YMMV / Nana & Kaoru

• Better on DVD: The complete manga volumes tend to end some chapters with bonus strips sometimes showing additional jokes, but sometimes showing very interesting scenes. Remember when Nana deleted the photos Kaoru took of her? She kept them on a USB-Stick.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Mitsuko Tachibana, the porn store manager. Such joy. Such perversion. And so informative too. In the Time Skip pseudo-sequel series Nana to Kaoru: Black Label, it turns out that she's the personal slave of Shuutarou Sarashina, Kaoru's favorite BDSM author... who then invites Nana to a countryside retreat. Sarashina invites Kaoru to the retreat around the same time.
• Fan Nickname: For Nana to Kaoru: Arashi. Scanlators (and therefore fans) used this to differentiate the main series running in Young Animal to the newest one running in Young Animal Arashi; in truth the Arashi magazine also referred to the new series as Nana to Kaoru, they didn't feel the need to create a new title till the first collected Volume was published. Nana to Kaoru: Black Label is the (un)official title of what fans have been calling Nana to Kaoru: Arashi for quite some time.
• Hollywood Homely: The live-action Kaoru is taller than Nana, and at worst could be considered "ordinary-looking."
• Les Yay:
  • Invoked between Tachi and Nana. Some of the things they do when one or both are tied up are very...close, especially in ch. 36.
  • The father of one of Nana's younger classmates is surprised when she introduces him to her - he thought it was a boy from the way she went on about Nana.
  • The captain of Tachi's track team, Yuuki Haruka, who not only is the only one who cheers her on during her race with Nana, but also looks bashful and hides when Tachi looks into the crowd after she wipes out with Nana in the middle of the race.
• Moe: When Kaoru finally - awkwardly, painfully - tells someone that he loves Nana, admitting it to himself in the process. "The pitiful kind of moe", indeed.
• Narm Charm: Amazume manages to make an anal suppository heartwarming.
• Ugly Cute: Kaoru, moreso when his love for Nana is concerned.
• Values Dissonance:
  • The lack of Safe Words in Nana and Kaoru's BDSM relationship may raise some eyebrows amongst American readers, especially those who are familiar with the tenets of Safe, Sane, and Consensual. Safe words are far less common in the European and Japanese S&M scenes, where considerably greater responsibility is placed on the dom for the safety and enjoyment of a session.
  • In some ways this can be seen as a sign of an even deeper divide. In America, acknowledging sexual desires is the norm, where in Japan it's looked down upon to be too open about your desires. So, where many Western kinksters could read this book wondering "why doesn't Nana just SAY she wants this..." in Japan it's considered quite normal that she isn't able to.
• Viewer Gender Confusion: Tachi never mentions her actual gender, thinking that it was obvious... Even though, in her jogging suit, she's masculine enough to fool everyone who sees her.
• The Woobie
  • It's pretty evident that everyone is judged by Kaoru to be unworthy of Nana, including himself. To hear him tell it... he is scum of the earth and utterly unworthy to even be around Nana, despite being obviously in love with her dearly.
  • It's easy to feel bad for Nana as well. As readers, we see Kaoru's inner thoughts and more sympathetic sides, but to her he must seem like a horrible person with a Hair-Trigger Temper.
  • Tachi openly adores Kaoru, is openly enthusiastic about "breathers", and Kaoru basically treats her like an annoying friend. Tachi is a victim of First Girl Wins and it's really sad to see her keep throwing herself at Kaoru and him brushing her aside.

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