Having survived being potentially disbanded, the Literature Club has actually received an odd request. To try and boost the popularity of the upcoming school festival, the club is to come up with a plausible-sounding “urban legend,” and what better subject for an urban legend than one that involves romance! The girls take a “training camp” club trip to try and wrack their brains for ideas, all the while privately pondering their own, romantic situations
These two volumes felt a bit quieter than the previous three, as there weren’t any especially large life events for any of the five girls. Sonezaki does start publicly dating her boyfriend, having finally been nudged into understanding that it’s unfair to pass negative judgement on anyone for just the act of dating, herself included. It’s been nice to see Sonezaki’s “not like other girls” attitude taken down a few pegs as she’s come to realize that her classmates aren’t shallow and vapid for simply being interested in fashion and boys. It’s also very funny to see her throw herself into creating the romantic “urban legend” with her own selfish reasons in mind!
Momoka finally has a chance to get her cram-school classmate off her back and, while she’s starting to get an inkling that she likes girls (it’s so obvious), most of her time in these two volumes is spent trying to figure out how to handle Kazusa and Sugawara’s self-inflicted love triangle. Sugawara says she’s not interested in Kazusa’s childhood friend at all and that she’s just trying to create pressure to force the two of them to get together, but it’s also obvious to the readers that Sugawara is interested in him to a degree.
With Kazusa so convinced that she’s already “lost”, the whole situation is dragging out more and more, not in a bad way narratively, but it would certainly be easier for Sugawara to straighten out her own feelings if the uncertainty was over. I do wonder if Kazusa feels more unsure of herself because of how lovey-dovey her parents are; Kazusa is dealing with some normal self-confidence issues but I wonder if she also looks at her parents and thinks that, since her relationship with Izumi isn’t anything like theirs, that the two of them would never make a good couple.
On the ickier side of things, Hongo keeps trying to put the moves on Milo-sensei and any sympathy I have for him is fading fast. The story is rather clear that the older man in Sugawara’s life, her former drama teacher, is clearly a pedophile and a creep (to the point where a character says it outright) and that this is bad with a capital B, but it seems to want to indulge in a bit more “ambiguity” between Hongo and Milo. Any adult his age knows that you have to shut down a budding “relationship” like this with an underage student quickly and without question, if for no other reason than to avoid a potential lawsuit from things like “Milo-sensei told me to secretly wear erotic underwear.”
Hongo isn’t making it easy for either of them — she needs some kind of older figure in her life to help her figure out her relationship to erotica (is she truly interested or still just trying to find out more? Either is fine but she certainly doesn’t even realize that the first option is on the table!) — but that doesn’t change the frustration I have with Milo. I feel as if the creators are trying to create an “interesting” situation between the two of them, this “they shouldn’t, and they won’t, but maybe something will happen because of Hongo’s forwardness,” but it’s not working and I hope this plot line gets ditched soon.
I’m sure there’s a more interesting story to involve Hongo in and I’d rather read that rather than more of this plot line that’s already dead in the water!