In Volume 3 of Manga no Tsukurikata (まんがの作り方), Kawaguchi continues to be an apathetic and uninspired artist and it beats me how she got enough work done to get a tankoubon out or how it could ever sell, since I can't project that someone so passionless could draw a compelling story. She's also a miserable girlfriend, if you can even call her that at all. Takeda's spiteful and unpleasant and Morishita is...I don't know what Morishita is. Masato's just pathetic.In fact, the *only* reason I picked this volume up is because I knew how it ended. That last chapter happened to be in an issue of Comic Ryuu I bought, and, so for the end chapter alone, I bought the volume. The rest of the volume was exactly as expected - a welter of uninspired writing about an uninspired artist, surrounded by dedication she does not deserve.
And when her girlfriend - the one person who has unreservedly supported her through everything, asks if she likes her, all Kawaguchi can muster is, "Mm." /spitspitspit/
In a final push to getting a collected volume out, Takeda is extra-specially spiteful and mean and it's pretty clear that Kawaguchi is using her too.
Clearly Kawaguchi thinks there's something wrong with her behavior because, after thinking over the situation for a while, she asks Morishita to break up with her. Morishita isn't surprised. She's resigned to it.
But after the release of her manga volume and few days apart, Kawaguchi waits for Morishita outside work. Before the younger woman can run, Kawaguchi hands her a pen body. It's been about two years, she points out. And for their one-year anniversary, she bought Morihita pen nibs. "Will you please go out with me," she asks as she hand over the body of the pen. And Morishita says, "Yes."
If this series ended here, it would be forgettable, but harmless. Since it continues, I expect *something* to develop between them now. For Kawaguchi to continue to be passive-aggressive would be unbearable. For Morishita to continue to put up with it would be unreasonable. I expect a Yuri story now, kthanxplz.
Ratings:
Art - 6
Story - 5
Characters - 5
Yuri - 2
Loser FanBoy - 1
Overall - 5
And I want both of them to go tell Takeda to go hang. What a jerk.