High School Family: Kokosei Kazoku, Vol. 1: Everybody Wants to Be a High Schooler

高校生家族 [Kōkōsei Kazoku] #1

by Ryō Nakama

Kotaro's classmates balk when his entire family shows up on the first day of high school. Just when he’s sure this embarrassment will lead to his social exile, Kotaro's family wins hearts through charm, surprising sports skills, and… desserts?! There's never a dull moment as the Ietani family tries to fit in at school!

Genres: Manga, Humor, Comics

191 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 4, 2021

Reviews

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 rounded up for a good premise, but incredibly cringey content replete with second-hand embarrassment.

[Tabi · Rating 2 out of 5]

Yeah I will not be reading the rest

[Tayla · Rating 3 out of 5]

Completely ridiculous but a lot of fun.

Don't know if I'll read more volumes though.

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Absurd, but it does have comedic moments that redeem the iffy artwork.

[Brandon · Rating 4 out of 5]

I actually cannot recall if it was High School Family or Yozakura Family, or both, but the persisting meme on /a/ is "WE EXIST," in reference to that fact that either or both manga seem to have no risk of cancellation, but nor do they receive particularly high praise....

I come to HSF as part of an old-ish plan to catch up with most everything currently running in Weekly Jump, using the MangaPlus app's third-anniversary promotion allowing users to read every released chapter for current series (when ordinarily you'd only have access to the first three and latest three chapters), but I definitely lagged behind, and/or took the promotion for granted and wasted time reading other manga. My reasoning to hit HSF before, say, Undead Unluck, or to hasten through Black Clover or something, is simply because this manga is pretty short so far. Of course, I failed to research, and it turns out the volume count is low mostly because chapters are shorter than other series, and so each volume contains about fifteen chapters rather than nine or ten....

I've read a fair amount of Me & Roboco, the other "major" (kind of...) gag series in Jump, so it's good to see HSF's brand of humor is a little different. For one thing, a lot of the humor in gag manga seems to revolve more on the straight-man character's reactions to the goofball's silliness, and Roboco's sense of humor prefers to have Bondo yell in surprise, whereas HSF has Kotaro react with more gloom. A lot of the absurdity of Roboco is in the title OrderMaid's love for Jump and references to popular manga, whereas a lot of what we see here is more like "Kotaro's dad is really athletic despite being forty-five." Basically, there's reason to read both, or to prefer one over the other (though I'm not far enough here to make a comparative judgment...), and I suppose it's really a matter of whether you're tolerant of gag manga, or if you're one of those assholes who wants Jump to be exclusively generic battle manga....

I generally aim for something of a "three chapter rule," to read three chapters before deciding whether to continue or drop a series. Lately, I've been reading entire first volumes, and it turned out to be beneficial for this manga; the first three chapters of HSF mostly used the same joke of "look how wacky it is that middle-aged parents, a small child, and a cat are attending high school!," whereas Chapter 4 onward start to flesh out the individual characters a little more, and the manga quickly comes into its own. Well, most of this volume ends up being about the father, but I guess it's okay because he's hilarious. That said, I look forward to more of Gomez.

There were a good handful of wholesome, heartwarming moments here as well, which I think are "sufficient" to letting the manga thrive, even for those readers who may be put off by the art or whatever.

[Brandon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Now THIS is some peak gag manga. You know the series is fire from the first chapter when Gomez smiles in his little uniform. I loved this series as it was coming out, so here's to the reread! I think what really makes it work is that it's actually, you know, wholesome? It can be awkward but it doesn't rely on cringe humour, making fun of people, all that. Kotaro hates being in high school with his family... but still offers to help his dad with homework, or look out for his sister, or let himself get inspired by their antics.

Also the dad decides to be a Haikyu gag for, like, the whole series, and it's incredible.

[Tharm_magotz · Rating 4 out of 5]

It really portrayed a surreal scenario of everyone under the same house hold, even cat!, is going to the same high-school as real high-school student. Admittedly, it’s humorous in the very socially awkward way.

[Laura Lloyd · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hilarious and great for something light to read that you haven't got to think much.