A brand new boy’s love manga has hit the shelves for English speakers this month, and our readers can expect a lot to be said about it this year! In anticipation of the anime adaptation that was announced recently, we’re diving into the first volume of Sasaki and Miyano by Syou Harusono to get a little taste of what to expect. Although the series is currently seven volumes long, and still ongoing in Japan, we’ll be basing this review on only what’s available to us in English, and will revisit it again as publication continues. Time for a slice of life and high school romance between a shy fudanshi and his super-popular senpai! Let’s get started!
The Plot?
Miyano is a first-year student at an all-boys high school. On the surface, he seems like a shy, timid, and less-than-average student. His only unique quality seems to be his undeniable feminine face, which warrants unwanted attention from his classmates. While his friends tease him all in harmless jest, it is something he is insecure about. Apart from that, he is a self-proclaimed BL expert, spending most of his free time shamelessly tearing through pages of any Boy’s Love manga he can get his hands on.
Then along comes Sasaki, a third-year student who is the exact opposite of Miyano in every way. He’s cool, confidant, sociable, and friendly to everyone he meets, almost to a fault when he winds up getting into scraps, defending others from bullies.
When the two meet, it’s the typical romance the reader is waiting to see happen, even if the characters don’t know what’s in store for them. Miyano and Sasaki don’t quite mesh well at first. When Sasaki asks Miyano to loan him a manga and insists that whatever he has is fine, Miyano takes a chance and gives him the latest Boy’s Love series he had been reading, expecting him to give it back the next day in disgust. To his surprise, Sasaki returns the book with a smile on his face and asks him to loan him another one as soon as he can.
The Relationship
It’s a slow-burner. The story continues as Miyano loans Sasaki various BL manga from his collection and then them both hiding on the school stairwell to discuss it the next day. To Miyano, that’s all it is. His friendship with Sasaki is based purely on a shared interest, and nothing more. Sasaki slowly finds himself falling in love with Miyano, at first admiring his feminine face, and then admitting to how cute he thinks Miyano is when he sees how passionate he is for Boy’s Love.
Neither of them are aware they are in the middle of a Boy’s Love story themselves.
Positives
There are a few background details of the story that are nice to see. For starters, Miyano’s friends seem to be aware of his hobbies and sexuality, but show little malice to him beyond occasional friendly teasing (more so for his face than anything else). For the most part, they let Miyano be. Seeing him being treated normally is nice because of the implication that other people can, for the most part, just treat those of the spectral norm of sexuality as well…still normal.
Sasaki’s character doesn’t come across as the done-to-death trope of a straight guy making an exception to his sexuality for a boy. Instead, Sasaki is someone who never thought about his sexuality before, until he reads the first manga Miyano loans him. Then he comments on how he relates to the way a nameless protagonist handles his hardships. Borrowing Miyano’s books is his tiny gateway to harmless sexual exploration and open discussion with someone who can relate and give him a safe space, free of judgment.
Negatives
By the end of the first volume, neither character is worth following or interesting. Sasaki’s personality especially feels like any other generic airheaded cool-guy archetype who can do no wrong in the eyes of his love interest, and in many cases displays predictable reactions in most situations. While I mentioned Sasaki having the opportunity of sexual exploration earlier, very little occurs. Miyano will sit next to him, gushing about how he felt about manga characters and sex scenes, and Sasaki will just listening to him quietly, thinking about how cute Miyano is, and then the next chapter begins. It’s not exactly entertaining and the sentimental value is only skin-deep.
The character designs aren’t unique. Sasaki looks like every Pixiv artist’s original teenager character. Miyano doesn’t even look like he belongs in the same universe, specifically in the black and white illustrations, thanks to his eyes. Large and watery, his design bears a closeness to 90’s shoujo manga. Sure, that’s part of the joke, but it probably would have fit better to design him with feminine facial details more common in 21st-century manga.
Final Verdict
Judging on one volume, Sasaki and Miyano is a cute series with potential. However, cute isn’t enough to consider it impressive — at least not yet. That can change as the series continues. There’s enough here to keep us interested and be hopeful it gets that extra push needed. Until then, we’ll be waiting patiently for volume two, and the anime adaptation coming later this year.
Sasaki and Miyano #1 is available now in print and digitally from Yen Press.
