Cherry manga review

Cherry is a short romantic comedy series by Eisaku Kubonouchi. I quit after one volume, then skipped to the end to find out it was all a dream… or was it? The story is about two young adults from the boonies who meet, fall in love “at first sight” and run away together to Tokyo to avoid a forced marriage.

At first Cherry seemed like it would be an interesting look at the difficulties of city life for a pair of outsiders with no money. Can they overcome the barriers, or will they be forced to go home in despair? Will Fuuko’s rich family come looking for her? Will the police? Where will they live? What will they do for money? What— stop worrying. Kubonouchi took the easy way out.

The couple almost immediately run into helpful people who give them a place to live, both Fuuko and her boyfriend find part-time jobs almost immediately, everybody loves the innocent, cheerful Fuuko, and Sakurabou’s only worry becomes “When can I have sex with Fuuko?” Every time he shows up, that’s all he can think about. I felt filthy just reading it, so I quit.

*spoilers for how it ends*
I skipped to the last chapter and it turns out everything was a dream. The house Fuuko supposedly lived in is ruined and empty, the people he “met” are probably people he imagined from reading about them in a magazine, and his ex-girlfriend is the one who runs from her wedding to be with him, not Fuuko. Fuuko never existed in the first place…or did she? There are a couple of problems with this:

1. This setup would have worked for a 1 volume series. After 4 volumes, however, the readers have grown to know and love the cast. Fuuko in particular has been shoved heavily down our throats, and now you say she never existed?
2. Several months must have passed in Sakurabou’s dream. In that time he must have fallen head over heels for Fuuko and forgotten all about his old GF (Meguppe who?). You can’t send him back to the beginning and tell him to re-fall for Meguppe, it’s not so simple.
3. Meguppe leaves her wedding to come see Sakurabou. But he still has no job, no prospects, no place of his own and no proper education. As long as he doesn’t know what he wants to do with his life, he can’t take care of anyone else. They have no future.
4. In the original timeline Meguppe turned into a skank who insulted and dumped Sakurabou very cruelly after leaving for Tokyo. Having seen this side of her, he’ll probably never be able to see her in the same light again. At the very least he’ll never trust her, so this relationship is not going to work.

In other words, “It was all just a dream” doesn’t solve anything at all! Thanks for that slap in the face, Kubonouchi. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.