Manga Notes: Haganai 18
Oct. 22nd, 2020 08:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
krpalmerIn that subset of anime both “embedded in a contemporary high school” and “featuring a somewhat disreputable teenaged guy who just happens to be able to hang out with many attractive teenaged girls,” Haganai (I Don’t Have Many Friends) has at least stuck in my memory, if for reasons less wholesome than, say, Clannad. Its animation did less “conclude” than leave off with an obvious nudge towards its original source material, but in this case Seven Seas is translating and publishing the manga. The manga is itself an adaptation of light novels, but in this case Itachi’s artwork has more character than a lot of other “manga adaptations” I’ve come across.
As I pressed through the series, though, I did pick up on impressions the conclusion of the light novels did not please many, my most obvious speculation being this had something to do with turning one of the girls into a “girlfriend.” The author’s afterwords in the manga have begun suggesting “maybe this will end in its own way,” but it’s a question as to whether that’ll happen in the first place, much less be received any better should that happen after all. However, when I made it to the end of the eighteenth volume I did wonder if that would make a decent place to “pull the rip cord.” I’d thought back in the anime the hostile sparks flying between the major female characters Yozora and Sena gave it some push clear of the throng; in this volume things do improve between them. That I can get by without demanding “romantic resolution” to a story (much less “pairing off everyone by hook or by crook,” although I can’t say I reject official resolutions in all cases, either) might help there. Still, the last page mentioning “two volumes left” remains a temptation, however unfortunate it might end up.
As I pressed through the series, though, I did pick up on impressions the conclusion of the light novels did not please many, my most obvious speculation being this had something to do with turning one of the girls into a “girlfriend.” The author’s afterwords in the manga have begun suggesting “maybe this will end in its own way,” but it’s a question as to whether that’ll happen in the first place, much less be received any better should that happen after all. However, when I made it to the end of the eighteenth volume I did wonder if that would make a decent place to “pull the rip cord.” I’d thought back in the anime the hostile sparks flying between the major female characters Yozora and Sena gave it some push clear of the throng; in this volume things do improve between them. That I can get by without demanding “romantic resolution” to a story (much less “pairing off everyone by hook or by crook,” although I can’t say I reject official resolutions in all cases, either) might help there. Still, the last page mentioning “two volumes left” remains a temptation, however unfortunate it might end up.