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stephenthewriter-blog · 6 years

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Love, Nakamura - My "Go for It, Nakamura!" Review

So recently with all the discord going on around Voltron and Insatiable, both of which I don’t watch but was just so tired of hearing about that when I got my copy of “The Adventure Zone graphic novel - Here There Be Gerblins” and “Go for it, Nakamura” (also known as “Ganbare! Nakamura-Kun!!”) this week, I was thrilled to have something to brighten my mood.

Seriously, “Go for it, Nakamura!” is just amazing. And I’m gonna tell you why. Warning spoilers ahead.

For those who don’t know the story, it’s simple. Okuto Nakamura is a gay, introverted high school student with a great interest in octopuses who has a crush on classmate, social butterfly Aiki Hirose. Like I said, pretty simple plot, with each chapter usually dealing with the escapades of Nakamura as he tries to talk with Hirose and become his friend... and more.

First thing I love about this manga is that there were a lot of relatable things as a gay man that I made me go “I’ve been there”, and much like how I titled this review I got a lot of “Love, Simon” vibe from it, though that maybe because I finally finished the book. One example being when Nakamura reads boy love manga for romance tips (and continues to do so for fun) and I remember when I started to realise I was gay, I read this manga inspired comic called “Tough Love: High School Confidential” by Abby Denson and I would watch the yaoi anime “Gravitation”, the one about the leader of a band who falls for a novelist, a lot too.

Nakamura himself is a great character; he’s an introvert but is passionate, sarcastic and at times a total drama queen. I love his obsession with octopus and how he has a pet one, and not forgetting that part in the culture festival chapter were he fantasies about Hirose been groped by tentacles which is hilarious (though it makes me headcanon that Nakamura maybe into tentacle porn. I mean come on, if it wasn’t so PG, at least when it comes that sort of thing, it be straight out of some porn you see online). I also love his character progression by the end of the manga, which I’ll get into when I talk about Chapter 11.

I for the most part love the rest of the supporting characters. Hirose (obviously), their artist classmate Kawamura, head of the drama club Tamura, head of the occult horror research club Reiko Aokiyama and teacher Sou Otogiri are among my favourite, with distinct personalities and goals of their own. Otogiri-Sensei in particular I liked the most because of his ability to connect and get along with the students, Hirose being a prime example, and in some ways he could be considered the third “main character” (with obviously Nakamura and Hirose being the first two main characters), he’s even on the back of book.

The story and chapters are all really good. I loved Chapter 7 when Nakamura saves Hirose from what I honestly think probably was nearly sexual assaulted by these Mad Max looking types (these guys were talking about the cute expressions Hirose was making and then wanted to rip his clothes and take pictures!!! I maybe over thinking it, but I can’t be the only who got that vibe from the situation) and I just loved that he saved him because he fell into a open sewer grate and then came up looking like a zombie, which freaked the biker guys. I also loved Chapter 6 when Nakamura meets a girl who looks like Hirose and then starts wondering if he’s bisexual, though I mainly like this chapter because he gets asked to perform in a school play with the girl (who then turns out to be Hirose himself and the girl Nakamura met early was actual Hirose’s sister, so Nakamura realises it was just because of the literal relative likeness that got his heart going) and it’s very cute and funny.

On a quick side not and also because I’d like to call out someone (though I don’t think they’ll be reading this) who for some (idiotic) reason jumped on the idea that Nakamura might turn out straight during that chapter, you actually need to read the whole thing and think. Nakamura even ponders if he’s bisexual, not straight, BISEXUAL! Cause they exist.

Anyway.....

Then after a few more chapters, comes the final chapter, Chapter 11 (which is the longest of all the chapters, with oddly enough Chapters 6 and 7 behind it in length) when Nakamura and his class go on a field trip to Yokohama and he sets himself the goal of finally becoming friends with Hirose, and this I feel is also very important. In the final few pages of Chapter 11, after Nakamura and Hirose have fun hanging out together, he asks if he wants to be friends, and I say this is important because unlike other boys love manga (which the author admits this story as) he would confess his love, but Nakamura, though he is VERY romantically interested in Hirose isn’t comfortable yet admiiting his feeling and for now just getting to be his friend is good enough, which I felt was so sweet. Made even sweeter when Hirose says “I thought we were already friends”.

The only negative thing I would say is that it’s sad that this manga is just one book and that it’s not a series of so and so many volumes, that way you could extend upon all the characters lives and personalities and have story arcs that went longer than just one chapter (like the field trip or the culture festival in Chapter 2). So I think it be incredible if it got a sequel, maybe where Nakamura and Hirose relationship goes actually romantic, or he starts crushing on a new guy, or maybe a story/series where he’s in college (thought he could still be in high school) and ends up become friends with other people of various sexual and/or gender identities. Maybe even an anime?

I just really loved this manga (It literally makes me happy just looking at it) and it’s the sort of content alongside “Brooklyn Nine-Nine”, “Love, Simon”, “Moonlight”, “Black Sails”, “Sense8”, “Carol” and even to an extent “Killing Stalking” to name a few which are actual lgbt+ representation from the get go that actually matters, that is good and also “HELLO MEDIA WE ARE HERE, WE EXIST, THIS IS HOW YOU DO ACTUAL REPRESENATION THAT WE THE GAYS ACTUALLY WANT!” and all of them are in various genres.

I just encourage anyone reading this go and buy this, I bought this for £9.15 from Amazon (another side note, boycotts don’t really work, they actually had the biggest sales on those days, so just protest and let the truth be known), instead of reading it online for free like I may or not have done first, and maybe we’ll get more of Nakamura or similar stories from the author, Syunedi, hopefully in the near future. Hopefully with more Octopuses.

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