THE END OF NAGATORO

 

Since I don't follow any manga forums, I had no idea that this popular manga -- usually rendered in English as DON'T TOY WITH ME, MISS NAGATORO-- would have its conclusion published in Japan this June. Thus, the final episode, #154, was translated into English online this week in July.

Now, though I didn't know specific end-times, I was fully aware that the series would conclude soon. In many teen humor serials, the characters never age and never leave high school, ranging from ARCHIE to URUSEI YATSURA. But from the first stories, NAGATORO's author Nanshi hinted that his story would be time-centric. The male lead Naoto is introduced to the reader as a second-year in high school, while the titular Nagatoro is his junior by one year. She seemingly fixates on Naoto the first time she meets him, sarcastically using the respectful term "Senpai" toward him while in actuality she shows him no respect, at least in the earliest stories. Though I don't recall that Nanashi specifies the passage of time, once the series passed its hundredth installment it was clear that Naoto was going to graduate, for he was began studying to pass the mock exams for college. This factor became an impetus for the Naoto-Nagatoro romance, since once Naoto graduated, he would no longer see Nagatoro every school day. Nanashi set the reader up for the expectation that all the high school hijinks would have to come to an end as the protagonists left high school and began entering the world of adult work.

Nanashi made the transition just as entertaining as any of the early craziness, with lots of humor and heartache, but I puzzled over how he would wrap things up. Even in the later chapters, he introduced a handful of interesting characters, and suggested the evolution of possible subplots, such as:

(1) Is Gamo-chan really crushing on Nagatoro's older brother Taiga, and will anything come up of that possible affection?

(2) Following Nagatoro showing her commitment by being a nude model for Naoto, a teacher suggests that it would be viewed as a crime for an underage girl to expose herself that way, even for art. Would there be complications because of the romantic commitment between the two?

But no, Nanashi tamped down on further chaos in the end. When he introduced a subplot about both Naoto and Nagatoro volunteering to give year-end speeches for their respective classes, I thought that was just a minor fillip. Instead, Nanashi used the speeches as a means of describing how the two protagonists would continue their real-world aspirations, even while presumably maintaining their long-term romance until both are old enough to marry.

So the speeches they both give are descriptive of their experiences with one another, though worded as if they were more generalized descriptions of school life.

First, Nagatoro:

And then Naoto:

These are, as I said, very restrained for the NAGATORO series, and I don't know how I feel about the conclusion, even after having heard through one source that there may be an epilogue. However, the final chapter should make it possible for me to finally organize some of my thoughts on the series as a whole for a forthcoming essay. In that essay, I plan to discuss reasons why this simple-seeming teen romance comic should grab me so strongly-- much more so, I believe, than others I've celebrated here, such as NISEKOI and LOVE HINA.