Sports day continues, and adversity is not going to come between Kubo and her aspirations for Shiraishi. The two of them continue to get closer, but actual progress is about as tangible as Shiraishi is to the naked eye.
Come for some low-wattage stories of affable charm, stay for same, because there’s not a heck of a lot else in this volume. The high energy of last time is dialled way, way back such that I read this less than 24 hours ago and can hardly remember it.
The sports day thing kind of fizzles out amidst Shiraishi’s realization that being seen means he’s no longer safe in the bubble that anonymity provided him before, but it’s not like the genie can go back in the bottle. It’s an interesting idea, but basically just boils down to a quick “friend power” moment that’s over in a blink.
There’s precious little to Shiraishi this time around minus his worries about these things and a couple of literal word-for-word reiterations about how Kubo has changed his life. It’s something, just not much something.
Which means it’s down to Kubo’s pout to save the day, aided by her happily freewheeling sister. Her sister manages to show the inherent danger of video calls, but she’s also very moved when Kubo has a friend over for an evening of incredible cuteness. She’s probably this volume’s MVP.
There’s nothing wrong with what we get - Kubo and Shiraishi have a fun all-nighter, Kubo figures out that somebody might have adjusted their coffee preferences for her benefit, and somebody else figures out that they can find our hero all on their own, which is treated with the zeal of somebody seeing a magic eye puzzle for the first time.
But it’s not as funny, barely managing an actual joke, nor does anything happen of note. This is in that dead zone that many manga with a romantic angle wind up - where the plot probably could wrap up, but won’t, and we need a bit more to keep our interest as the stretch goes on.
Plus, it eats up the page count this time by presenting the original one-shot, which is always one of those moments that makes me feel like we’re getting less bang for the proverbial buck. By which I mean actual buck. This one is especially egregious because it’s really not much different than the story it turned into. At all.
The most interesting part of it all is the mangaka’s reveal that nobody liked this idea at the start but them, and they just kept at it until it got published. That takes a paragraph out of a couple dozen pages and it’s a story I would way rather hear than seeing the story’s opening salvos a second time around.
3 stars - it’s not bad, but I sure wouldn’t call this essential reading. I’ve greatly enjoyed some of the good laughs and simple joys, and there’s a little of that this time, but it’s not nearly reaching the heights of this series when it’s firing on all its cylinders.