Tai's manga / #Tragedy(16)

i read this so many times in my Youth. its such a teen soap but damn was it addictive af. (and their chemistry? outrageous). its tragic but it does have a happy ending fyi. massive TW for childhood s*xual abuse tho.

so im crying really hard right now. and i dont know WHAT i expected but somehow it wasnt That? like goddamn well played once again Ilkwon. auuughhh im gonna go lay down now. (i'll come back with a proper review of this later ok. i need like..a few days)

i can never decide if i actually like studio stellas art style or not but it is distinctive i will give them that. neway this toon was such a trashy soap opera but i enjoyed that. i dont rec it and i dont not rec it? the sex scenes are sexy tho. ill say and she def ended up with the right guy

well goodness that was a Ride. there's alot of cyclical thoughts and dialogue on here. its a bit exhausting to read at times. its very dark and fucked up but not scary or nauseating the way killing stalking is. just a very different vibe despite the really creepy beginning. they both need massive psychiatric help tbh but since this is fiction i couldnt help but want those two crazy kids to work it out somehow and then they do! yay? ngl its a bit of an anti climactic ending. i dont think a tragic ending woulda been better just cause it woulda been patently obvious so rather smth less pitch black woulda been refreshing but this ending just felt kind of...idk flat. i think it works better if u read it all together with the final chpt, it feels like a nice reprieve from all the intense emotion and action then. also gonna be honest, didnt care about those other two criminal guys. at all. anyway gonna leave it at 4 stars tho since it was a good and sexy thriller. i think its fair to call it an erotic thriller right?

i keep thinking i wish i could spend more time with these women and their relationship but oh well. the ending has one of the ladies dying because ofc it does. but with so little build up to the climax there is p much no emotional payoff. also the way it goes from jeannette being surrounded by dudes trying to kill her, only to suddenly end up in a room sadly reading her dead gf's letter is...not everything Needs to be explained but that was a very weird narrative choice tbh. i rly cant rate it higher than this even tho i want to. so here's hoping the next GL comic i pick up will be more enjoyable.

that was depressing af but also....meh? it would've had more impact if it was longer and we got to know the characters more. i feel sad for both the main characters. these kids really had to grow up too fast and were failed alot by the adults in their lives. its sad for sure but becuz so much happens offpage, via a sudden time skip of EIGHT years, we get little insight into their character growth or complexity of motivations so its hard to be as invested as i wanted to be. the ending feels rushed instead of painful and earned. anyway ramjak continues to be a webtoon creator that i have mixed opinions on. im also reading his current work right now Snowman. which is also clearly a setup for tragedy but with a less sympathetic main character so that's..something (appreciate that its full color too). anyway yall can just skip this one

i have so many mixed feelings on this...like there's a good heartfelt theme to this story and it has alot of good characterizatioin and a very interesting setting. altho this was DEF written by a person who has never spent a notable amount of time in america cause the racial dynamics of the friendships here is...it just wouldnt go down this way irl is all im sayin but i am still glad to see all these black folks in the comic just bein regular people and not stereotypes despite being written by a native korean who prooobably hasnt interacted with a ton of them in her real life. that said i think koreans arent as rare of unicorns as she seems to think they are in this urban large city devlopment these characters seem to live in. but the racism they would go thru is def very true. whether it would go down quite like This tho....and this leads me into what my real issue is with this story. The amount of pure unmitigated torment that Sehyun goes thru in this story is just Too Much. esp when i know he is never gonna get the trauma counseling and sexual assault survivors group meetings that he truly desperately needs. but these stories are always about trauma victims being healed by Love. i do appreciate that the love Sehyun recieves is from a family and community of people and not just one guy who is his White Knight. and in fact his white knight in question is a pretty flawed complicated person himself. which i appreciated. but there's a way to indicate that sehyun went through Alot without...showing us in excruciaating detail every single fucked up thing he went thru? after a while it felt..fetishizing and sadistic in a way it didnt NEED to be. and its esp troublesome cause unlike other BL stories that overuse rape as a form of titilation in their dark smutty stories...this story is taking the abusive actions VERY seriously and grounding them in the real world. but then its also trying to treat them the way alot of darker BL involving rape would. again as a Sex Scene and not as a fuckin nightmare which is what this boy has been enduring. i dont think these scenes are meant to be very sexy but they are clearly showing more than needed to just make their point, which is why i think its being treated in a way that feels inappropriate to the actual subject matter here. like these are rapes in the realest sense that they are meant to dehumanize, to punish, to dominate, to torture etc this poor kid (and from a VERY young age)...like the fact that he is not only assaulted by his father figure...multiple times...and we see it everytime...im like...FFS. it was too much! anyway once he gets out of that environment and these men are dealt with by the police. i was hoping the rest of the story would be consensual sex and healing for sehyun. but nooope, the writer still felt she needed more fucked up rape scenes but this time with the bonus that sehyun Resists! cause he doesnt think he's trash anymore! wow growth! except...thats....so victim blamey??? like it implies that if sehyun had tried harder to resist and hadnt bought into the fucked up gaslighting and mental conditioning he was literally being raised in at one point wrt the worthlessness of his body and person...that he coudla got out sooner or smth and im like...what the fuck? idk if thats what the writer was Trying to say. but it felt HELLA sus. showing that sehyun has broken out of his self loathing mindset could've been done without being assaulted again (and Again. Tho tbf it wasnt shown and the other time he manages to get away but jfc after What??). Idk if that scene where he yells at his abuser is supposed to feel cathartic and inspiring but all i felt was sad that this kid still has to go thru this shit and have to fight this battle Alone. ffs. In conclusion, this is not a bad comic, but it is a very frustrating one. its got its heart in the right place (mostly) but the execution really tried every ounce of my patience. i dont recommend it but i also cant say its worthless trash either. just up to whether the unusual setting and distinctive characters are enough of a draw to make u stick thru this to the (genuinely sweet) ending or not. i mean i did, but i still dont know if i should have~

this story does some interesting thigns and im always here for an author who like TRIES something u know? instead of just the usual cliches. but yes you should read this asap. if u like omegaverse its a pretty darn thoughtful and dare i say critical? take on it. its deconstructive of alot of its popular tropes. tbh omegaverse has its usually presented makes little sense to me from a biological or even evo-psycho lens. rape isnt good for propagating the species. i cant beliieeeve i have to say that. the way rut makes alphas turn into violent slavering beasts is...nonsense. however the story does seem to think that IS messed up and approaches it seriously enough. and its also very romantic. there isnt that much sex in it but it is def a Mature title. but thats why i didnt add the smut tag. cause its not. it did manage to wring some tears out of me and thats not easy to do so. worth a read for sure. but yeah the twist in the first half of the story (and the changes in POV in the second half) really justify its existence alrdy even if the execution had been subpar (and imo it wasnt). so yes go forth and read!

alot better than i thought it would be. Kirin the main guy is so pretty and thats why i picked this up tbh. i expected the other main guy to be far more cruel and vicious and while he is a certified psychopath and a bit (or alot lol) rough in bed...he's surprisingly one of the uh nicer Problematic Tops in the darker end of the BL genre. (hell he still cares more about consent than the leads of POTN, YTC, LTWW or even LIAI all popular BL comics with asshole ish tops obv in varying degrees of horrible and 2 of them are supposed to be like romcoms more than dramas and yet....annnnnd yet). anyway if u like ur BLs dark and ~psychological~ and very sexual then i dare say u came to the right place.