MANGA REVIEW | "How Do We Relationship?" - Volume Four
Romances can be unpredictable. One moment you are head-over-heels in love with your significant other; in the next, you’re bickering over the stupidest things! And that bickering can escalate to unfathomable levels, until things calm down and the relationship seemingly returns to normal. But then, the other shoe drops when you least expect it. This is what happens in the fourth volume of How Do We Relationship?
Miwa’s reunion with a high school friend fortunately doesn’t end at a love hotel. However, the guilt that such an idea hit her brain affects the way see looks at her girlfriend Saeko. At first, things look okay between the two, only for their emotional volcanoes to erupt in a fiery blaze! And just when everything is off of their chests and their dates goes back to normal, Saeko suggests breaking up.
I was not expecting things to reach such catastrophic levels in a short amount of time. In fiction, bad couplings normally reach a explosive crescendo before the breakup occurs. And while Miwa and Saeko have a heated argument, it seemingly ends okay between the two of them. So when Saeko just ends the relationship after a night of love-making, it arrives like an incoming train smashing into an unexpected car.
That’s when I realized what author Tamifull was trying to demonstrate in How Do We Relationship?, as love in fiction is different from love in reality. In real-life, love and partnerships can just reach a conclusion out of the blue. (Hell, I personally went through that myself with my last ex-girlfriend!) It brings the manga’s title to the forefront as a genuine question: “How do we relationship?” Its answer: “We don’t fucking know!”
Nevertheless, it’s a moment that doesn’t cause the narrative to halt frantically, but instead find itself at a fork in the road. Now that their relationship has ended, where do Miwa and Saeko go from here? It looks like they’ll stay together as friends, but a blip from the future shows that something might happen again between the two of them. So where does the story go from there?
For the time being, it could focus more on the band club and its other members. As other people in the club enter relationships, it’s possible that we could see how their love lives go. But with such a focus on Miwa and Saeko since the first chapter, it’ll be difficult for Tamifull to try to keep the readers’ attention if the spotlight shines on another relationship. Hence why we might see the two attempt to have relationships with other people.
The breakup may come out of the blue, but How Do We Relationship? attempts to show that such an occurrence can happen. Volume Four heats up the arguments and anxieties of dating, and shows why breakups happen because it’s just the right thing to do. What happens next between Miwa and Saeko is difficult to guess, but one wouldn’t be surprised if their return to being just friends might be short-lived. Will they get together again, or will it reach a point where neither can be in the same room with one another?
Perhaps from here on out, How Do We Relationship? won’t be a question revolved around dating, but will instead be on how a friendship can evolve or devolve.
FINAL GRADE:
Promotional consideration provided by Chantelle Sturt of VIZ Media
