Second Look: Hibi Chouchou

Synopsis

Suiren, for most of her life, has been considered as a beautiful and delicate flower who has been admired by many from afar. This has only gotten worse as she enters high school. Even her quiet demeanor only adds to her charm for the many males of the school, all except one martial artist named Kouha. This is the love story between a shy girl and a shy boy, both who are unsure of how to speak to the opposite gender.

First Read

There are plenty of romance stories involving opposites attracting or one of them finding the beauty within the other. This series, however, presents a completely different couple amongst the majority in shoujo. While other series features the main couple getting together through romantic scenarios or having heavy chemistry scenes between two, this is not the case for this series.

With this series, it takes on a more subtle romance to it. Rather than having emotional moments to build their relationship, this series takes on a softer note. Here, we see the couple develop through how they act towards the other rather than usual teasing or emotional conversations. More than having a soft romance and interesting main characters, the art leaves a lovely impression for the series.

The downside with the series is that they are more than one of the typical cliches. Whether it be the rival or the festival chapter, this is only a minor flaw in comparison to the bigger issue with the series. As sweet as the main couple is, their dynamic could have been explored a bit. Other than this, it would have been nice to see more interaction between the main couple and each other’s friends.

Second Read

When it comes to this series, the opinions tend to be a mixed bag. On one side, there is the low opinion of the series having flat characters and a slow paced romance. On the other, is the high opinion of the series being highly adorable and a different type of shoujo. Both sides are right in their own way, but not completely. Let’s start with the former. True, the pacing could have been done better, but the characters actually have interesting depth.

With Suiren, she does seem like a typical shy girl with pretty looks type of character. When you see the manga at a certain angle though, she is actually a well-developed character. She’s not a quiet girl for the sake of being quiet nor is it a personality quirk, rather, there is an understandable reason behind it. That’s the first thing that makes her a distinct character. Second is how her subtle development can be seen as a tale of a shy person trying to learn how to communicate better.

On Kouha’s side of things, he does have some nice development to him. However, the whole trope of him denying being Suiren’s boyfriend when confronted by their schoolmates does get repetitive. This trope is one of the main reasons behind the issue of pacing. Honestly, the whole dancing around between the two isn’t all that new with the genre. Out of all of this though, it doesn’t change that the two have a rather sweet relationship.

Other than the main couple, the other characters were also handled well in the development area. It was a pleasant surprise that the series took a different route with the rival character, but that just added to the positive points of the series. It’s also nice to see the different ways that the series spins typical types of characters and how they interact with one another. In a way, the series is a subtle but clever shift of a typical school story.

Conclusion

It’s true that the series could have done better with the pacing and there is a handful of cliches, but there is a cleverness to the manga. This mainly pertains to how the series handled the characters and their development. While it did have its repetitive moments, it does present a lovely soft romance that isn’t seen often enough. What makes this series so enjoyable is that more than being a different kind of shoujo, it has a nice depth to its characters.

Rating: 8/10