I’ll be sad to see the end of this series. It’s been a lot of fun and all three of our main cast have been great.
Well…
I’ve wanted to like it, but it just hasn’t quite come together for me.
I think I get what the author was trying to do, but it just doesn’t really work for me. The basic underlying idea is that Arima actually likes Miyahara, but I don’t think that’s really true. I mean, he likes her, but just as a friend. And meanwhile he obviously has romantic feelings for Yukihira - he just doesn’t know what to do with them.
So he keeps ending up with Miyahara, but not because she’s the one he “likes” but just because she’s the one he feels most comfortable with. Yukihira really is the one he “likes.” And she “likes” him too, but she’s convinced he “likes” Miyahara (which just breaks my heart) And they’re not going to end up together and not because Miyahara was somehow his destiny, but just because they don’t know what to do with their feelings, so he’s going to once again default to the security of the childhood friend and Yukihira’s going to go along with it.
So to me, it’s sort of sad. I feel sorry for all of them.
Yeah, I think that is a fair take on things. I agree that it is a bit of a tragic tale. I think that one of the main things this series is lacking that would make it a bit more satisfying is an arc where Arima and Yukihira actually try to get closer (like go on dates or something like that). I think that Arima has placed Yukihira on a pedestal in his brain, and an arc where he actually gets closer to her and gets a more realistic image of her would help his turn back to Miyahara feel more satisfying.
Yeah - I think the whole thing of him putting Yukihira on a pedestal was meant to be a central point.
But then that somehow morphed into the idea that he doesn’t actually like Yukihira (in the Japanese schoolkid sense of “like”), or at least not as much as he likes Miyahara, and I don’t buy that. It might well turn out to be the case given time, but right now, I just don’t think it is. And neither does he.
Ah well - hardly the first time a manga has rushed to a not quite satisfying ending. And at least, as you noted, the characters are charming.
