YMMV / Kisshou Tennyo

• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Yuiko Asai, who's a much better fit for the conventional Shōjo Demographic protagonist role, contrasts well with Sayoko's Dark Action Girl tendencies. Sayoko even brings this up— Yuiko is the relative normalcy that's constantly out of reach for her. Then Yuiko is Demoted to Extra in favor of aristocratic family drama. One could imagine that there'd be a lot more depth to the manga's discussions of gender if Sayoko and Yuiko were given more time for interaction...
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Unlike Banana Fish, which is unafraid to explicitly bring up queer romance (albeit a relatively chaste version thereof), Yuiko and Sayoko's dynamic is incredibly under-explored. It's pretty strange, too— there's a very hard shift in focus from Yuiko meeting Sayoko to Sayoko's dealings with the Toono cousins. A lot of what Takashi does in the course of the story could just as easily have been done by Yuiko— with the exception of the painting, sure, but it's fairly disappointing to see the Ambiguously Bi segments of the plot fall by the wayside in favor of a meandering Love Triangle between Akira, Ryou, and Sayoko.
  • Sayoko expresses disappointment in Ryou and Yuiko feeling guilty about not perfectly adhering to gender roles. We never get to see how she feels about her own Action Girl abilities— does she feel guilty that she's doing something "not feminine?" How does she feel about being Yuiko's version of the perfect girl?