This is generally a good mana and consistent with others in the same style and storytelling approach. My one hang up with manga is the whole OTT reactions. I get that it is part of the way this genre works, but it happens to be the one thing that drives me nuts because it feels so much like the Bang! Crash! of the old Batman TV show.

All in all, the story moves well and there is a good amount of character development. I did read ahead, so I am happy with how the overall Blue Flag series ends because at the end of this one, I was wondering where everything would go. I have my hopes and wishes.

The story feels a little bit like Twelfth Night meets Heartstopper and that's a very good thing because it means that there are some complexities to the romances. You also fall for one character and are rooting for them throughout the story. Won't tell you who I am rooting for.

The artwork is typical to the genre and I lack the skill to figure out the nuances between manga in order to be able to say what makes this better than others. But I appreciated that the characters are distinct enough that I can tell them apart.

All in all, a good read.

Blue Flag has been on my radar ever since I first caught a glimpse of the cover. I was even more intrigued once I read the synopsis. It was ever bit as hilarious and adorable as I hoped it would be!

This book was hilarious and so cute! I really enjoyed seeing how the characters acted and reacted to different situations. I would highly recommend this book if you enjoy romance plotlines!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

I loved this one SO much! I can't wait to continue on with the series. I immediately put volumes 2 & 3 on hold at my library :D Blue Flag is so sweet and so fun. The art style is beautiful, and it's super easy to follow, too! I will definitely be recommending this series to my friends who want to get into manga but don't know where to start. All in all, 10/10

A high school romance manga that takes standard tropes and expands them into something more nuanced. Tahichi has always been annoyed by his shy classmate, Futaba. But his feelings begin to change when she ask for help confessing her love to Toma, Taichi's best friend. A stand out athlete and popular guy, Toma has always been mysterious about the type of person he'd like the date. As Taichi spends more time time with Futaba, he's confused by the anger directed at him by the girl's overprotective best friend, Masumi. But Toma understands what is happening - both he and Masumi are in love with their same sex best friend, unbeknownst to those same friends. The first volume sets up the love quadrangle with sensitivity while maintaining the usual moments of humor and drama common to the genre. Has the potential to be a series that pushes at Japanese norms.

Thank you to VizMedia for sending me a copy of Ao No Flag.

Blue Flag is an adorable love story. The story begins with Futaba asking for help to gain the attention of gentle giant Toma who was Taichi's childhood friend. However Futaba may sometimes takes the advice a little too far or literally. The three characters trudge through all the emotions one goes through; love, romance, confusion and also some unrequited love.
I found this Manga beautiful, heart warming and gripping. I read the entire thing in one sitting and much like all my other manga over the last few decades I instantly regretted it as I'll have to wait for the next instalment..

Highly Recommend.

Every so often a volume lands in your lap (or downloads to your digital reader of choice) and instantly becomes your new favourite. With such a broad and diverse selection of manga and light novels available on the shelves today, that’s no easy feat either. To a certain extent, we can chalk it up to the joy of starting something new. Especially if that feeling can be bolstered by positive word of mouth from fans and a generous helping of hype.

But truthfully the proof is always in the manga-flavoured pudding, of course. While I had a certain level of expectation from the strong reception I’ve seen for Blue Flag (Ao no Flag) online. I never expected how much I’d fall in love with this beautiful, hilarious and heartbreaking manga. With all that said, the question remains. Is Blue Flag volume 1 worth reading?

Friend or lover
Blue Flag follows a central trio of three 3rd year highschool students, Taichi Ichinose, Futaba Kuse and Toma Mita. If you’re anything like me, you’ll probably be smitten with all three before the end of the first chapter. Be it Taichi’s thoughtful nature, Futaba’s adorable awkwardness or Toma’s admirable gentle giant qualities. It’s almost impossible to not find these three endearing or sympathetic on some level. It’s a good thing too because after ensuring you’ve got an emotional connection with Ichinose, Kuse and Mita, author KAITO is quick to throw them into a love triangle melting pot which has a stubborn tendency to boil over at times.

You see, lovestruck Futaba has a crush on big ‘ol softie Toma, but she’s been too nervous all these years to confess her love. After an extremely embarrassing encounter together, she turns to Ichinose. Seeking his advice, as he used to be Toma’s best friend back before high school. These days, however, things between Ichinose and Toma are quite complicated.

Toma is smart, athletic and handsome, a “different species” to the average Taichi and his current colourful entourage. Taichi himself admits they aren’t close anymore. With the amount of time he spends with Taichi, away from his popular friends, Toma thinks otherwise. Taichi, despite his detached and distant exterior, clearly has feelings for his childhood friend. Feelings he has never confessed to Toma, or himself. Things get even more complicated when an awkward Futaba musters up the courage to approach Toma

Witnessing Futaba overcome her nerves and make an effort to express her feelings for Toma evokes a mixture of emotions inside Taichi. He agrees to help her out, but there’s something dark bubbling under the surface. This darkness is represented fantastically by KAITO’s stellar art throughout, with black shadows appearing intermittently around Taichi, or in his thought boxes. A storm of emotions threatening to engulf him. Then the romance boot camp kicks off. As Taichi and Futaba fruitlessly endeavour to transform Futaba into the perfect type for Toma.

These short snippets provide an ample amount of brevity and humour between the more emotional moments of the manga. KAITO has a superb handle on pacing. Knowing when to ease off the throttle and let us catch our breath and when to floor it for the gut-punches. And boy, we sure do get plenty of gut-punches.

Boiling over
Shot Down
Remember the love triangle melting pot? Well, now it’s boiling. A cinema date for Toma and Futaba inadvertently becomes a double date when the nervous Futaba brings her friend Masumi Itachi along for moral support. Of course, Taichi gets roped along as well. After being a background character, Itachi makes herself known in a BIG way.

You see, Itachi is fiercely loyal to Futaba. She scolds Taicihi for messing with Futaba’s heart. At the same time that Toma mistakes Futaba’s awkwardness as a crush on Taichi, instead of him. So as you can imagine, the date doesn’t exactly go according to plan. And, perhaps Itachi is even more “loyal” than appropriate?

The real gut punch arrives later, however. After spending time and recalling his past with Toma, Taichi finally comes to terms with some truths. It’s a sequence of events that leaves you feeling emotionally raw, and it occurs halfway through the first volume. Fully fleshed-out series rarely evoke such powerful feelings in me. However, KAITO managed it before he even hit double digits in chapters. Sobering yet powerful. Did I mention you’re going to need a box of tissues for this one? Better stock up!


Is Blue Flag volume 1 worth reading?
It most certainly is! The last series to have this strong a first impression on me was Jujutsu Kaisen. If you’ve read any of my gushes, ahem, reviews for that series, you’ll know I was hooked from the start. Now I find myself on the same boat with this series! KAITO really has crafted something special here. Gorgeous, clean art depicts an emotional tale of friendship, love and everything in between. The cast are all extremely likable. The pacing doesn’t miss a beat, and the unexpected humour hauls you through even the most heartbreaking moments, of which there are many. At times it’s a tough read, unflinchingly honest, but it’s also fulfilling, heartwarming and gripping to an equal effect. Blue Flag volume 1 was an utterly captivating read, and I cannot wait for volume 2 to drop!

You can read the first three chapters for free on Manga Plus!

Blue Flag provides an honest and refreshing take on the contemporary high school romance genre. Through carefully placed tones, clean lines, and well drawn expressions, Kaito captures the ups and downs of high school full of feelings of first love, awkwardness, and friendship. Kaito portrays both queer joy and pain, but the later is not superfluous. This was a fairly light read but it wasn't without heaviness, especially as the reader learns how complex and deep the feelings between the main characters run. I'm excited to read the rest of the series, and I would recommend this to people who are looking for a title that can make them shed tears of both sadness and joy.

I'm hooked and will definitely need more in this manga series. A cute and fun read. Content warning for mention of large boobs and porn but not as bad as it sounds. I guess it goes with the territory as it is a challenge to find G rated manga. I think the teens frequenting our library will gobble this up.

I received this arc from netgalley in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Viz Media for allowing me to read and review this title! I have been dying to check this one out! I knew it had LGBTQ elements to it, but honestly had no idea what that meant exactly.
We are given three main characters so far and I love each of them so much! They are precious and relatable and I am so into the story here. We have love and romance and confusion and also some unrequited love...I do not know how sad this series might be, but I want so many things to happen already and I cannot wait to see where this series goes!

A very fun read, especially for teenagers! However, I believe this book could be challenged in schools due to its same-sex attraction themes. Regardless of that, the classic comedic timing found in manga here is handled well and the art style is quite nice.

I have found my new favourite high school romance manga!
Help me get the boy I love to fall for me, always turns into the scheming pair falling for each other, but when their same-sex best friends are in love with them, that always makes things complicated.

This is so cute with a real-life situation and meet-cute arrangements made by two of the characters to reach their goals. Still, I especially loved the LGBTQ representation that I hardly ever see in high school romance -not that there isn't any; I just wasn't exposed to it in my catholic secondary school.

This series is highly addictive. It'll leave you wanting the rest, seeking it out online.. Despite that I will wait to get it through English resources to give the author their due.

There's a sadness to this that I wasn't expecting, but I am looking forward to the rest.

I love the characters and the artwork. I'm really invested in their story after reading the first volume. I'm looking forward to seeing where this series goes.

Have you ever had a story take you completely by surprise?

I had low expectations for this. I mean, not only does it have love triangles, and that is my most despised trope of all time, but it’s a love quandrangle! Ugh! Usually when a love triangle is introduced I instantly lose all interest. I’ve stopped reading books because a love triangle has been introduced, so I just didn’t think Blue Flag would be my cup of tea, but my curiosity got the better of me a picked it up, just to see how this worked. And I am so glad I did.

This story just took my stone heart and made me feel.

Taichi and Toma used to be best friends when they were younger, but began to drift apart when Toma became popular in high school, but when Futaba admits to Taichi that she has feelings for Toma and asks him for his help in confessing to him. But things get complicated when it turns out Toma already has feelings for someone else.

I was getting Ao Haru Ride vibes with the art style. It’s beautiful, and refreshing, invoking an nostalgic feeling of youth and first time love, but the biggest draw were the characters. The friendships between Toma and Taichi and Futaba are natural and fun. All the characters have great personalities, and you feel for their growing pains of first loves, faltering friendships, burgeoning sexualities, and finding your place in the world, but balances it out with carefree and funny moments that grab your heart.

I’m already going to buy the rest of the series, because I can’t let go of these characters. The drama is promising and guarantees messy moments in the future, but every page takes you away on a realistic portrayal of teen angst.

Beautiful.

At the beginning, maybe the first part of chapter one, I didn't like the book. I didn't care for any of the characters except Touma.

But the author, Kaito, Sure spun me around their little finger. So much angst (almost too much, thus 4 stars) but I cared so much about what happened to these characters by the end. I can't imagine stopping at volume 2. So I'm going to finish this series. I bet the next volume will be even better since I won't have that half of the first chapter to contend with.

I received an e-arc of this manga through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

3.5/5 stars

This manga focuses on the relationships between four different people, though this first volume really only focuses on two of the four people with the other two showing up periodically. It all begins when our main character tries to help a quiet girl get a book from a high shelf and realizes she's trying to read a book about how to get a guy. He decides to help her try to figure out how she can get her crush to notice her.

Honestly, if it wasn't for the ending I don't know if I would be continuing on with the series as it was really kind of boring to read but that ending really packed a bit of a punch and makes me very curious about how things will end up playing out. I think that the complexity with the relationships is really going to be interesting. I also really liked the art style.

I was not expecting to love this manga as much as I now do. If you're looking for a beautiful art style, loveable characters, and an addictive storyline, this manga is the one for you!

This story follows Taichi. He's a bit of a loner with few friends, and he's been asked for help by Futaba in getting his not-so-best friend to like her. Together, they work in getting Futaba to open herself up and get out of her comfort zone in the hopes that he'll finally notice her romantically. However, as their attempts go on, the pair begin to fall for each other, unaware of their own best friends falling for them.

I loved everything about this manga. Kaito really has a beautiful art style, and even though it's all completely "animated" in the art, it felt almost realistic to me. I found myself able to see even the smallest of details, be it in their eyes, or the backdrops. It was clear a lot of effort and time were put into each panel, and I appreciated every single bit of it.

As for the writing, I loved the dialogue. I felt it moved the storyline along nicely, and I thought that each piece of speech or thought were placed in the right places. Along with that, I also really liked how it was paced. It was just a smidge slower than decent pacing, and normally I'm not a huge fan of slower paced books, but this one was different.

Overall, I really loved this story and look forward to continuing the series. For that, I rate this manga 5 stars.

I don’t know if I can praise this book enough! I loved it so much, it might just become my next favorite series! The characters are so dynamic the relationships are so adorable and complicated. This is the best kind of love story. I love a mix up of feelings more than a miscommunication troupe. The friendships developing are so pure and it just makes my heart soar.

I literally need the second book ASAP!

I really enjoyed reading this graphic novel, like JUST LOOK AT THE COVER, it’s SO BEAUTIFUL!! I’m excited to read the next volumes