Once again, I will shout from the rooftops that, despite the trashtastic title, this series is very sweet and not trashy at all, although I wouldn’t blame someone for not reading it in public with that title splashed across the cover.
After the cliffhanger of volume two, Adachi finds himself playing temporary host to Kurosawa, a situation he’s not entirely sure he’s comfortable with given that he’s aware of Kurosawa’s affections. In a bid to set himself at ease, he impulsively invites their other colleague, Rokkaku, over for dinner… which backfires somewhat when Kurosawa gives into a flare of jealousy. Further complications arise when Adachi mistakenly comes to believe his female colleague Fujisaki is also carrying a torch for him (she’s not). Sensing something might be up, Kurosawa makes a sudden confession – and Adachi just is not sure how to handle any part of the situation anymore.
It’s a bit hard to discuss this volume as much of what I’d like to comment on would involve spoilers (in fact, I kept putting off actually moving this review beyond draft form because I was struggling with that). A lot of what I’d like to bring up had to do with what the story opts to NOT do, as there are some elements that begin to make an appearance only to be firmly averted. Without getting into details, I hate when yaoi indulges in misogyny as a means to shore up the starring couple, so, yay, Cherry Magic didn’t do that, good job!
The wait was pretty brutal for this (original release date of March was bumped until May, eight months after the second volume), so it was a relief to find its continued to plug along as a cute and relatively low-key romance. (The next wait is going to be just as rough, as volume 4 is currently listed for January 2022.) After a couple volumes of increasing tension as Adachi waffles over whether he wants to make a move, the issue’s now out in the open, and while I’m sure there’ll be plot complications, I appreciate the shift in the situation to one wherein Kurosawa knows that Adachi knows how he feels. (I will note that the sidestory about Adachi’s virginal romance novelist friend falling in love with a younger deliveryman, is still doing nothing for me after three volumes of being in the bonus chapters. The characters in it simply don’t interest me.)
I really, really like this series and would encourage BL fans to give it a go if they haven’t already, but if the huge gap between releases is a bit off-putting, a live action drama was released last October and is available to stream subbed on Crunchyroll outside of Asia. I haven’t tried it myself yet, but I’ve seen generally positive reviews of it. If you like yaoi, like your yaoi to be about adults, but also want something with a bit more plot and absolutely free of the rapey overtones that regrettably feature in a lot of BL, Cherry Magic is definitely worth trying.
GAR GAR Stegosaurus 