Bokutachi ga Yarimashita (We Did It, 僕たちがやりました), 2015-2017, Kaneshiro, Muneyuki, Young Magazine

STORY: 8

Meet Tobio, Isami, and Maru, three boys who are trying to enjoy their everyday, average life, along with an older and lonely rich boy that provides all the money for their fun. Things could be simple if their school was not located next to Yaba High, a notorious establishment full of dangerous delinquents. When one day, they decide to rise against their bullies, their life steers off-road from the path of normalcy.
What starts as a non-subbtle horny teenage comedy turns into something much darker while exploring different facets of individualism. There’s no heroes, no redemption, just different ways to deal with consequences, and a story that is smarter than it looks.

ART: 7

Art is sometimes clunky, but overall it’s great, adapting to the situation and carrying the tone between comedy and hopelessness.

POLITICAL POTENTIAL: 7

The story uses the classic ‘everybody in Japan is greedy, lonely and self-centered’ to talk about its characters with a bit of depth, and the approach is efficient. With that ‘cynical and lonely’ view, of course, it’s hard to find any way for people to connect meaningfully. That outlook on society is so widespread in manga that it seems to illustrate a fear of the collapse of the collective aspect of society. Is there a goal beyond consumerism? If money gets everything, should it be used to buy friendship or affection too? The main thing that the manga contributes to the subject is a crisis that reveals how ugly or desperate people can be on the inside.

FEMINISM: 3

Whereas the story manages to avoid being generic, the content is your typically sexist school-life seinen. Girls are closer to sex-objects than real characters and consent is never respected. Prostitution is the most natural thing, as in too many adult manga. Male gaze is also included, even on minors of course.

CONCLUSION: 7

A quality read, but only if you are in the mood for darkness and can ignore the lame treatment of female characters.