THE TYRANT FALLS IN LOVE (Koisuru Bokun), by Hinako Takanaga. First published in 2004 and first published in North America in 2010.
PLOT:
For the last five years, Morinaga has been pining for his lab partner and fellow graduate student, the extremely tempermental, homophobic, and generally grumpy Souchi. This emotional stalemate might have lasted forever, if not for Tatsumi going on an angry drunken bender and accidentally drinking an aphrodisiac forced upon Morinaga by a friend.
Morinaga takes full advantage of the situation, but afterwards Souchi's seemingly back to his old self. But what will he do when Morinaga tries to quit school and slink away in shame?
STORY:
Anyone who's been collecting manga for some time has at least one problematic favorite on their shelves. Perhaps it's a relic of your earlier days as a fan or something picked up in the heat of a sale. It's got qualities you love, but it's something you kind of want to hide from others.
The Tyrant Falls In Love is that series for me. It's got a premise that nowadays I would avoid like the plague, but in the early days of my fandom it sounded intriguing. True story: this first volume was the last book I ever bought in a Borders - that's how long I've had it. So why do I keep it around?
It's not without its charms. This is technically a sequel to another Hinako Takanaga series, Challengers, which I love very much and some of that feeling is bound to carry over to this one. Over the course of that series (as well as this one), it's clear that Takanaga loves writing these two leads. She gets a lot of humor out of their interactions, and Jillian Nonaka's translation only enhances this.
Takanaga uses this story to tweak the standard seme-uke dynamic. Morinaga is gentle on the streets and firm (but not cruel) in the sheets, while Souchi's harsh, combative public face melts into whimpering pleasure in bed, no matter how much he wants to deny it. I'll also admit that despite the fact that it's both a fallacy and a fantasy more than anything, there is something karmically satisfying in watching an outspoken homophobe being forced to confront his feelings for another man.
That being said, I can't dance around the fact that this story begins with an instance of rape.
It doesn't matter that Morinaga didn't want to accept the aphrodisiac and hid it well out of sight and mind.
It doesn't matter that Souchi drank it by accident.
It doesn't matter that Souchi initially consents to a hand-job after said aphrodisiac kicks in.
What does matter is that Morinaga escalates that encounter knowing Souchi is drugged and does so against his many (and loud) protests. At that point, it becomes rape. My younger self might have tried to hand-wave it away as "dub-con," but after a decade's worth of wisdom and discourse, I can't deny it. Even if Takanaga doesn't treat it that way during or afterwards, it is the undeniable truth.
I wouldn't blame anyone for rejecting Tyrant outright with a hearty NOPE for this very reason. Would I do the same were I reading this for the first time today instead of 10 years ago? Would it be easier if I didn't know this was a sequel, or if I hadn't already read (and in some cases reviewed) other Takanaga manga that I enjoyed? Would it have been easier if her art was lousy, her characters utterly charmless, and the writing dull and rote? It's hard to say. What I can say is that this truly is a guilty pleasure, in that I enjoy it in some ways but feel guilty as hell for doing so.
ART:
It certainly doesn't help that Takanaga's art is above the average for the genre. While her character designs tend towards the sort of lankiness that's all too common in modern BL, she brings a degree of skill the others don't possess. You can see that in the care she puts into their hands, or just how lively and emotive Souchi's face is. I just wish she put the same care into the layout of pages, particularly when things get smutty. Things tend to get a bit chaotic when that happens, between the various tangled limbs, Souchi's loose hair flying everywhere, dialogue and sound effects.
RATING:
I can't wholly recommend The Tyrant Falls In Love without some MAJOR caveats. That being said, I can't entirely condemn it either. If you can get past the premise, perhaps it might become your problematic fave as well. If not...well, DMP has made it all but impossible to collect so you're unlikely to encounter it in the wild.
This series is published by Digital Manga Publishing. This series is ongoing in Japan with 11 volumes available. 10 volumes have been released and are currently out of print.
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