If there's one thing I'm a sucker for, it's romance stories; which is why even though the premise didn't appeal to me at all, I decided to dive into this. To start, Futaba Igarashi looking like a literal middle schooler is about as off-putting as can be.
I'd love to say that it stops being weird after a while, but frankly? It doesn't. Her main love interest, Harumi Takeda, even treats her as a kid.
Premise aside, this manga has it's fair share of cute moments between the main couple, and it's even (mostly) in color. The character designs aren't anything to write home about, especially in the beginning; however, the art style and coloring increase in quality pretty drastically over the course of the manga. Despite the simple character designs, the art style really makes them pop.
Additionally, the character interactions and humor in general are pretty on point. There's some legitimately funny moments in this manga, and I didn't really feel like any of the dialogue was forced or otherwise out of place. The moments when all the characters are together and just goofing off in the office is where it shines the most.
All that being said, the main couple and even their cute moments are... forgettable at best. Worse, the longer I read this, the less I found myself caring about the development of the main characters and their romance. Aside from the gimmick of her being tiny, there's not a lot that really sets the romance between the two apart from any other generic romance. Not to mention, the manga is in no hurry to get the characters together.
Which brings me to my biggest complaint: the pacing. In stereotypical romance manga fashion, there will be dozens of chapters without any kind of substantial romantic development between the main couple. This is only made worse by the fact that when they do have a moment, it's overshadowed by either a character being incredibly dense or a character refusing to accept their own feelings. Between her looks and how they act, you'd almost forget that these are supposed to be adult characters and not high schoolers.
Speaking of which, while I don't believe the age gap between the two is ever explicitly stated, it definitely can be felt. Age gap by itself isn't usually an issue in romance, but it only hindered an already questionable romance. From the beginning, they establish him as the older coworker who doesn't really seem to consider her as a romantic option. While the manga does address her working hard to try to get him to see her as a woman as opposed to just his younger coworker, it never felt like they were able to break away from this dynamic. Generally speaking, when I look back at a romance and I can't realistically imagine them being together, I feel like that's a major issue.
So why isn't this a much lower score? Easy: the side characters.
In my opinion, Touko Sakurai and Souta Kazama are the ideal romance characters. I can't think of another story that has the side characters do everything the main couple does but so much better. Better writing, better personalities, better cute moments, etc. They even feel like they have better chemistry and a much more natural progression to becoming a couple. To top it all off, they do everything better in the relatively low amount of chapters dedicated to them compared to the main couple.
All in all, while there's a good amount of disappointing aspects of this manga, I am glad that I read it, and I would recommend anyone thinking about starting it should at least try it.
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