Usagi Drop/うさぎドロップ Manga Volume 05

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SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

Ten years later, Kouki and Rin are now in high school together, and are joined by Rin’s cousin and friend, Reina. Many folks, including Reina, think that Kouki and Rin are going out because they often are seen together and he will sometimes eat at her house. She denies it, but Kouki is interested and at her house, he again attempts to get her to go out with him, but she refuses, citing the fact that he’d had a girlfriend, whom she believes had been sending her strange e-mails. Rin recalls how Kouki kissed her in middle school. She asks Daikichi if he’d had a girlfriend in high school, which causes him to be flustered. However, he figures the question was because of Kouki, and Daikichi is surprised that Rin and Kouki aren’t boyfriend and girlfriend.

At Kouki’s home the following morning, Nitani-san is surprised that her son is so chatty with her once he gets up. He asks if she is going to marry a guy she’s dating, and expresses his thought that she’d end up with Daikichi. Considering his lack of success with Rin, he wonders if their family is cursed. He wants his mom to know that she shouldn’t worry about him if she wants to get remarried as he’ll still take care of her when she gets old. When she tells him he just has a mother complex, he consults with Rin and Reina about this, before consulting the cafe owner they are currently at.

When they head home, Rin states that she’d like to be a mom like Nitani-san. Kouki expresses his admiration of Daikichi as the kind of man he’d like to be.  During their talk, Kouki learns that Rin has her phone blocked because of the girl Kouki had dated. He feels bad about this, though she doesn’t seem worried about it. He attempts to hold her hand, which she initially resists, but lets him do so when he cites that they are like siblings, so it should be OK. At Rin’s home, Kouki has a chat with Daikichi and tries to plant the notion of Daikichi and Nitani-san hooking up.

Rin and Daikichi pay a visit to his parents, where Kazumi has her young daughter, Mami, over. Rin plays with Mami and has a chat with the exhausted Kazumi before she and Daikichi pay a visit to Grandpa’s grave site, where they have a chat about things. Meanwhile, Kouki calls his ex-girlfriend Akari to put a stop to her harassing Rin. After they chat a while where Akari reveals her plans for the future, she kisses him goodbye, causing Kouki to nearly lose his resolve.

At summer school, Kouki is asked by girls to go to a private (pay) pool with them. He turns them down, which leads to a discussion of public pools and Rin’s love of them, something that allows Kouki to save face. Reina, Rin, and Kouki walk home, were it is revealed that Rin is attending summer school only because it is free unlike cram schools. Rin is not enthused about going to college, but Kouki has planned to get into a 4-year university. Reina wants to get into college and find a husband, leading Rin to remark that based on Kouki’s post-college plans, he’d be the perfect fit for Reina.  They have a study session at Rin’s house, but end up not having time to go to the public pool, so when Daikichi comes home, they break out the inflatable pool.

Finally, Daikichi recalls how a few years back, Kouki was going through a huge rebellious stage, so Daikichi gets involved to try to bring him under control.  He tries to get Nitani-san to live with him, but she turns him down since she’s afraid that Kouki might not be able to control himself if he’s living under the same roof as Rin. She wishes she’d married someone like Daikichi from the start. Realizing he’s not going to get anywhere, Daikichi backs down, not realizing that she really is attracted to him. She’s happy at Daikichi’s words, but apparently frustrated that he did not pursue her further.  As such, they decide to keep their feelings bottled up.

Review/Thoughts:

Wow. I knew there would be a time skip in this volume of the manga, but man, I didn’t expect the radical change in the story’s focus from Daikichi raising Rin to romantic angst of Rin and Kouki, with Daikichi and Nitani-san on the side.

While this volume was interesting to read, it was also frustrating.  I say this because the volume does address the gorilla in the room regarding a potential Rin and Kouki relationship should Daikichi and Nitani-san get married, or even live together. During his puberty years, there’s no doubt that Kouki would have tried something on Rin, especially since he swiped a kiss from her during that time. Sadly, Kouki appears to have killed any chance he has with Rin since he has shown he’d hook up with anything that moves, though I do believe he truly loves Rin now and would not do anything to harm her.

Daikichi is one of those guys who needs a woman who will just lead him by the hand.  I say this because he’s never been good with women.  It took him forever to work up the muster to tell Nitani-san that they should move from being friends to more than friends.  She pushes back, but the way I read things, she didn’t want him to back down, but rather proceed forward.  So, he lost his chance at Nitani-san as it appears she’s with someone else, based on the name-drop Kouki gave when he spoke with his mom.

Still, things could change. As Kouki and Rin complete high school, Rin might decide to be with Kouki.  As for Nitani-san and Daikichi, well, I’m not so sure about that working now.  If Unita-sensei wants to, obviously it will work, but if she keeps things real, then once you’ve struck out with a girl, that’s it.  I don’t see Kouki as having struck out with Rin yet (though he has two strikes against him).

Again, while all of this was interesting at some level, the manga no longer has the charm it had back when it was about the single Daikichi virtually adopting and raising the six-year old Rin, whom nobody else wanted.

On the Yen Press side, Japanese honorifics are there, which is good. There is one piece of color artwork. I wish there were more. There are translator notes, which is a good thing.

I’ll keep reading this manga series to see where things go though.