Bokurano (Bokura No: Ours, ぼくらの), 2003-2009, Kitoh, Mohiro, Ikki

STORY: 4

Meet not one, but fifteen school kids! They are fated to protect the earth using giant robots! We get a short good start and, very quickly, you realize you will never get any in-depth explanation about some cosmic-scale tragedy. You can feel that the mangaka has pitched the beginning of the story to the editor without having a solid vision on how to pursue or conclude. We are treated to one arc per kid but all these characters are bland and never react realistically to any situation. Despite the focus being on their different personalities, all along there’s a feeling of bored sadness instead of empathy, and it’s hard to enjoy.

ART: 5

Don’t expect awesome giant robot fights. Most of the art consists of similar-looking and inexpressive faces. A lot of the action conveniently takes place in an empty void, save for 14 or 15 chairs.

POLITICAL POTENTIAL: 4

A bit of reflection about responsibility and empathy. At least, it’s a manga that is not centered on one or two exceptional heroes, but, the execution is too poor to make something interesting out of this.

FEMINISM: 3

Most of the kids in this title are around 12-13 years old. Some of them are seen having sex, good for them! The girl is tiny, but drawn with a very round ass to make the scene arousing, is the sexualization necessary?
Another girl is manipulated, gang-rapped and blackmailed and does not find any private or institutional support. Worse, her sister is dating her persecutor and seems to know what he did! That ark could be positive as a description of the dysfunction of the safeguards supposed to protect the kid but, there is just no empathy through the pages. Showing the absence of empathy of society can be used to denounce something, but here, it really feels like the author does not care at all. If you want to see a different approach, the manga Sensei’s Pious Lie (reviewed here) deals with the same kind of subjects but you can feel the emotional investment (and anger) of the author.

Similarly, another character beats his younger sister regularly without any worry, and the sister just bears with it because she understands her brother’s pain like she’s freaking 40 years old. Again, the issue in itself is not the problem, it’s its representation that seems to make light of sexism in this manga.

CONCLUSION: 4

Bokurano is dull and boring despite potential. This is especially easy to say knowing that there is actually a good manga about kids whose private lives are intertwined in a cosmic tragedy with aliens. It’s called ‘Dead Dead Demon’s Dededededestruction‘ and I recommend this one instead.