elsewhere. Even from the beginning he was all like "I'll improve so I can have a perfect love with Saeki" and "I'll become a pervert and save Nakamura". Because he was an empty hunan.That's why it's so rewarding when he gets with Tokiwa. Because he isn't faking himself. He geniunely cares about her book and novels in general. Not "forcing them down" to look cool and "special" like he did with Baudelaire as a middle schooler. He bonds with her over shared feelings and interests.
>>282939727I'm not saying he should make all the right decisions from the beginning but he doesn't grow as a person at all until after the timeskip.
>>282939856Did a anything good come from getting involved with her in the manga? Kasuga just made literally everyone around him miserable. His parents, Saeki, he wasn't even able to save Nakamura. Nor was he able to kill himself. He was in a depressive rut for 3 years before he found genuine happiness.I don't think that it the manga loses anything by showing that some people don't take having the mundane life as well. And not having everyone have 100% happy endings with no issues whatsover. Thatd be cheap. Saeki still running away from her past and using her bf as a stand in for Kasuga really works as a parallel to Kasuga and Tokiwa.
>>282939097>My favorite mangaRead more, lurk moar, and grow the fuck up
>>282939876Yeah because he's a stupid middle schooler who was still figuring out how he saw and what he wanted from the world. It wouldn't have hit as hard if he didn't see out his ruinous path until its ugly end. Also he did grow just negatively.
>>282939949Im sorry for not reading up to volume 300 of My Beautiful Sister From Another World Is In Middle School.
>>282939970You thinking that when people tell you to grow out of your angsty teenage whining phase they mean read "volume 300 of My Beautiful Sister From Another World Is In Middle School" says a lot about you. Anyway, shouldn't you be older than 14 to post here? Mentally as well, I mean.
Read this too long ago so I don't remember much but Nakamura was actually schizo right? iirc she was taking pills in the timeskip and the last chapter seemed to suggest it as wellIronically enough Saeki seemed to be the craziest by the end with her Kasuga lookalike bf years after the suicide incident
>>282940031Why do you think I currently relate to pre time skip Kasuga? Maybe when I was in middle school. But the whole reason why the manga is so good and what elevates it is the post time skip development and how well it ties everything together.
>>282939910>Kasuga just made literally everyone around him miserable. His parents, Saeki, he wasn't even able to save Nakamura. Nor was he able to kill himself.Like I said, the story acknowledges it was impossible but that doesn't mean there was something there he yearned for, even after the timeskip. There was something about Nakamura's character that's romanticized. Like "there is something beautiful here with her but it can't work out in this world." Remind me, did Kasuga do anything to make amends for all the harm he's done? Besides getting a new girlfriend.
>>282939956It just doesn't feel like he has any agency. Stories about tragic characters whose downfall is brought about by their own vices can be interesting, but as it is, he only grows as Nakamura's puppet.
>>282940120Yeah obviously. The story wouldnt work if there wasnt anything about Nakamura that Kasuga was drawn towards. But I dont think that means that the author was trying to say that "mundane" lives are bad, or romanticizing Nakamura outside of Kasuga himself doing that. Leaning onto her as a crutch and having a built up idea of her in his head that no one else had. Just off the top of my head, when Saeki told Nakamura that she and Kasuga had sex, Nakamura was trembling. But Kasuga was all like "Nakamura is special, she doesnt care about things like that".Interesting too is that I hear that Saeki and Nakamura are also based on the real life muses that Baudelaire himself had. One an "angel" and another an "evil" prostitute. With him obviously being drawn to and being more inspired by the prostitute. Cool parallels.
>>282940165Thats the whole point of his character. He said it himself he was an "empty human" who only pretended to like literature because it made him look special. He also only even got it from his dad, not because he actually was interested in it. Just as he was drawn to Nakamura and pretended to be a pervert because she was "special". He even says it outright right after he took Saeki's gym clothes "The Flowers of Evil in real life..." His arc is about a common, easily relateable experience in adolescense of finding your identity and thinking about your purpose. Only obviously exaggerated and dramatized.
>>282939097>What are your thoughts?I liked the bits when Ric Flair showed up. The rest is just self indulgent filler to make middle schoolers go "SO DEEP"
>>282940244And it also wouldnt work as a cautionary tale if there was nothing "desireable" about Kasuga's pre time skip arc with Nakamura. It'd be like making a cautionary tale of "Don't jump into a shark's mouth"
>>282940301>a common, easily relateable experience in adolescense of finding your identity and thinking about your purposeMost people don't have that experience controlled by a violent, psycho bitch. This isn't just one uncommon factor I'm being pedantic about to ignore the "obviously exaggerated and dramatized" part. That completely changes the direction of how that experience goes.
>>282940635It was pretty clear from a little while into it that he could have incinerated the clothes and have been done with it all from the beginning. Its not like she could prove he stole them, and being a weird kid her word wouldnt have much weight. You could tell he was independently drawn to this because of how he idolized Baudelaire. It basically spells it out for you when the little flashback to him saying "Does anyone in this town understand Baudelaire?" when Nakamura was calling him boring right before the trash the classroom. She gave him an out from the contract right there and HE still pursued her out of his own will. Because he didnt want to be a boring, normal person. It wouldve basically proved that he was all talk with his superiority complex, constantly talking about "the darkness that the masses are ignorant of".
>>282940723Am i muted chat?
>>282939571>wagie slop endingI FUCKING KNEW ITI will find your mentally degraded family and rape you in front of them, for forcing me to read this garbage. Hopefully you will kill yourself before that.
>>282941831Speed E. Reader sama... I kneel.
>>282939097One of the few manga I bought the volumes for. 1) Because it ends without dragging it out2) Because I loved it the same way you did
I had my book reading aunt read this as her first manga experience lmao. She liked it well enough.
>>282939970Your loss, butt floss.
only read until the part where the dude and the psycho girl trash the classroom. im gonna start it over again. i really liked it. premise and the theme of the story is very simple. but it is portrayed very intriguing. evokes very primal emotions
>>282939097Not for everyone. A lot of people go through life without a single suicidal thought. A lot of people can never experience any sort of existential dread. A lot of people's mental state will never be an obstacle for any part of their lives. A lot of people will laugh at what they can't understand or think they understand based on their personal experiences and individual makeup. I think for people that can resonate with the state of the characters in Aku no Hana it is a very entertaining read that will stay with them.
