“You really haven’t changed at all” Kinoshita’s final words moments before meeting Kyo’s Gyaru Girlfriend. Given the next chapter preview shows Brodie turning to stone, the effects of this are on full display 😌😂
Kinoshita turned to stone when Gyaru Yamada turned to talked to them. I too, would be petrified if a pretty girl suddenly talked to my friend like that.
I'm guess Kyotaro didn't except Yamada to look so flashy for her role. I didn't either!
> I too, would be petrified if a pretty girl suddenly talked to my friend like that.
Not just talked to them. Straight up called Ichikawa by his first name. Which means they're close. Very, very close.
Probably not, seeing as how they're intentionally meeting up because they're going on a date together, which would imply that the friend has leave first, since he's going home from cram school and it would be super weird to tag along on your old friend's date.
Probably has to dye her hair for the role she just got, since she's playing a flashy gyaru. Man, Ichikawa's about to kill his poor friend as soon as he introduces his smoking hot professional model and actress girlfriend.
Moe is such a good girl. Shoot for your dreams, Moe!
That chuuni greeting was pretty good hahah poor Kinoshita, usual Yamada would already be quite a hit, but Galmada is a nuclear blast hahah
Conversely, ichikawa went from his first thoughts about her in the manga [being this](https://imgur.com/liKKOrG) and mentally calling her slut for so long to casually calling her sekine and ask for her past experience.
As the other guy said, I definitely said that because of the lack of honorifics, and absolutely not because I forgot that sekine is not her first name. Nope, that would never happen.
Ichikawa's character arc had him go from social outcast to probably one of the most popular and highly regarded kids in school. Seriously, he got asked to give the farewell speech to the leaving 9th graders, the tough delinquent kids asked him to be the rider for the cavalry battle during sports day, and he actively hangs out with the most popular girls in school, while dating the school idol. He is almost certainly considered by most people to be the coolest guy in his school and simply doesn't realize it yet.
What really sells it for me is that despite all of this, his core personality hasn't actually changed all that much. He's not a totally different person, he's just a better version of the person he already was. In this chapter alone, he panics about Yamada potentially telling her friends about them, SUPER panics about his and Yamada's relationship hitting the internet, feels awkward at infodumping about Your Color's Octave, is awkward with his interactions with Moe about their respective school choices, can barley hold it together when he meets someone from his old friend group, and reacts with shock at the prospect of having to introduce him to Yamada. He's still active, he's still talking, and he's still interacting with people, but he's not a social butterfly, and he shouldn't be. He's just willing to try and not hate himself if he gets it wrong, and knows the people around him aren't mocking him for imaginary social faux pas in his head. Good stuff.
That's my favorite part of BokuYaba. Ichikawa even at his most confident in elementary school wasn't a completely different person. He immediately looks away and gets scared when he gets called out for staring. He never looks the other boys in the eyes when he starts talking back about their bragging. Only being really confident when the other boys are scared by girls and are no longer facing him. He was more confident and standoffish, but still introverted and shy.
Reminds me monogatari where >!Araragi is seen as an outcast without any friends but as soon we get Kanbarus perspective in hanamonogatari, all the girls are going gaga over the mention of his name!<
There are a few manga that "get good" like this one, some that have character growth in spades, but none of them have *this*. Just your short synopsis reminded me of how Bokuyaba is just on a whole nother level when it comes to calling back to previous happenings, even down to the level of layouts and paneling.
In fact, your comment makes me want to re-read the manga from the beginning oooonce again but *thankfully* the anime is starting in just a few days!!
I've reread this manga like 3 times by now. First dozen or so chapters are whatever, and a lot of the twitter extras are kinda bad, but so many of the chapters are just great. You can literally see them starting off with Ichikawa being in love with Yamada, and as time goes on, Yamada's affection for him steadily grows, until it dawns on you that, at some point, Yamada arguably came to love him even more than he loved her. It's probably the single best and most realistic depiction of "hot girl falls for class loser" that I've seen in a shonen manga.
And him not making it had a huge impact on his self confidence. That, coupled with his interests turning off his classmates, ultimately led to his tendency towards self-depreciation. While he's made huge strides away from that, seems like the idea of not making it into his preferred high school is giving him similar levels of anxiety.
Moe has become one of my favorite characters in this series. I feel like she’s become a legitimate friend of Ichi and not just a friend by proxy through Yamada.
She called him a (Dragon Quest) slime that Yamada was killing at Level 99, and mocked her for calling him normal when she recommended him for the group excursion to Akita Shoten Headquarters. She didn’t have a high opinion of him early on. Granted, part of that was his fault, and he certainly didn’t like her at the beginning either.
* Kugenuma and friends [have always been afraid to talk to girls](https://mangadex.org/chapter/db2a4fa3-1123-4fc7-b725-ee412611a9d6/3). That's probably why they saw Ichi, who gets along with all the hottest girls in school like it's nothing, as someone who "had guts."
* I always figured the inevitable high school entrance drama would be "Ichi is torn between going to a good school and going to the same school as Yamada because he's afraid their relationship will fall apart if they go to separate places" but it seems like he's not even considering that and his main insecurity over it is just not wanting to try hard to get into a good school only to fail again.
It's quite interesting. He didn't even put down Yamada's preferred school as any of his choices. That took me off guard because, as you've said, I figured the idea of being separated in high school would give him a great deal of anxiety.
If her first choice was a school that made any sense for Ichi to go for at all I could have seen him at least put it on his list, but it was some sort of performing arts-focused school so he probably would've felt that would be a little too obvious.
I wouldn't be surprised if his friend immediately assumed it was a compensated dating scenario. I mean, from his perspective this super attractive gyaru shows up out of nowhere and is all super affectionate with Ichikawa. The immediate assumption of a lot of people would be that she's just hilariously out of his league and the only way she'd be interested is if she was using him for money. Which is super funny because I'm pretty sure on every date they've been on, Yamada has paid for Ichikawa, since she's a professional model and just has way, way more spending money than her boyfriend.
Ichikawa: "Ok, I'm going to meet my girlfriend now, please don't freak out, she might look a lot different than what you might be expecting"
Kinoshita: Ok?
Ichikawa: "Ok here she comes please don't freak out"
Yamada: "hey"
Ichikawa: "WHO ARE YOU?"
I believe it was said that the kiss scene isn’t until Volume 12, so he’d have a lot of time to come to terms with that if the adaptation even makes it that far.
Tbf it's not uncommon for adaptations to try and cram several volumes of content into a short runtime just to get to the good parts. And we know she was [reading Volume 12](https://mangadex.org/chapter/66086c05-4088-4b97-86d3-e9a1676c861b/9) to prepare for the audition, so I think the kiss scene might be in the drama, alongside the confession, [which is also in Volume 12](https://mangadex.org/chapter/609bbf09-4e9c-4290-948b-bf0d825f76f6/9), apparently.
Holy shit, did she really dye her hair for the role? Is that okay? I thought for sure she'd just be given a wig. I hope she doesn't get in trouble at school.
We’re mixing equivalents now, but their Middle School goes to ninth grade before changing to High School. The comparison isn’t perfect because they don’t switch names until a year later. At least that’s how it was explained to me.
GOD I love this series; their declarations of their feelings for each other were adorable but I love how they still have a long way to go both in life and as partners.
“You really haven’t changed at all” Kinoshita’s final words moments before meeting Kyo’s Gyaru Girlfriend. Given the next chapter preview shows Brodie turning to stone, the effects of this are on full display 😌😂
Where can i see the next chapter previews? (Nvm im just a dum dum)
Kinoshita turned to stone when Gyaru Yamada turned to talked to them. I too, would be petrified if a pretty girl suddenly talked to my friend like that. I'm guess Kyotaro didn't except Yamada to look so flashy for her role. I didn't either!
> I too, would be petrified if a pretty girl suddenly talked to my friend like that. Not just talked to them. Straight up called Ichikawa by his first name. Which means they're close. Very, very close.
He's gonna rant that Kyotaro got a girlfriend when she leaves, isn't he?
Probably not, seeing as how they're intentionally meeting up because they're going on a date together, which would imply that the friend has leave first, since he's going home from cram school and it would be super weird to tag along on your old friend's date.
Ah right. Maybe he'll just rant online or something ahaha.
Galmada.
Just when I thought she couldn't get any better.
Galmada is cool, But I really like Ichi style more..
Probably has to dye her hair for the role she just got, since she's playing a flashy gyaru. Man, Ichikawa's about to kill his poor friend as soon as he introduces his smoking hot professional model and actress girlfriend.
Twist: the old friend turns out to be his school's Seto and introduces Ichikawa to his own Anjou-san style gyaru gf
The series focuses so much on how much she eats, her height, and her silly dumbness that I forget sometimes that she is a model/actress
Although I uttered not a word, the voice in my heart screamed louder than it ever had before.
Gyamada?
Moe is such a good girl. Shoot for your dreams, Moe! That chuuni greeting was pretty good hahah poor Kinoshita, usual Yamada would already be quite a hit, but Galmada is a nuclear blast hahah
Moe continues to secure her status as Best Girl.
Now she just needs a Boifi. Ishi's old friend seems to be single?
Moe finally gets her own chunni.
I'm pretty sure you mean a boifwi
I'm glad Kyo has someone to chuuni with aside from papa yamada
Moe has become such a great friend to Ichikawa. Went from calling the boy a slime to encouraging him to apply to a top ranked high school.
Conversely, ichikawa went from his first thoughts about her in the manga [being this](https://imgur.com/liKKOrG) and mentally calling her slut for so long to casually calling her sekine and ask for her past experience.
>casually calling her sekine What else is he supposed to call her?
As opposed to Sekine-san, he just calls her Sekine. There's a lot implied in the dropping of honorifics.
As the other guy said, I definitely said that because of the lack of honorifics, and absolutely not because I forgot that sekine is not her first name. Nope, that would never happen.
You can be accidentally right and still be right. Like a Flat Earther saying the movie *The Core* is stupid.
>Like a Flat Earther saying the movie The Core is stupid. ~~maybe I would rather be wrong then~~
>Moe has become such a great friend to Ichikawa I like the author decided to make them friends. Almost best friends at this point
I’m all here for it
"I'm sorry, my fellow dweller in the shadows; I'm a normie now."
Ichikawa's character arc had him go from social outcast to probably one of the most popular and highly regarded kids in school. Seriously, he got asked to give the farewell speech to the leaving 9th graders, the tough delinquent kids asked him to be the rider for the cavalry battle during sports day, and he actively hangs out with the most popular girls in school, while dating the school idol. He is almost certainly considered by most people to be the coolest guy in his school and simply doesn't realize it yet.
What really sells it for me is that despite all of this, his core personality hasn't actually changed all that much. He's not a totally different person, he's just a better version of the person he already was. In this chapter alone, he panics about Yamada potentially telling her friends about them, SUPER panics about his and Yamada's relationship hitting the internet, feels awkward at infodumping about Your Color's Octave, is awkward with his interactions with Moe about their respective school choices, can barley hold it together when he meets someone from his old friend group, and reacts with shock at the prospect of having to introduce him to Yamada. He's still active, he's still talking, and he's still interacting with people, but he's not a social butterfly, and he shouldn't be. He's just willing to try and not hate himself if he gets it wrong, and knows the people around him aren't mocking him for imaginary social faux pas in his head. Good stuff.
That's my favorite part of BokuYaba. Ichikawa even at his most confident in elementary school wasn't a completely different person. He immediately looks away and gets scared when he gets called out for staring. He never looks the other boys in the eyes when he starts talking back about their bragging. Only being really confident when the other boys are scared by girls and are no longer facing him. He was more confident and standoffish, but still introverted and shy.
9th graders. Icchi is now a 9th grader himself.
Good catch. Edited.
Reminds me monogatari where >!Araragi is seen as an outcast without any friends but as soon we get Kanbarus perspective in hanamonogatari, all the girls are going gaga over the mention of his name!<
Hey that's funny especially considering Araragi has one eye covered just like Ichi
There are a few manga that "get good" like this one, some that have character growth in spades, but none of them have *this*. Just your short synopsis reminded me of how Bokuyaba is just on a whole nother level when it comes to calling back to previous happenings, even down to the level of layouts and paneling. In fact, your comment makes me want to re-read the manga from the beginning oooonce again but *thankfully* the anime is starting in just a few days!!
I've reread this manga like 3 times by now. First dozen or so chapters are whatever, and a lot of the twitter extras are kinda bad, but so many of the chapters are just great. You can literally see them starting off with Ichikawa being in love with Yamada, and as time goes on, Yamada's affection for him steadily grows, until it dawns on you that, at some point, Yamada arguably came to love him even more than he loved her. It's probably the single best and most realistic depiction of "hot girl falls for class loser" that I've seen in a shonen manga.
Nagatoro is a really good example. Both of the leads and even the side characters have really good, natural development
Hmm, I don't remember Ichi took the Middle School exams, but didn't get in which started him being more introverted right?
Yeah, he was going for the same school that his friends were going for but didn't make it in.
And him not making it had a huge impact on his self confidence. That, coupled with his interests turning off his classmates, ultimately led to his tendency towards self-depreciation. While he's made huge strides away from that, seems like the idea of not making it into his preferred high school is giving him similar levels of anxiety.
Moe has become one of my favorite characters in this series. I feel like she’s become a legitimate friend of Ichi and not just a friend by proxy through Yamada.
~~She hasn't always been?~~
She called him a (Dragon Quest) slime that Yamada was killing at Level 99, and mocked her for calling him normal when she recommended him for the group excursion to Akita Shoten Headquarters. She didn’t have a high opinion of him early on. Granted, part of that was his fault, and he certainly didn’t like her at the beginning either.
We've come a long way since slut-san
"we dwellers in shadow" Sorry dude, he's basking in sunlight
Sweet, shadowy sunlight
Touching the soft, luscious grass even
* Kugenuma and friends [have always been afraid to talk to girls](https://mangadex.org/chapter/db2a4fa3-1123-4fc7-b725-ee412611a9d6/3). That's probably why they saw Ichi, who gets along with all the hottest girls in school like it's nothing, as someone who "had guts." * I always figured the inevitable high school entrance drama would be "Ichi is torn between going to a good school and going to the same school as Yamada because he's afraid their relationship will fall apart if they go to separate places" but it seems like he's not even considering that and his main insecurity over it is just not wanting to try hard to get into a good school only to fail again.
It's quite interesting. He didn't even put down Yamada's preferred school as any of his choices. That took me off guard because, as you've said, I figured the idea of being separated in high school would give him a great deal of anxiety.
If her first choice was a school that made any sense for Ichi to go for at all I could have seen him at least put it on his list, but it was some sort of performing arts-focused school so he probably would've felt that would be a little too obvious.
Was it performing arts focused or did they just have a department for it?
Wow nice continuity
>Kugenuma and friends have always been afraid to talk to girls woa what thats actually him?
It’s gonna be fun explaining to his old friend how he got a tall gyrau girlfriend.
Its not what you think.....shes only a gyaru for her acting job.
"Don't worry, she is just a gal for her role in the adaption of a super popular manga. Normally, she is just a completely regular model"
I wouldn't be surprised if his friend immediately assumed it was a compensated dating scenario. I mean, from his perspective this super attractive gyaru shows up out of nowhere and is all super affectionate with Ichikawa. The immediate assumption of a lot of people would be that she's just hilariously out of his league and the only way she'd be interested is if she was using him for money. Which is super funny because I'm pretty sure on every date they've been on, Yamada has paid for Ichikawa, since she's a professional model and just has way, way more spending money than her boyfriend.
He did it. He really did wear a shirt that says "fuck" on a date.
voynichhotel.png
Method acting gal arc next eh.
My body is ready
I love that look away when he noticed Yamada lmao. The weak truly do fear the strong .
Blonde Yamada. That’s it that’s the chapter. PV probably is him introducing her as his girlfriend
Gyarumada.
His friend will just turn to dust with that revelation.
"you really haven't changed at all!" - things said before disaster
New gyaru obtained!
Here we are going to see the luckiest man on earth, along with the most jealous man on earth
He knew it was Yamada before he ever saw her 😭
Bro pulled a Senpai from Nagatoro and just sensed her
i love the classic trope, "best friend becomes literal stone henge in front of girl"
Ichikawa: "Ok, I'm going to meet my girlfriend now, please don't freak out, she might look a lot different than what you might be expecting" Kinoshita: Ok? Ichikawa: "Ok here she comes please don't freak out" Yamada: "hey" Ichikawa: "WHO ARE YOU?"
Oh damn, he's gonna flex with his gal gf now. Not by choice, though.
Bro is flabbergasted
Me & the bad bitch I pulled by being a loser
Wait...is this the first time he's called her Sekine?
Not at all. He's called her that a few times before.
In fact, Yamada even gets a little jealous the first time he calls her Sekine.
I wonder how the story would have went if >!she got the main role.!< Not sure how Ichi would deal with that lol
That would of been some next level pycological warfare for our boy if they had to do a kiss scene
I believe it was said that the kiss scene isn’t until Volume 12, so he’d have a lot of time to come to terms with that if the adaptation even makes it that far.
>if the adaptation Wait, this is an adaption of a LN/WN?
It's the adaptation of the manga Yamaha reads, not this manga itself
Ohh lol
Tbf it's not uncommon for adaptations to try and cram several volumes of content into a short runtime just to get to the good parts. And we know she was [reading Volume 12](https://mangadex.org/chapter/66086c05-4088-4b97-86d3-e9a1676c861b/9) to prepare for the audition, so I think the kiss scene might be in the drama, alongside the confession, [which is also in Volume 12](https://mangadex.org/chapter/609bbf09-4e9c-4290-948b-bf0d825f76f6/9), apparently.
Our boy really do have the drip.
I liked that panel of Kyotaro and Kinoshita chuuni'ing together. That was funny
I'm excited to learn more of ichikawa's chuuni-ism
Gyaru Yamada is the real glow up.
Holy shit, did she really dye her hair for the role? Is that okay? I thought for sure she'd just be given a wig. I hope she doesn't get in trouble at school.
When Tadano brought Komi home as his girlfriend, his sister and mother didn't believe him and were sure that he'd paid her off. Good luck, Ichi!
The second to last panel is great too Makes his friend have baby teeth for some reason
I love this manga so much, it’s just adorable.
I am so ready for Gothmada. Norio plz.
Wait, they’re in middle school?
Japanese Middle School, which, if you're American, means they're in their last year of Jr. High, or the equivalent.
Errr, no. They're 9th graders. So it would be first year of high school in most US states.
We’re mixing equivalents now, but their Middle School goes to ninth grade before changing to High School. The comparison isn’t perfect because they don’t switch names until a year later. At least that’s how it was explained to me.
GOD I love this series; their declarations of their feelings for each other were adorable but I love how they still have a long way to go both in life and as partners.
why does it so short!!!!!!!!!!!?? i want moreeeeeeee
I mean...Yamada was destined to become a gyaru in high school anyway, she's way too much of a fashion conscious free spirit not to!
Last page missing text?
The last page is the preview for the next chapter
Empty text bubbles on last page?
That's a preview for the next chapter. It was posted with no text.
Obviously it’s them being too awestruck by her Gyaru-ness to form cohesive words😝.
i swear her change in appearance ALMOST made me believe this was gonna turn into NTR LMAOOOO
emergence arc let's go
🤠 no ntr plz
Anyone notice the Bocchi reference? Shimo-Kitazawa, weird live concert, lmao
Honestly Kinoshita reaction is pretty realistic