The siren song of money is a powerful one. Additionally, said song can be applied to a specific site’s built-in currency that can help you SAVE money. I didn’t really want to read Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out! (published in English by Seven Seas), but I couldn’t resist the 70% Coin Back on BookWalker! So, let’s see what the cost of my stupid decision was.
In Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out!, Shichirin Sakurai is a typical, introverted college student. However, he is constantly approached by his kouhai, Hana Uzaki. She launches an all-out verbal assault on him until he, well, hangs out with her. And thus, various shenanigans ensue.
This manga is dumb, that’s pretty much intentional. There is no intention to have a complex plot or drama. While the premise is reminiscent of Bottom-Tier Character Tomozaki, which- of all things- offended me on a personal level, the one distinction with Uzaki is that she’s forcing her way into Shichirin’s life because she’s stupid, instead of forcing him to date strange women just so that her preconceived image of him matches his actual image (seriously, why do people love Tomozaki so much?).
Unfortunately, the humor comes off as pretty dry. The basic formula is to take everyday activities, and add boobs and a lot of yelling. Most of the time, Uzaki acts like an idiot, and Shichirin ends up in an ecchi-like situation. Other than a few clever blips (such as an epic speech about mint chocolate), there’s not much finesse in the execution whatsoever. The manga also tries to have something called “Poop Cat” appear, but it’s not funny nor clever. But hey, I’m a tough nut to crack.
The characters are perhaps the weakest aspect of all. I tend to have a soft spot for some one-dimensional characters, but the cast of Uzaki-chan is- I don’t know- zero-dimensional?! Uzaki is incredibly marketable, what with her immense assets, and that weird canine-tooth-shaped protrusion on her upper lip that makes her stand out from the 99,999 other girls that look exactly like her. She seems like the type of character who comes off as funny as an extension of her being an idiot. This works on a case-by-case basis, and this is NOT one of those cases.
Meanwhile, Shichirin is a pretty typical dude. He definitely doesn’t hate Uzaki, but that doesn’t stop him from being the usual witty-comebacks-guy. Other than that, we have the audience surrogates; some friends who want Shichirin and Uzaki to be in bed together. HOW META AND RELATABLE. But in terms of personality, they were lacking by a large margin.
Speaking of lacking by a large margin… the art! The manga is very average and typical looking; that kind of super-simplistic style that’s so basic that the anime doesn’t look that much different by comparison. The panel flow is not taken advantage of for comedic effect. And furthermore, Uzaki-chan is somehow on par with Hunter X Hunter for the most amount of words on a single page.
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Current Verdict: 5.5/10
Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out! is a cute, mindless manga, but there are way better of its kind out there! It feels like it follows the bare-bones basics of comedy and thinks it can use boobs to get away with it (which it seems to be succeeding at wildly, according to the anime episode discussion). Don’t bother reading this manga; if you want something better, read D-Frag or Grand Blue Dreaming instead.
Weeb Revues 