I cannot believe the author fumbled this story this hard this early on.
Let me be clear, my issues have nothing to do with the subject matter. But it has everything to do with pacing and how the characters are handled. Because the first chapter really sets up a story that’s going to be full of suspense and mystery, something like Erased, where the readers piece together the truth alongside the MC. I expected the priest to be a suspect and maybe even the real killer but it wouldn’t be confirmed until late into the series, or even if the reveal was early it would be to the audience and not the MC, which creates a sense of Dramatic Irony and horror.
It’s a lot to pull from a first chapter but that was the vibe I got and it turns out I was completely wrong in the worst way possible.
It takes a little over a single chapter for the priest to go “it was me all along”, for the MC to despair and then for some fucking reason forgive the priest, and then go back to him. And I’m just left standing there, “what?”
I know the MC is starved for a genuine and kind relationship, that the public’s rejection of him (understandably since most think he raped and murdered a child) would push him to cling to the first person who’s even slightly nice to him. But like even with that in mind his rejection and turn around is just way to fucking quick. He’s known this dude for like what? A couple weeks at most, if not days.
I think if the author had stuck with the idea of him being clingy and obsessed with the priest, immediately forgiving him or even lying to himself and pushing himself into a deluded state to cope with this new reality, it could work. It would make sense even. It shows him as someone so deeply unstable due this deeply traumatizing event, so desperate for any kind of human connection, that he could look over the horrible truth that his savior is who condemned him in the first place.
But we don’t get that characterization, he reacts with horror. He’s sickened by the truth and he’s compelled to run. And that also makes sense but it doesn’t make sense for him to have such a quick turn around, simply because the author barely spent enough time to build a convincing relationship between the two. Again, all of this essentially occurs w/in the span of a single chapter.
Okay but MAYBE it’s all a lie. Or MAYBE he’s not actually forgiving the priest and this is actually a ploy for revenge.
It still doesn’t really help how much of a whiplash this string of events was. This kind of reveal and reaction would take multiple chapters in a decent murde-suspense manga. Like Erased for example. A good reveal, even if it’s a red herring, requires build up. It requires suspense. It requires mystery. This manga tossed that all out for “OH PLOT TWIST (except it really isn’t because everyone and their mother expected this) IT WAS THE BLACK HAIRED PRIEST ALL ALONG” by chapter 3.
I love suspense and I love BL and I was really hoping for something that combined those interest but instead I got a cheap plot twist.
Let me know if it gets a lot better but for now I’m dropping this.
I cannot believe the author fumbled this story this hard this early on.
Let me be clear, my issues have nothing to do with the subject matter. But it has everything to do with pacing and how the characters are handled. Because the first chapter really sets up a story that’s going to be full of suspense and mystery, something like Erased, where the readers piece together the truth alongside the MC. I expected the priest to be a suspect and maybe even the real killer but it wouldn’t be confirmed until late into the series, or even if the reveal was early it would be to the audience and not the MC, which creates a sense of Dramatic Irony and horror.
It’s a lot to pull from a first chapter but that was the vibe I got and it turns out I was completely wrong in the worst way possible.
It takes a little over a single chapter for the priest to go “it was me all along”, for the MC to despair and then for some fucking reason forgive the priest, and then go back to him. And I’m just left standing there, “what?”
I know the MC is starved for a genuine and kind relationship, that the public’s rejection of him (understandably since most think he raped and murdered a child) would push him to cling to the first person who’s even slightly nice to him. But like even with that in mind his rejection and turn around is just way to fucking quick. He’s known this dude for like what? A couple weeks at most, if not days.
I think if the author had stuck with the idea of him being clingy and obsessed with the priest, immediately forgiving him or even lying to himself and pushing himself into a deluded state to cope with this new reality, it could work. It would make sense even. It shows him as someone so deeply unstable due this deeply traumatizing event, so desperate for any kind of human connection, that he could look over the horrible truth that his savior is who condemned him in the first place.
But we don’t get that characterization, he reacts with horror. He’s sickened by the truth and he’s compelled to run. And that also makes sense but it doesn’t make sense for him to have such a quick turn around, simply because the author barely spent enough time to build a convincing relationship between the two. Again, all of this essentially occurs w/in the span of a single chapter.
Okay but MAYBE it’s all a lie. Or MAYBE he’s not actually forgiving the priest and this is actually a ploy for revenge.
It still doesn’t really help how much of a whiplash this string of events was. This kind of reveal and reaction would take multiple chapters in a decent murde-suspense manga. Like Erased for example. A good reveal, even if it’s a red herring, requires build up. It requires suspense. It requires mystery. This manga tossed that all out for “OH PLOT TWIST (except it really isn’t because everyone and their mother expected this) IT WAS THE BLACK HAIRED PRIEST ALL ALONG” by chapter 3.
I love suspense and I love BL and I was really hoping for something that combined those interest but instead I got a cheap plot twist.
Let me know if it gets a lot better but for now I’m dropping this.