School Rumble Volume 20 Manga Review

–> Click the link to buy School Rumble Volume 20 from Amazon.com!

Summary/Synopsis (Main Story):

The school walking festival kicks off with guys and girls passing through a YES or NO gate to indicate whether who has a crush or not. Tenma goes through the “NO” gate since Karasuma isn’t there. Harima, still handcuffed to Yakumo, witnesses this and thinks he has a chance. Yakumo tries to stop him at the gate, leading to what looks like an accidental kiss on the lips.

Tenma goes off on Harima, ‘causing him to “go ape” and flee. Yakumo eventually calms him down, but Eri is angry and kicks him in the balls. Further, Tenma locks him in a cage, with Yakumo just outside, still cuffed to him. Tenma doesn’t believe Harima didn’t kiss Yakumo, but video proof of his innocence emerges. However, Tenma won’t release him from the cage.

Hanai shows up as guard. He misunderstands Harima’s need to take a dump as Harima needing to have sex with Yakumo. Frustrated, Hanai runs away to train to be a better man.  Suou finds him, but accidentally causes a training tree to fall. Hanai saves her, but has amnesia in the process. When she takes him back to the others, he mistakenly believes they are a couple. When she denies it, he confesses his love to her and she accepts.

In order to help him regain his memories, a fake wedding is quickly set up. Akira notes that this is likely both their true feelings. Hanai sees Yakumo and his memories return. However, he now ponders his true feelings for Suou. That night, Tenma sleeps between Yakumo and Harima to prevent any dirty deeds. Harima plans to kiss her, but stops when she speaks of her dad in her sleep.

Summary/Synopsis (Side Stories):

Two aspiring manga artists come to Tokyo to visit the Dankousha (publisher) building. They mistake Harima for Nijou-sensei (Karasuma). As such, Harima gives them advice, but has them draw all the girls with Tenma’s hairstyle.

In 19th century London, a tailor (Hanai) dreams of entering the Bird Man contest. He’d like to use the money to help the poor in town. As such, he starts building a prototype plane. His wife (Suou) gives her reluctant support by giving him fabric that was to be for their child. However, the “Birdman Contest” wasn’t about flying, but dressing as a bird.

As a little girl, Mai-chan’s father heads to sea in a fishing craft. She misses her dad when he’s at sea. When word comes that her father’s ship has crashed, Mai is depressed and cries. Her childhood friend, a slender and handsome Nishimoto, ends up helping her cope in his own, weird way. Her father ended up being okay.

Thoughts/Review:

It really does suck that School Rumble Volume 20 will almost certainly never get a print edition. There’s a place on my bookcase for it. However, since it is better than nothing, I do have the Kindle version. 😅

King Kong Parody

Kobayashi-sensei has a flair for doing outrageous depictions of events that end up being hilariously funny. In School Rumble Volume 20, this came about via Tenma’s angry accusations at Harima being an ape because he’s allegedly dating Eri, but is handcuffed to and supposedly kissed Yakumo. Kobayashi-sensei even had a rock tower for King Kong Harima to climb.

I laughed so hard at this King Kong parody, complete with Yakumo being the damsel held by the giant ape. (And as a result, my lungs were stirred up, causing me to cough for an insanely long time.) And while Yakumo may have calmed Harima down, it was Eri that brought him down with a kick to the balls. Ouch. I wasn’t laughing there. 😬

Another Big Laugh

The other big laugh in School Rumble Volume 20 came from Hanai mistakenly believing that Yakumo was in a sexual relationship with Harima. The payoff was that actually, Harima needed to take a dump and since he was cuffed to Yakumo, an arrangement had to be made to do this. Still, my sides hurt after reading this, and again, my lungs were wrecked for a time.

Still, as a result of this misunderstanding, Kobayashi-sensei provides the means by which Hanai finally starts to see Suou as a potential romantic interest. And for Suou, her actions indicated to the others that the reason she seems to keep other guys at a distance is because she actually loves Hanai. Considering where School Rumble Z goes, I really liked this moment.

Side Stories

One of the fun things about School Rumble is that because it was published in multiple magazines at the same time, Kobayashi-sensei was able to publish the main story in one magazine, and side stories in the other magazines. So for School Rumble Volume 20, Sensei goes into the “what if” territory of Suou and Hanai being a young married couple in 19th century London. It is a fun way to have the characters in a completely different setting.

The other side story of interest was Mai’s. She’s a minor character in the manga, but as the co-class rep with Hanai, she does get the occasional screen time. I think the manga had previously established that she has a long history with Nishimoto, the “Porn Buddha” of the class. So it was kinda humorous seeing him as a slender, younger teen boy. That aside, he did help her through a hard time and she does care about him to some extent. I wouldn’t mind their relationship being fleshed out more.

Final Thoughts and Conclusion

In the end, School Rumble Volume 20 was a lot of fun and even had some of the biggest laughs I’ve had in a while.