TachibanaChiharu's Topics (181)

Well, this is junk in every way possible, pretty much. This fails as any kind of compelling story, and even manages to fail as smut somehow as well. Everything that happens is so stupid and illogical I just can't even believe it managed to get published in this state.

(spoilers)
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The author uses lame cliches/stereotypes as the two leads. Hibiki is a typical top; older, taller, rich, powerful, etc. Nono is a shoujo heroine in a beefcake's body; he's a ditz, innocent, doesn't know what AVs are, assumes everything's his fault even when he's done nothing wrong, blah blah blah doormat. Furthermore, trying to use Nono being a beefcake as some kind of subervesion of the bottom stereotype was a complete waste of time, and was only present to satisfy the reader's fetish of the beefcake bottom. The muscles are all aesthetic; somehow he can't seem to push people off of him when his personal space is being, ahem, violated. In reality, a guy who is stacked like Nono would be able to punch Hibiki's lights out the second Hibiki started playing with his nipples.

Now, I realize none of this is Nono's fault. No victim-blaming. But I have a hard time with authors depicting characters as complete doormats who won't lift a finger for their own sakes under any circumstances. When a person is being attacked or violated in some way they don't want, there is an animal-brain instinctual response that most people have to push the perp away. We see later that Nono is completely capable of pushing Hibiki away. So why didn't he do it in chapter 1? Oh, I guess because we gotta shoe-horn in an early sex-scene to grip the reader in the lowest-common-denominator way possible.

So, Hibiki rapes Nono in the first chapter, and then later agrees to help Nono with his suit problem (with no strings attached, I might add), even though Nono's been avoiding Hibiki because of the rape, and only asks him as a last resort. And then of course, Hibiki forces Nono into sex again at the hotel in a much more predatory way because he knows Nono is a doormat and that he can get away with it (aggravated abuse of power). The fact that Hibiki basically raped Nono twice is never acknowledged by either Hibiki or Nono, and then the manga transitions into a romance tone and storyline, where Hibiki the playboy has to somehow come to terms with now being in love with Nono, and starts trying to "win his heart the right way" without him ever admitting any wrong-doing from before. This doesn't feel believable, and doesn't even feel a part of the same story. Blaaaaaah.

Meanwhile, from Nono's perspective: Nono is raped by Hibiki twice, and then Nono decides he's now in love with him? I need Hibiki's dddddddd so bad, it's the only thing that can reach that good spot! Stockholm-syndrome cliche!

Having sex with a hired prostitute in a communal bath is hella inconsidertate. Why would this even happen? Hibiki has gotta be well-off, why would he do something like that besides the fact that he's just a bad, selfish person?

Alert! Inverted nipples cliche!!!! Oh, but then let's forget about it completely halfway through the manga.

I don't understand Hibiki with respect to the share-house. Does he live there? Why does a CEO need to live in a cheap share-house? In some chapters he seems to, but in others he doesn't (the chapter where Nono ruminates that Hibiki has been coming to the share-house regularly every weekend -- wouldn't he always be there if he lives there?? idk...). Does Hibiki just go there for catfishing because he knows the owner/manager only lets hot guys rent there? What if the hot guys aren't gay? He's gonna sex them up anyway, like he did to Nono? What is even going on here.

The author doesn't seem to understand what a scene transition is at all. Every time this happens it's completely jarring, and takes me right out of the story. Let's look at one example. Hibiki comes to the share-house to meet with Nono. Nono has just seen Hibiki get into a car with someone else Hibiki bought a suit for who seemed to be promising Hibiki sexual favors in exchange. Hibiki and Nono sit on the couch and have tea. Hibiki leans towards Nono, and Nono pushes him away and runs away to his room while Hibiki has a shocked expression on his face. Then Nono just starts furiously masturbating in his room, and Hibiki.... what? He just continues sitting on the couch sipping tea? He's frozen for hours with a shocked expression on his face? Nothing? He doesn't go to check on Nono or ask what's wrong? And then immediately after the voyeuristic masturbation scene with Nono, it's just the next day suddenly. What happened to Hibiki? I have a hard time believing he just got up and went home (or to his own room...) without going to find out what was wrong with Nono, and why Nono pushed him away. WTF even. This isn't even the only instance of this.

Setting a comic at a share-house like this has some implications all on its own that the author doesn't seem to understand at all. It initially sets the tone of this story as a light-hearted comedy starring an ensemble-cast who are the motley tennents of the share-house and the ways in which they affect the straight-man (the comedy genre straight-man, not the sexual orientation) main character's life. Like Maison Ikkoku, for instance. But then the bathroom rape scene ended up happening, which turned it into this jarring and badly-written smut-style comic that isn't really good at anything. The other tennents are barely shown, and when they are, they aren't doing anything particularly interesting or funny. It's just a waste of time to set this in a share-house. Perhaps this is just another reader fetish thing that doesn't interest me so I didn't notice. This could've just been set in a normal apartment complex and have the others just run into each other in the stairwell or elevator, if they even needed to be in the story in the first place. Kaoru could still be the manager of the complex and still appear in scenes in that context without it feeling forced.

The art in this isn't really good enough to justify trying to make this a smut-style story. Smut is best left to artists who have amazing art, like basically anything by Zaria (Mob for Jack, Kinbaku, etc). If your art isn't top-shelf stuff, you should probably stick to writing stories with actual plots and character development. Really, even smut requires a specific type of plot to be satisfying even if the art is good, but that wasn't present here either. Speaking to the story's art itself, it feels messy and sketchy and unfinished in a lot of places. It took some time to try and figure out what a panel was even trying to depict sometimes, which also takes me out of the story. No comment on the uncensoring.

Like, what is that thing on his lower-back in the first panel (upper left) of this page?
http://www.mangago.zone/read-manga/our_house_love_trouble/uu/our_house_love_trouble-chapter-3/29/

Anyway.

I know I've only really talked about the main couple, but this is actually a story about 3 couples, all composed of some combination of these share-house guys, but I'm not going to really go into any more detail about the other romance plots because it's not really worth it. All of my comments generally apply to all 3 stories. All 3 "romance" stories are incepted by rape. All 3 stories are rape-to-love (although I would argue the 2nd couple at least is friends and/or seems to like each other beforehand). Everything that happens is nonsensical, BL-crazyworld BS. The art is middling. Most of the tops are unlikeable (mostly for the same reasons). Some of the bottoms are also unlikeable (for varying reasons). This isn't worth reading imo. Generally, the stories aren't satisfying, and while the vignettes at the end are kind of funny, they're only funny because of the BL tropes they're kind-of making fun of, not because any of the characters are likeable or relationships are compelling. Skip this one.

The story in ch5 is "okay", although liking someone (and possibly deciding you're now gay or bi) for fetishistic reasons is still Not Good (tm). Aside from that, the rest of this is one continuous story (ch1-4) and it's one of the worst dumpster fires of writing I've ever read. Every aspect of the main story is done poorly.

(spoilers, but who cares, don't waste your time reading this)

- Shinoda and Tamura have character designs that are too similar, making them hard to tell apart sometimes.
- Perpetuating bad and incorrect stereotypes about gay men just being rapists that try to entrap straight men.
- Police not existing in the world.
- Not firing your underling after he assaults (rapes) you.
- Doing what your rapist subordinate tells you (contacting Tsutsui for him) even though you know you shouldn't, after you just talked with Tsutsui at the cafe about Tamura being bad news.
- Stupid cliches like declaring with a straight face that you can defend yourself right after you just DIDN'T defend yourself and got raped, and then it happens again.
- Believing someone who obviously can't be trusted since he's an unrepentant rapist about sad backstory without any evidence and then acting on it.
- The comic trying to play off a past tragedy that as justification for rapist behavior, and then dumbdumb Tsutsui thinking that the stupid rapist is owed more sex because its Such A Sad Thing For Him, Poor Guy.
- Putting in some BS about Tamura studying abroad in America, which adds nothing to the plot and doesn't really tell us anything about Tamura's family/life/backstory/personality/etc (Steven could've been Shinji and from Aomori instead of America and the story wouldn't be any different). (people who study or work abroad usually come from wealthy families and get some really advanced training in something, and here he's just working as a peon at a cafe? what's the point?)
- Tsutsui low-key blaming Shinoda as if he's just as bad as Tamura for the things that happened to him (Shinoda has definitely enabled some things, but he's not really the same level of badness as Tamura at all; they're both victims, and Shinoda's just a limp noodle)
- Cliche about Tsutsui not being able to get a boner with a girl anymore just because he enjoyed anal once (eyeroll).
- Letting stupid Tamura be right in the end that he's a naughty gay guy that attacks virgin straight guys to awaken them to being gay -- Shinoda and Tsutsui hook up in the end.
- Remaining friends/continuing to associate with someone who assaulted you.
- Not ever really explaining why Tamura is the way he is.
- Not really explaining why Steven would put up with this BS and chase Tamura all the way to Japan, since he obviously knows Tamura is like this.

Good points:
- The art was pretty ok
- I liked Tsutsui's character design
- Tsutsui actually thinking about his sexuality at all, and coming to terms with it
- Tsutsui being shown to actually go to work
- Tsutsui has coworkers who have names and dialog (well, at least one of them)
- ch5 random story was pretty decent, although I hope he starts to like him for him, and not just because he looks cute wearing glasses

I actually did like the stories, but this author's writing lacks cohesion and establishment. The heart is there, I can definitely feel it, but the details are missing to ground the story in the reality of the setting. Makes everything feel a little fake/artificial somehow, even though you can make sense of what's going on despite it.

Examples:

- First story: Takeshi returns from his trip and just happens to run into both Yoshihisa and fated-alpha arguing (at the airport?). Was Yoshihisa there to pick him up? Did fated-alpha follow Yoshihisa, or just randomly happen to be in the airport too? Were they even in the airport, or just randomly somewhere on Takeshi's way home? Like how did things even end up in this state, where Takeshi comes upon them mid-argument on his way home from his flight/trip? There is no establishment at all beyond Takeshi landing at the airport beforehand for this very important scene.

- Second story: Seijiro sees Fumiya's interview on the billboard/tv in the middle of the street after Fumiya's been out-of-touch and presumably abroad for months. Fumiya even said previously he was tired of and getting rid of his condo or whatever. So, when Seijiro sees the interview, he's inspired, and starts running to .... where exactly(?) .... to reunite with Fumiya, when he wasn't even sure Fumiya was in Japan?? Like lol, what's going on here?

Skip ch1 since it's just a confusing jumbled preview of all the actual stories and you won't realize what it is untll you've read ch2.

All of the stories here are very good and thought-provoking. They showcase a single idea or urge and present it in a realistic way. The cat story in particular had really good writing and actually explored concepts/themes, and had character growth with the main character, all in just one chapter. The body hair story was really great in the opposite sort of way from the cat story. There's a good breadth of great 1-shots here.

I really like the main couple, like most people here, Taki x Kureto. I also really like Takaaki (ugh that name is horrible to say though). I also liked the guy at Kureto's college that seemed to be low-key crushing on Kureto, and wished he played into the story more (I was actually hoping he was the one coming to Kureto's apartment that one time that ended up being the big Akio reveal instead). Akio is just an agent of chaos and while I don't like what he does most of the time, I kind of get where he's coming from, if but a little.

(spoilers in this paragraph only)
I think the weirdest part of the story for me is regarding the twin-sex-feels thing .... Kureto never felt Akio having sex before he pretended to be him? He felt him having sex all the way at college later in the story, so I'm a little confused. Akio definitely mentioned that it has a range, but I guess the college and the HS aren't really that far away from each other? I suppose Akio never felt it before on his end because Kureto was a virgin until the incident in the infirmary. Is it because Kureto was a virgin that he never felt Akio screwing before? This point isn't really clear, so I was a little confused here and there about how it worked. I guess if you explain it like this, that would clear up all the possible inconsistencies.
(no more spoilers)

Anyway, I liked this one pretty well. The art is nice, and so is the smut. The story is a bit loopy/crazy-BL-world insanity, but I felt it was fine for what it was. Also there is a non-standard main couple in that the seme is much shorter and younger than the uke (also, a college freshman boning HS freshman is a little.... but ok, comic). If you don't get too bent about slutty bottoms, or that someone's sexscapades all have to be with their one true love no matter what, then I think you can get some enjoyment out of this.

Doha is such a mood. (づ￣ ³￣)づ

There are so many writing problems here that I really just couldn't get into this, although I did finish it. I'm not sure what comics editors do if they don't catch all the basic writing 101 problems that an author proposes and force the authors to fix them. Well, at least the art was nice.

(spoilers)
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Jiho is never explicitly stated to be gay. He says Sunghyun is his "ideal man", but it's impossible to tell if that's with respect to someone who he wants to be someday (or wishes he was) vs someone who he wants to be in a romantic relationship with. His extremely frank, dismissive rejection of his best friend (for the second time) makes it seem like he's not really into dudes. But he accepts Sunghyun so easily later that I'm just not sure. There should be some stigma here, but dumb-dumb Jiho never has a single thought about it. The author should be more explicit about this, making it clear whether or not Jiho really understands what being in a gay relationship in a society like this means.

Sunghyun manipulates and sexually harasses/assaults (I'm not even sure) Jiho with the excuse that Jiho owes him, at the beginning of the story. Sunghyun later tells Jiho that he was just basically screwing with him in the beginning but that fell in love with him later, but where exactly did that happen? We never see it happen on screen, so it's impossible to believe. Did it happen between forcing Jiho, a virgin, to shove a dildo up his arse and the nipple toy? Or was it between the nipple toy and dinner? Just stating something and never showing it is not enough in a comic like this, especially one with such a questionable start to it.

Jiho also never has a moment where he transitions from trying to avoid running into the creepy pervert who keeps coming into the store to sexually assault him to actually liking Sunghyun. He definitely doesn't like it at the beginning. Then suddenly by the end he's just a blubbering drunk mess the instant he thinks Sunghyun is cheating on him. Why did his outlook on Sunghyun change? Because Sunghyun came clean about being the store owner, WHICH I am forced to point out was not because Sunghyun chose to tell him (argh) but because Jiho overheard his conversation with the manager and Sunghyun was forced to address it. Is it because Jiho realized that Sunghyun is both hot and loaded, making him a great catch?

Speaking of that, SungHyun is such a shoujo-manga wet-dream. Hot, ostensibly "nice" and "considerate" (if we ignore the initial sexual assaults), rich/loaded, somehow not in a relationship, etc. Meanwhile Jiho is basically a useless waste of space and contributes nothing to the relationship beyond being a fleshlight, which he rightfully points out at the end of the story himself even. This is very much a shoujo manga set up, and is tiresome to read about at this point.

Also pretty much every plot point was totally predictable. As soon as I saw glasses-guy, I was already grumbling to myself, "this better not be a twins plot; how lazy would that be?", and then it turned out to be a twins plot. Ugh. If you're gonna go with something like that, it has to be like that from the beginning and be the crux of the whole story. Just shoving it in off-handedly like this with no setup/foreshadowing is soooooooooo bad and lazy.

Jiho is also low-key a dick to his best friend. He knows, KNOWS, that his best friend is in love with him yet he forces him to help him constantly deal with his romantic woes without any thoughts of how Woojin might feel. This is really crappy. Woojin should really just cut off his relationship with Jiho so he can get over him and move onto someone else. It really isn't that noble to be hung-up on one person you can't have for your entire life, rather than finding someone else to be happy with. This nonsense romantic soul-mate junk is such a lie. A person can love any number of people in their lifetime, and should strive to make themselves happy, not trying to make someone else happy who never considers their feelings at all.

Anyway, as for the positives -- I liked how Sunghyun's brother had a totally different personality. I like that Sunghyun's brother, despite seeming very no-nonsense, cared enough about his brother to help resolve his romantic problems. I liked the art. I liked the store manager; she was a nice grounding element in the story filled with all these crazy gay boys and their melodrama. I liked Woojin, and felt like this seemed more like a prequel to an actual good story about Woojin eventually finding someone to love (although it never happened). I liked Sunghyun from the dinner-date and on, where he stopped being a creepy predator and started acting more like a decent person who was enamored with Jiho (I had to force myself to pretend the earlier sex pervert stuff didn't happen). I liked that Jiho is a college student and is actually shown to go to class at least once. I liked that at least one of the characters (Sunghyun) is shown to have a family, even if the main character never was.

But then again, most of this stuff is just basic competency. A story needs much more than this to be engaging and interesting. This comic could've used about 10-15 more chapters to: 1) foreshadow the twin brother properly, 2) show sunghyun actually coming to like jiho, 3) show jiho actually coming to like sunghyun, 4) show a little bit of jiho's childhood, with his family, and the initial confession (in HS?) from Woojin, 5) actually show a moment that addresses whether jiho considers himself gay or not. The plot still would've been pretty cliche, but at least the basics would've been covered.

Whether or not to read this? I don't think it's really worth reading, but some people seemed to get some enjoyment out of it, so I'd say this one is very YMMV. If you've read a lot of BL comics, you probably will find it very cliche. If you haven't, then you might get some enjoyment out of it since the cliche plot elements won't bog you down. Again, this one is very YMMV.

Is there an end in sight for this comic in the raws yet? I want to (re-)read it, but I just don't want to start until it's close to complete. 100+ chapters is pretty daunting while the "ongoing" status is still up there.

Part of the art of writing is knowing when to end a story before the characters and their relationships get boring. I was paging through the sex scenes by the end because it was no longer interesting to me. The best parts of the side stories was when the characters were horsing around, doing silly things that did not involve sex, like the stray cats, etc.

Hyung is so incredibly immature after the end of season 2 that I found it hard to read any side stories about him. Although I also think Kisun was too prideful and in the wrong about the whole moving into a new apartment with Hyung sponsored by Hyung's stepdad, and Hyung had every right to rip him a new one over that. But the rest of the time, Hyung was an annoying arse and Kisun was the more sympathetic character.

I don't mind the rape stuff in the first season since it adds to the drama of the first season, it speaks to Hyeongjo's (or however you spell his name) character and the obsession that he doesn't even realize he has, and it's recognized as wrong by both characters involved after the fact. Hyeongjo continually feels he needs to atone for his past behavior somehow, which means he really understands how he victimized Minjae, so I think it's fine. If no one can learn from their mistakes, then we're all doomed. But anyway, it's also pretty clear by the end, and esp chapter 51, that Minjae kinda seems to get off on being forced (there were plenty of other hints to this prior to ch51 though).

I found Hyesung to be more interesting here than in Love is an Illusion, where his character is totally annoying and unsympathetic to me, and constantly making stupid decisions. In this property I like his story a lot more. His concerns feel real here, and it's somewhat annoying how Dojin tries to trivialize them. I especially don't like how Dojin dismisses Hyesung's father beating the stuffing out of him as no big deal and Hyesung should just suck it up and go home and beg forgiveness and go back to college. I mean, I agree he should go back to college, but he should definitely not go back to an abusive household. That was not a trivial beating his dad gave him.

Final thought: I can't believe lezhin is trying to release an all-ages version of this. How do you even have a story left after you cut all the sex out? Hyung's character is completely based on being a manslut. Plus Hyesung's sexuality crisis over his drugged-up 3some where he bottoms for the first time but is pissed about it when he's sober. I'm so confused. ┑(￣Д ￣)┍

whereisthestory

OMG I can't believe I complained about 10 chapters ago about this one going off into the weeds, and here I am now, and it still has not found its way out yet. Where is the story? It had such a good setup. Now it's just nonsense smut. I mean, it's good-looking smut. But I just don't feel anything for anyone, and just can't believe that Big Daddy Tae-Seung could be so enamored with Soo-Young's lame arse. Sure, the initial attraction was explained, but not the growing (extreme) obsession. It just doesn't feel believable and takes me right out of the story.

I have been reading this week-to-week on Lezhin, but I may have to drop this if it can't find its way back to an actual plot soon. I'll give it till chapter 30, but after that, I'm done. What a shame; this one seemed like it was going to be really good. YMMV of course.