Morthos

Note: I read this before chapter 5 and the extra was added, but I don't think I'm going to update this again after this.

Felt 50/50 about this book, but I kept thinking about two of the chapters way too much that I had to own it. I thought that this manga was mainly centered around fetishes but it seems like only ch.1 & the extra is about asphyxiation. The rest of the chapters I would consider extreme but not fetish-y. Personally feel that each story here would've been better as its own thing because it feels like Hidesato wanted to write more. I think ch. 3 and 5 (from what I've skimmed through the raws) don't have enough to be whole books so they fit fine here. However, chapter 1 can stand on its own. Chapters 2 and 4 NEED their own books. In fact, I don't think 2 and 4 belong here at all. They don't fit this book to me.

My thoughts on each chapter:

Ch.1 - Could've been a more interesting story. The asphyxiation thing isn't my thing so it was... interesting to read, but it being a short story wasn't a good move.

Ch.2 - I talk about this further down in my 1st update.

Ch.3 - Didn't really have a story and was kind of weird. This one negatively felt messy and all over the place.

Ch.4 - Was not prepared to read that and it's never going to lead my mind.

Update 1: Looking back on it, I honestly feel that chapter 2 might not need to change anything other than its homophobic dialogue since it doesn't add to the story. It just points out how horrible of a person the main character's girlfriend is... and that's it. I love studying psychology and mental disorders are a HUGE interest of mine and why I was drawn to chapters 2 and 4 the most. When I used to be in group therapy back in my teens I met someone with MPD/DID and their stories on living together in one body gave me a lot of context into what some people go through with MPD. While not the exact same experience as it was written in this story, it was very interesting to hear. Chapter 2 embodies a lot of similar feelings and experiences that they told me as well as another book I love called Many Minds One Brain by Christopher Badger where his experience was pretty close to what I just read in this manga. Whether or not the author meant for chapter 2 to read so disjointed that the reader is just as confused as someone with this disorder may be, I'm not sure. But seeing how well done and traumatic chapter 4 was written... I think so.

I honestly want to see chapters 2 and 4 get full stories. Mainly chapter 4 where it takes place either during their high school or adult years and it's about the friend who you see in the story helping the mc deal with and heal from what happened and his Maladaptive Daydreaming. Even if it's just helping by being there and comforting him. You guys, I think about this chapter and its continuation potential way too much.

Right off the bat there was a use of the f-slur and I'm really not ok with that. Bad translation or not. The art style wasn't really to my liking, but I can deal with that. Using the f-slur was a HUGE no for me.

Right, I'm gonna make sure I stay away from anything tagged "Omegaverse" from now on. Not only was the characters and story completely unlikable to me, this "Omegaverse" bullshit just rubs me the wrong way. It's kinda fucking disgusting and hard for me to read.

Oooooh my god, I've finally finished this damn book after 7 thousand years. I am so in between about this story. On one hand, it has its moments, stuff like the hurt/comfort bits between Ryou and Yuuichi, Ayumu and Yuuichi learning how to be more open and honest with each other after their family's death, and Ryou seeing himself in Ayumu and wanting to help make sure he doesn't grow up like him.

BUT the same dumb, annoying ass tropes rear their heads and I think it's the reason why I kept putting off this manga. Misunderstandings everywhere between Ryou & Yuuicihi and Yuuichi and Ayumu. No communication until the end. Possessive lover trope? Hate that. People aren't allowed to have friends? Hate that. People aren't allowed to talk to other people? Hate that. There was nothing about Yuuichi's and the other lady's (I forgot her name) body language when they were talking that gave off any fucking impression of anything. But I guess we need conflict, am I right boys?

There's was also Ayumu and Ryou "fighting" over Yuuichi which I also headed. I guess with Ayumu you could say he's a kid and Yuuichi's his uncle and father figure now. He doesn't want to lose that attention since he'd feel like that would be yet another person in his family he's lost. I can see that. But why the fuck is Ryou not leveling with Ayumu about how Yuuichi's love for him won't ever change, but instead stared some fucking rivalry shit with a KID? It's harmless but still annoying by the end of the manga.

I was really hoping to like this more than I ended up liking it because of these tropes that I wish would die.

Update: So this is an older review before I got around to reading volume 2... It's been 2 years since I've thought about this manga so I don't remember my thoughts on vol 2. I guess I'll add this to my rereads.

When the misunderstandings are so prominent that manga updates the lack of communication tag… I don't normally comment until I'm completely done with the series or book, but I gotta talk about things in this 1st vol. I'll update this once I'm done with this series.

I think the story is really cute and it touched on one of my biggest problems with BL and that's communication. So many problems can be solved if they just talked and not making them talk just to amp up the conflict really pisses me off. They did this a little bit. It would be misunderstanding followed by making up followed by misunderstanding followed by making up... That might actually be more annoying with how many times this happens. I also feel like this story didn't need as many sex scenes as it had and I hope the later vol 2 tones that down (but after reading ch 2 of vol 2 eeehhhhh). As for translation, which is its biggest downfall for me, it felt poor. There were a lot of words that didn't need to be there, a lot of weirdly said sentences. Often times I felt like other words could have been said when translating this that would be a better fit for the flow of the story. I'm glad that I do get to read this in English but I do hope this gets officially picked up for mainly this reason.

…. Listen… Overall, Kaji and Yura are my favorite couple over Maki and Hagiwara mainly because I think Maki is an asshole. I understand that he super loves his son and Hagiwara but his over-possessiveness and the way that he treated Yura and Kana pissed me off. I like how Kaji and Yura were written a lot more and it seems like the author does too seeing how much care they gave these characters. There were bits and pieces that I thought were dumb. Stuff like Kaji putting up that “I’m not interested in men” wall, and not speaking up every time Yura cuts him off. That’s also a bs move on Yura for jumping the gun too quickly…

But it’s also understandable why he does this. I just wish that was something they worked on in the 2 books they're in rather than letting him keep doing that. But fuck all that because the only thing that REALLY matters is Kana and Ritsu! AGAIN! They are the power couple, the fucking MVP out of all 3 of these mangas, and deserves a super cute, completely fluff one-shot manga about them trying to be together in high school and everyone else just fucking accepting it! No sex, just a super cute teen romance is all I need.

Update 5/26:

Just found out there's a vol 3... I'll move this review over to the 3rd vol when I get around to reading it.

Before I get to talking about the first book, I said below that I didn’t like how Hagiwara’s friend was written to start drama. I didn’t read the other book he was in until now so now I know that Yura does like Hagiwara. However, that is not shown in the first manga, so for him to be acting like an ass and for Maki to be jealous before you find out from reading the next book just makes them both look really petty and frustrating to read. Either way, I still hate that "trope" so much. It really dose not matter to me why he was an asshole.

Overall, I thought this was cute. There were some sweet moments and I loved the family dynamic of it all. But there were a couple of things that pissed me off. Firstly, I never liked how people can’t have friends in BL manga without the lover being jealous of the friend. Hagiwara’s friend never acted like he was coming on to him or anything, they were just friends and Maki was jealous because he was hanging out with his friend. There’s also a point later where the friend got villainized for no reason other than to start “pointless drama”. The way he was later written and how Maki acted didn’t sit well with me either. I think the author was trying to go for something emotional and sad to make you go “awww I feel for them” when it just had me like “uhhh everyone’s being a bit problematic”. There are better, more emotional ways to have the mother be a point of conversation to touch on without the need to start pointless drama.

Another minor thing that is just a pet peeve really, is the thought that Hagiwara had about not having a family because they’re both men. I would love for adoption or “found family” to be a big part of bl/gl manga so we can stop seeing this dumb thought be something to worry about. Lastly, the extra story. It was kind of dumb and not needed. It felt shallow like the only reason to write this short story was for the sex alone. Which, that ending sex scene I was not ok with at all. I do want to buy this as I need more family-oriented lgbtqa+ manga but I did wish I didn’t have to give it 3 stars. In the end, the only people that matter in this book are Ritsu and Kana. God bless these sweet baby boys!

I don't think I have anything I really hated about this manga, but I didn't really love it all that much either.

I didn't care about any of the characters that much. Shino's pretty normal, Mio was a bit secretive, and while I lived that, there's literally nothing else interesting about him other than a pretty face. There were some adorable moments with the couple but the only two points of "drama" that came up felt really flat. Like they were trying to find something for them to fight about. Him slowly realizing he loves his friend: fine. There is a possessive person in the way and the drama around that: whatever. But nothing interesting really happens. I did have a problem with the change in translation. Something about the translation really took me out of the story in the later chapters.

This was such a 3 or a 3.5 star for me overall but vols 1 & 2 are straight 4 stars. Mainly because I don't think I liked any of the characters except the main two and even then Mashita was riding a fine line for me. Yoshinori was definitely the only character ever, everyone else was either ok or "please stop talking". I've also noticed that this took forever for me to get through even after all the vols came out because of vol 3. The story itself was just ok, nothing gripped me but I also didn't want to drop this either. But when Yoshinori's friend was a part of the story and the vacation stuff stared kicking off, I just didn't feel like reading it. Probably the worst part of all 4 vols for me. Afterward, it just became fine again.

Overall this was just fine.