KS Hanako Story (Major Spoilers)
There's a big contrast in how I feel about Hanako's story now than how I felt 4 years ago. Of course, 4 years difference of relationship experience, breakups and difficult conversations can do that, but I feel like it's more complicated than that.
Hanako's story, for lack of a strong word, was cute. I love this author's way of dancing around Hanako and Hisao's conversations, relying heavily on the reader's imagination to help read Hanako's mood, emotions and thought process. However, this also makes reading the story feel incredibly slow. Every interaction with Hanako feels like it moves at half-speed. Every phrase said, every action made is precious and important. But when I take a second to step back and really analyze what I'm reading, I feel almost drained. I don't feel like, for as much energy as it took to read and analyze each chapter, I was progressing enough with Hanako. That isn't to say that the ending wasn't worth the trouble, because it was, but rather that it took me far longer than the previous two stories to complete this story for the same feeling at the end. (Using Shizune's story as a base, Emi's took me 60% as long as Shizune's, but Hanako's took me almost twice as long at about 185%.)
More than her story being cute was the art. I loved the art for Hanako's chapter scenes. So far, I think that this artist definitely is my favorite. The artstyle greatly enhances the relatively dialogue-weak story, I couldn't be happier about that. The art is cute, gentle, and detailed in all the right places. All of the scenes benefit greatly from the art used in them.
Most importantly though, I wanna talk about the story itself. I found myself very... upset and confused by the general arc of the story. Like I said above, I feel very differently about Hanako's story now than I did in 2014 when I was a high school sophomore who hadn't kissed anyone yet, better yet done anything serious with a girl. But to put my feelings into few words: Hisao treats Hanako like a child from day 1 and then wants to stick his dick in her??? You can't have it both ways, Hisao.
For sake of transparency, I read through Hanako's story almost entirely with a friend of mine, and she and I were sharing our thoughts throughout the story. Some of these thoughts might not have started out as mine, but I do support everything I say here.
Hisao is terrible to Hanako from their first conversation right up to their first major "romance subplot" at the beginning of Act 3, and even still after that. Hisao constantly goes on and on about wanting to protect her and cherish her, like she's some sort of child, and then gets upset when he isn't making any progress with her romantically. Like, fucking hell, dude. One of the #1 things that can ruin your chances with someone is putting yourself above them in your mind. Hisao puts himself above her in his head by saying he wants to protect her. He's basically saying that she cannot protect herself, and that she is not autonomous enough to be able to live her life without him. She needs him, he thinks. Now, if that's not some of the most condescending shit you've ever heard, then I don't know what is. You can't just put yourself in that mental position and then suddenly want to be called her equal.
Hisao and Lilly both set up this complex where they were acting almost as parents to her, conscious or not, and Hanako saw this. She saw it and hated it-- she even says so during the climax. And almost equally as important, my friend and I saw it. Every time Hisao brought up wanting to protect her, or wanting to keep her safe, or shielding her from the cruel outside world in the same paragraph as talking about how much he loved her, my friend and I would visible cringe and roast the boy. Fuck outta here, Hisao. You can't have it both ways.
I was glad that it was actually Lilly who knocked some sense into the kid. At least Lilly somewhat knew what she was in relation to Hanako. But Hisao kept thinking he was gonna be Hanako's White Knight before Lilly broke his ankles. I remember pausing on the screen where Lilly points out Hisao's hypocrisy in how he treats Hanako, and saying "It's about goddamn time!" It seemed like Hisao actually takes her words into consideration if you choose for him to, though, which surprised me a lot considering how much of an idiot he was up to that point.
While I'm thinking about it, I wanna tank about the progression of their friendship before I close this off. Their sex scene was super, SUPER forced and I absolutely hated it. The incredibly out-of-place sad piano and violin background music, the terrified look Hanako constantly had on her face, the description of the pain she was likely in the entire time... it was awful. I understand that Hisao and Hanako both wanted to take their relationship from "good friends" to "dating," but the situation they put themselves in pushed both of them way past "dating" and into "first time sleeping together." If they'd not had this encounter, there's no telling how many weeks or months it wouldn't taken them to hit that point naturally, even if every other part of that scene (her showing him her scars) stayed the same. I remember practically screaming when the sex scene started, saying "No! Hisao why are you-- fuckkkk! This is not how you handle this sort of situation!!" Hisao's words right before the scene also upset me. He paused to objectify her, talking about her curves and hot body while he casually undressed in front of (a distressed-looking) Hanako. It felt super rapey-- even if it's canon that it was consensual.
In the end, I feel like Hisao and Hanako have a lot of things to discover about each other. With the way the story was written, you can have any sort of Hanako you want in your head-- as long as she likes books, chess, and other canon hobbies of hers. Her personality is left a mystery because of the sheer amount of masking she does to compensate for her PTSD and the psychological abuse she encountered growing up. In a way, being able to "build-a-Hanako" gives the reader as happy of an ending as they could reasonably imagine. But for me, I didn't necessarily feel like it was a "happily ever after" like Emi's, or a "the future awaits us" like Shizune's. It was a very natural-feeling progression in their relationship that came after an incredibly unnatural-feeling lurch forward. Their relationship didn't necessarily have a clear future, but was obviously not meant to finish at the credit roll. Sort of a combination of both Shizune's and Emi's endings, if you will. I would like to think Lilly comes back from Scotland and sees that they've begun to date and is happy about it, but cautious at first. Hisao and Hanako relieve her suspicions over time by being transparent with each other and working to build their own futures while also supporting each other. There's still many bumps in the road, but overall I feel like their relationship is on the uphill, and could last a long time.
I feel like Hanako's story is hugely overrated. I don't know how popular this opinion is nowadays considering how big I remember Hanako's fanbase being in 2014, but I stand by it. Hanako's story is set up to fuel the imagination of the reader to fill in the blanks of Hanako's personality that otherwise leave her boring, and trigger paternal feelings in the reader. These feelings, however, are exactly what trip up Hisao in the story, and are the reasons why not taking Lilly's advice keeps you in the friend zone. Hanako is incredibly shy and introverted, but she is still an adult and is apparently quite smart. Treating her like a child that you must protect will not make her want to sleep with you. As Hanako said, she saw something different in Hisao (once he started dropping small hints to her) and didn't want him to turn into another Lilly in her life. She wanted something more than that, and she wasn't sure he was capable of feeling the same way (though he fortunately did in the good ending). I think that this is as good of an ending as I could have hoped, though I don't feel resolve. Maybe it's because I'm such a forward thinker, and value progress over a destination. I don't know.
Anyways, second to last is Rin's story! I'll try and grind through it in my free time, but I have some big plans throughout the weekend that will have to come first. Stay tuned!
Hanako's story, for lack of a strong word, was cute. I love this author's way of dancing around Hanako and Hisao's conversations, relying heavily on the reader's imagination to help read Hanako's mood, emotions and thought process. However, this also makes reading the story feel incredibly slow. Every interaction with Hanako feels like it moves at half-speed. Every phrase said, every action made is precious and important. But when I take a second to step back and really analyze what I'm reading, I feel almost drained. I don't feel like, for as much energy as it took to read and analyze each chapter, I was progressing enough with Hanako. That isn't to say that the ending wasn't worth the trouble, because it was, but rather that it took me far longer than the previous two stories to complete this story for the same feeling at the end. (Using Shizune's story as a base, Emi's took me 60% as long as Shizune's, but Hanako's took me almost twice as long at about 185%.)
More than her story being cute was the art. I loved the art for Hanako's chapter scenes. So far, I think that this artist definitely is my favorite. The artstyle greatly enhances the relatively dialogue-weak story, I couldn't be happier about that. The art is cute, gentle, and detailed in all the right places. All of the scenes benefit greatly from the art used in them.
Most importantly though, I wanna talk about the story itself. I found myself very... upset and confused by the general arc of the story. Like I said above, I feel very differently about Hanako's story now than I did in 2014 when I was a high school sophomore who hadn't kissed anyone yet, better yet done anything serious with a girl. But to put my feelings into few words: Hisao treats Hanako like a child from day 1 and then wants to stick his dick in her??? You can't have it both ways, Hisao.
For sake of transparency, I read through Hanako's story almost entirely with a friend of mine, and she and I were sharing our thoughts throughout the story. Some of these thoughts might not have started out as mine, but I do support everything I say here.
Hisao is terrible to Hanako from their first conversation right up to their first major "romance subplot" at the beginning of Act 3, and even still after that. Hisao constantly goes on and on about wanting to protect her and cherish her, like she's some sort of child, and then gets upset when he isn't making any progress with her romantically. Like, fucking hell, dude. One of the #1 things that can ruin your chances with someone is putting yourself above them in your mind. Hisao puts himself above her in his head by saying he wants to protect her. He's basically saying that she cannot protect herself, and that she is not autonomous enough to be able to live her life without him. She needs him, he thinks. Now, if that's not some of the most condescending shit you've ever heard, then I don't know what is. You can't just put yourself in that mental position and then suddenly want to be called her equal.
Hisao and Lilly both set up this complex where they were acting almost as parents to her, conscious or not, and Hanako saw this. She saw it and hated it-- she even says so during the climax. And almost equally as important, my friend and I saw it. Every time Hisao brought up wanting to protect her, or wanting to keep her safe, or shielding her from the cruel outside world in the same paragraph as talking about how much he loved her, my friend and I would visible cringe and roast the boy. Fuck outta here, Hisao. You can't have it both ways.
I was glad that it was actually Lilly who knocked some sense into the kid. At least Lilly somewhat knew what she was in relation to Hanako. But Hisao kept thinking he was gonna be Hanako's White Knight before Lilly broke his ankles. I remember pausing on the screen where Lilly points out Hisao's hypocrisy in how he treats Hanako, and saying "It's about goddamn time!" It seemed like Hisao actually takes her words into consideration if you choose for him to, though, which surprised me a lot considering how much of an idiot he was up to that point.
While I'm thinking about it, I wanna tank about the progression of their friendship before I close this off. Their sex scene was super, SUPER forced and I absolutely hated it. The incredibly out-of-place sad piano and violin background music, the terrified look Hanako constantly had on her face, the description of the pain she was likely in the entire time... it was awful. I understand that Hisao and Hanako both wanted to take their relationship from "good friends" to "dating," but the situation they put themselves in pushed both of them way past "dating" and into "first time sleeping together." If they'd not had this encounter, there's no telling how many weeks or months it wouldn't taken them to hit that point naturally, even if every other part of that scene (her showing him her scars) stayed the same. I remember practically screaming when the sex scene started, saying "No! Hisao why are you-- fuckkkk! This is not how you handle this sort of situation!!" Hisao's words right before the scene also upset me. He paused to objectify her, talking about her curves and hot body while he casually undressed in front of (a distressed-looking) Hanako. It felt super rapey-- even if it's canon that it was consensual.
In the end, I feel like Hisao and Hanako have a lot of things to discover about each other. With the way the story was written, you can have any sort of Hanako you want in your head-- as long as she likes books, chess, and other canon hobbies of hers. Her personality is left a mystery because of the sheer amount of masking she does to compensate for her PTSD and the psychological abuse she encountered growing up. In a way, being able to "build-a-Hanako" gives the reader as happy of an ending as they could reasonably imagine. But for me, I didn't necessarily feel like it was a "happily ever after" like Emi's, or a "the future awaits us" like Shizune's. It was a very natural-feeling progression in their relationship that came after an incredibly unnatural-feeling lurch forward. Their relationship didn't necessarily have a clear future, but was obviously not meant to finish at the credit roll. Sort of a combination of both Shizune's and Emi's endings, if you will. I would like to think Lilly comes back from Scotland and sees that they've begun to date and is happy about it, but cautious at first. Hisao and Hanako relieve her suspicions over time by being transparent with each other and working to build their own futures while also supporting each other. There's still many bumps in the road, but overall I feel like their relationship is on the uphill, and could last a long time.
I feel like Hanako's story is hugely overrated. I don't know how popular this opinion is nowadays considering how big I remember Hanako's fanbase being in 2014, but I stand by it. Hanako's story is set up to fuel the imagination of the reader to fill in the blanks of Hanako's personality that otherwise leave her boring, and trigger paternal feelings in the reader. These feelings, however, are exactly what trip up Hisao in the story, and are the reasons why not taking Lilly's advice keeps you in the friend zone. Hanako is incredibly shy and introverted, but she is still an adult and is apparently quite smart. Treating her like a child that you must protect will not make her want to sleep with you. As Hanako said, she saw something different in Hisao (once he started dropping small hints to her) and didn't want him to turn into another Lilly in her life. She wanted something more than that, and she wasn't sure he was capable of feeling the same way (though he fortunately did in the good ending). I think that this is as good of an ending as I could have hoped, though I don't feel resolve. Maybe it's because I'm such a forward thinker, and value progress over a destination. I don't know.
Anyways, second to last is Rin's story! I'll try and grind through it in my free time, but I have some big plans throughout the weekend that will have to come first. Stay tuned!
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