What can I say? I love this story. It is among my favorite one-shots, if not my absolute favorite. Having picked up Fujimoto’s 17-21, it immediately stood out to me and pretty well landed a special place in my internal animanga corpus. To me, it fulfills the nature of a one-shot perfectly: demonstrating entirety in brevity. It’s hilarious, but also edifying and captures character qualities that are worth emulating. Also, it’s super cute! I would definitely recommend taking 3 minutes out of your day to read “Love is Blind” -- especially if you are considering reading this review.

Ibuki-kun is the student council president, and he is nearing the end of his high school career. As is not so uncommon, Ibuki has carried within himself feelings for his kouhai, Yuri, for a very long time. Ibuki’s “lifelong unrequited love” has stood by his side and worked with him in the student council. Did I mention that she is the only other member? Their bond runs deep, and this becomes more and more obvious with each panel. Ibuki, on the brink of running out of time, has resolved within himself to confess to Yuri. This is the issue of tension that our protagonist deals with, and nothing could allow him to anticipate the roadblocks that stand in the way of fulfilling this confession of love.

Ibuki’s main source of conflict is that of himself. This internal conflict is the barrier which has purportedly been the reason he has not confessed to Yuri earlier in his high school career. He has been consumed with procrastination, struggling to overcome his stagnation that has probably stemmed from the result of various fears about what may or may not result as a result of telling Yuri that he loves her. There is no shame in this fear, yet at some point a boy must become a man, seize the day, and face reality. This seems to be the point that Ibuki has reached, as he acknowledges and is aware of the little time that he has left to tell Yuri how he feels about her.

The source of conflict for the reader grows to a heightened state, as there are external conflicts embodied in different characters who try to intervene and interrupt the confession. This quickly becomes a source of comedy though, as these aforementioned characters and their schemes are reduced to nothing but whims as Ibuki’s resolute will puts them to shame (and even causes them to start rooting for him). It becomes clear that nothing could stop this young man, who is driven by the divine force of love. When a man has “made up his mind to do something” and resolves within himself to submit to love, even if it be in the face of inexorable odds, nothing will stop him. Ibuki’s love for Yuri provides him with courage to continue on despite the condition of their external circumstances. His single-mindedness is a virtue, wherein he is able to focus on that which truly matters and become blind to everything else that is truly unimportant in comparison. Love is only blind to that which is irrelevant. This, I believe, is the essence of the entire story.

To conclude, this story is quintessential Fujimoto. I understand why this would be easy to overlook and just brush off as a cute little story with what would rightly be considered some of his subpar art. I can see why that would be a reader’s first impulse, especially if they have been exposed to the rest of his work. I don't think the art is much of a hindrance with how short it is and probably how little it was refined, considering the circumstances of how/when it was published. That being said, it couldn’t hurt to take a step back and read this story in light of the transformative power of Love.