Kazune Kawahara's My Love Story

Illustrated by Aruko

Reviewed by Anson Leung

(Viz Media, 2014)

Kawahara and Aruko’s Ore Monogatari (My Love Story) is about a high school boy, Takeo Goda, who wants to have a girlfriend. After starting the series off trying to confess to a girl he likes, only to have his best friend, Mokoto Sunakawa, confessed to by the same girl instead, Takeo laments that it is always his popular friend who will find love, and not him. He resigns himself to always being the bridesmaid, and never the bride, due to his weird face and gorilla-like physique being looked down on by girls. Guided by fate, he soon encounters the petite and cute high school girl Rinko on a train. Seeing a male passenger attempt to molest her, Takeo steps in and heroically subdues him on her behalf. When the male molester attempts to have Takeo be seen as the only offender, Rinko finds the courage to speak out against him. Rinko’s act of sticking up for Takeo sparks the start of their friendship, and Sunakawa is part of this friendship circle, too.
 
To make a manga stand out among its competitors, there must be a twist, or something unique about it. There are many romance manga that exist, and in the case of Ore Monogatari, it is a shojo manga catering to the young and teenage girls as its demographic. Its product differentiation, when compared in relation to other manga, is its unrelenting focus on making scenes that tug at readers’ heartstrings. Even if the scene is a bit contrived, the author makes sure that sentimental feelings are always around the corner. The main scenes of the manga thrive on romance and its excessive sentimentality.

Something all readers will find tugging at their heartstrings is the almost inexplicable, and very inexcusable fact that female characters, especially Rinko’s friends, have the audacity to badmouth Takeo Goda. Takeo is not the most handsome person in the world—that’s part of the story’s plot—but who gives these people the right to talk about him in that way, when he hasn't done anything wrong? He is a man who would willingly risk his life to save theirs, and this is the thanks he gets? These taunts do stop, but only after he literally risks his life to save theirs from a burning building. Takeo earns their respect, and the audience will struggle to hold back tears as he finally gets the respect he deserved in the first place.
 
One of the most heartbreaking scenes in the manga, which happens before rescuing Rinko's friends from the burning building, is when he saves Rinko herself from a poorly installed steel beam. The beam collapses, and whilst Takeo was strong enough to temporarily hold up the beam so Rinko could escape, he is not strong enough to remove the beam safely. It appears he will slowly be crushed under it while he is holding it up, unable to do anything but delay his inevitable death. He's glad Rinko's safe, but he realizes something. The steel beam falling down was about to hit Rinko, so his instinct was to catch the beam and prevent it from falling onto her. His best friend, Sunakawa, goes for Rinko instead and pushes her out of the way. Takeo "realizes" that his friend went for the girl, while he went for the beam, which is why he "could never win". He thinks he's not good enough, that he doesn't deserve love, for not being selfless enough. When in reality, very few would be heroic enough to do what he did.
 
Is it his innate kindhearted personality, or years of living with the reality that he would always face prejudice for the way he looked, that drove him to such negative thoughts? While the reader may never receive the answer, one cannot help but feel that the reason is the latter.
 
Say what you want. That this manga is too sappy and sweet. That this manga is too unrealistic and sentimental. But never commit the sin of hating the manga because of the "ugly" design of Takeo, as some readers tend to pre-emptively do. Because, in all sincerity, the main character, Takeo Goda, has the highest moral authority in the entire series. He's a better person than most could ever dream to be.
 
The main characters of the manga are Takeo, Sunakawa, and Rinko. Their friends sometimes hang out with them, but are not the main focus of the story. To recap their characteristics, Takeo is big, strong, but has an unattractive face. Sunakawa is very attractive and aloof, and considers Takeo his best friend since childhood, when Takeo became his neighbor. He likes Takeo and supports him, citing a main reason that he’s so close to Takeo is because Takeo is the only one who can make him laugh from the bottom of his heart. Something that shows the depth of their friendship is when Sunakawa admits he rejects girls Takeo can only dream of having, and has attempted to ask out, because these very same girls are like Rinko’s friends. They don’t know the real Takeo and his heroics, so they put him down because he doesn’t look handsome. Sunakawa rejects every girl who insulted Takeo behind his back. Contrary to what Takeo perceived, Sunakawa isn’t rejecting those girls because he thinks he’s too good for them. He’s rejecting them because they aren’t good enough for Takeo.
 
Rinko is small, but courageous, and sticks up for her friends. Some of the more prominent peripheral characters include Takeo’s father, a carbon copy of Takeo, minus his face, which Takeo inherited from his mom. Nanako is Rinko’s closest friend, and acts as a “big sister” type who protects her. Osamu is Takeo’s most prominent friend who jokes around to hide his insecurities. He is a bit sneaky and underhanded, and lacks the morality Taeko has.

The main focus of the story is more on the relationships and sentimental scenarios involving friends and family around Takeo. Or even random strangers in the case of the girl who worked up the courage to confess to Sunakawa. Unlike the other girls who badmouthed Takeo behind his back, she is not immediately rejected despite Sunakawa having no interest in her. The love story of Takeo and Rinko is resolved early on, with Takeo realizing that Rinko loves him, and not Sunakawa, despite what his low self-esteem, and the past history of Sunakawa being confessed to multiple girls Takeo loved, led him to believe. Once that misunderstanding is resolved, they become a lovey-dovey couple, with the only real problems between them being how fast the relationship is progressing. But they are never in danger of breaking up.
 
One of my favorite arcs is when Nanako and Osamu get together as a group of friends for Christmas, but they have trouble communicating their honest feelings with each other. Rinko’s friend wants to get together with Osamu, but can’t get over how unromantic he is. He doesn’t seem to care for Nanako, even though he does and is hiding it because he’s insecure about being unable to live up to Nanako’s expectations. Hence, he downplays any romantic gestures that Nanako would deem as exciting. Most prominently, this includes the star on top of the giant Christmas tree in the mall. This star supposedly grants whoever manages to climb up and get it the romantic partner of their dreams.
 
This frustration Nanako feels regarding Osamu’s indifference comes to a head when three teenage delinquents harass Rinko and Nanako. Rather than protect them himself, he’s naturally afraid of what will happen to him, and gets Takeo to protect them for him. His fear is justified, and what I didn’t like the story doing is having Osamu’s very valid reason for fearing for his safety and getting the only person among their group of friends who can stand up to 3 older teenagers at once be treated as a coward’s way out, and a lack of love for Nanako. Nanako rants at him for not being more romantic, when Nanako herself did not explicitly ask him out at this point in the story. Yes, Osamu can sense subtly that she’s not happy with him, but at this point, they are not dating yet.
 
Is Nanako’s anger justified? To an extent, especially since Osamu can pick up on it. Is it fully justified? In my opinion, no. Regardless, Osamu decides to make amends by climbing the dangerously tall Christmas tree and grabbing the star for Nanako, despite the very real risk he could die from falling from what appears to be a height almost as tall as the mall itself. Luckily, Takeo is there, and throws him back up like a video game checkpoint whenever he happens to fall down.
 
Battered and bruised, victorious and apprehensive, Osamu holds the bright star in his hands, and presents it to Nanako. He confesses his insecurities, especially his envy towards not being as good a person that Takeo is. Very poignantly, he lays out that he is who is, and hopes with all his heart that Nanako would love him, because he loves Nanko with all his heart. And the moment she accepts is triumphant. This moment is enough to overlook the lack of realism regarding climbing the Christmas tree in the first place. It’s moments like these that make you realize this manga is special. Maybe the cliches have been seen by the reader before, but the execution is flawless.
 
Ore Monogatari focuses on sentimental situations as its main appeal. Overall, the romance stories are slightly contrived, and the sentimentality a bit too sweet. But these negatives are felt only once in a while, because 9/10 times, it does its job perfectly. The audience will feel good reading this manga; they will feel emotional. Because that’s what this manga sets out to do, and it does it exceptionally. In my opinion, Ore Monogatari is a classic that will stand the test of time. 

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Anson Leung is a graduate of the University of Alberta’s Bachelor of Commerce program. He is an Alberta-based writer who loves all forms of writing, including poetry and article writing. In his spare time, he loves playing tennis and board games.