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

So you're in the market for a slow burn romance, unrequited love and awkward crushes gone right (and wrong) with beautiful art? Oh you found it here YAY! No seriously this was really fun and dramatic and I loved it! 

I defiantly recommend this to anyone! It's just super cute!

This was an interesting read. I was NOT expecting that twist at the end of chapter 5! Looking forward to reading the next volume.

Blue Flag takes the time for the emotional nuance of its central characters, to illustrate the pauses, the shifts in expression, as emotions cross over characters' faces panel to panel. Told from high schooler Taichi's perspective, this slice-of-life drama follows Taichi, shy Kuze, and popular Toma and their friendship and romantic entanglement(s). With touches of humor, the story predominately feels soft and a bit contemplative.

This is one of my favorite series that Viz licensed! LGBT+ storyline starting at the end of the book with like a love quadrangle. I appreciate how the protagonist Taichi encourages his classmate Futaba to get the attention of Touma, who is one of the popular boys in their class and Taichi's childhood friend. But along the way he gets feelings and some of Futaba's actions are misinterpreted by her crush.

The series often delves into heartfelt conversations between teens along with lighthearted moments, like when Taichi invites Touma to hang out and watch movies but it's actually an agreed upon plan with Futaba who "happens" to be there with her friend going to watch the same movie and then Taichi invites her to watch with them! It's also funny how Taichi is portrayed as the average nobody kid but he's the protagonist of the whole story.

I think anyone who likes lighthearted romance and Shonen Jump series will enjoy this manga. Only 2 volumes is in the Shonen Jump vault if you have the subscription, but the series is complete at 54 chapters. The last 3 chapters are available on Manga Plus for free.⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Turns out I just don't like manga. Maybe the translation's not good enough but I also just don't like the artwork in general. It's too bad because I've heard so many good things about so many manga.

I really loved this story, it is so nice to see LBGQ rep in manga more and more. I'm very invested in this story and I will be continuing this series,

This is a favorite genre and this book did not disappoint I am very much looking forward to reading  volume 2.  Thank you for the opportunity to review this book

Really great beginning and cliffhanger leaving me wanting more. The art style is reminiscent of some older mangas while still holding up to the crispness of newer mangas. I would classify this as a slice-of-life mange.

Futaba has a crush on Toma. Toma has a crush on Taichi, but thinks that Futaba has a crush on Taichi. Futaba’s best friend Masumi has a crush on Futaba. So far I think the only one who doesn’t have a crush on someone else is Taichi. So, to sum up, we have one guy with a crush on a guy, one girl with a crush on a girl, one girl with a crush on a guy, and one guy who doesn’t seem to have a crush on anyone.

I’m rooting for everyone to end up in a stable group relationship by the end, I seriously am.

I knew from the moment I saw the description of Blue Flag that I wanted to read it. The whole, “but Toma has a secret crush on someone else,” made me wonder if that person was Taichi, and I deliberately went and looked up spoilers to see if I was right. I’ve mentioned before that I keep wanting to read manga with queer characters, but so many BL stories are problematic that I keep getting burned out and disappointed. But Toma’s crush on Taichi instantly made this one stand apart, because that one crush wasn’t the whole of the story. It couldn’t be. Not with Futaba in the mix. I went into this series with some spoilers in hand, wanting to see how it all played out, to see if this presentation of queerness was any better than most of the others I’d encountered.

What I didn’t expect was to have a bonus wlw relationship thrown in the mix! So as much as this manga seems to be playing out like a contemporary high school romance story, it’s already got me more invested than other titles, because there’s a mix of straight and not-straight love going on.

I can really relate to Futaba. Shy, earnest, awkward, generally a loner most of the time because people are scary and weird. Taking out the adorable earnestness, I was pretty similar in high school. And Touma is exactly the kind of person I would have developed an impossible crush on, because he’s considerate and popular and if someone like that had deigned to say kind words to me, I would have definitely felt a pull to them.

Taichi, too, was an interesting character. At first it seems like there’s no much to him, that he’s a “just another face in the crowd” kind of guy, one who doesn’t seem to have much direction in life and is a bit disillusioned with things, not seeing what the point of anything is. But the more he got to know Futaba, the more it seemed like he started questioning that aspect of himself. If shy, awkward, “nobody likes her” Futaba can have hobbies and interests like gardening, for instance, then why doesn’t he? If someone people think nothing of other than to put them down can still have passions in life, then what’s stopping him? It feels as though him seeing an unpopular person still have more of a life than him made him stop and reconsider some things, and that was pretty good to see. Especially in manga, because so often I see the “go home club” type characters glorify their laziness and then often end up having massive story arcs and being Chosen One type characters instead. I get that the point is to emphasize the “zero to hero” bit, but in a more realistic setting, it’s actually somewhat refreshing to see someone go, “Maybe I ought to reconsider what I’m doing with my life,” after seeing someone else have fun with theirs.

I can’t say too much about Masumi yet, because her character shows up rather late in this volume and I haven’t had as much time to learn about her as I have the other three. But she does bring an interesting dynamic to the romance, that’s for sure!

There isn’t too much more I can really say about this first volume of Blue Flag. As a contemporary romance, there isn’t some great big world-changing story arc or anything filled with action and tension. It’s slow-paced, a rather relaxed story, but that does mean that the first volume doesn’t contain too much to discuss. Taichi starts to help Futaba get more comfortable talking to Toma, questions his life decisions, learns some things about his new friends, and that’s it. Even the reveal that Toma likes Taichi and Masumi likes Futaba is a short scene between only Toma and Masumi, so that aspect of the love, er, quadrangle hasn’t really been brought into play yet. It exists almost passively for the moment, though I’m hoping that picks up some in the second volume.

Which I’m absolutely going to read, by the way, because as I said, I’m invested in seeing how this definitely-not-straight romance situation plays out. There’s how I want it to play out, how I half expect it to play out, and possibly a third option in there for how it all might go down, but I’m very curious to see it happen, because I haven’t encountered any manga that attempt to tell a queer love story alongside a straight love story without it basically being very much yaoi or yuri, and at that point, you know how it’ll turn out because of the genre. This has so many variables, so many unknowns, and that mystery is what keeps me wanting to read more.

As if being a teenager or high school wasn't hard enough why not add a love quadrangle.
Drama, bullying and angst all tied up in one emotional beginning to a series I'm sure will tear us apart and put us back together again before its all over. 

I loved the art and story line. The emotion, and sweet moments. 

UGH! But that cliffhanger is ugh!!!

I need the next volume now!

Adorable high school drama.
Tomas' attraction to Tai-Chan is obvious with every panel they're in together. 
Things are about get complicated.

I would say the Viz's habit of putting a watermark on every page is really annoying. Reviews, and by association reviewers, help sell books. The watermark affects the ability to clearly see the artwork and declares a profound lack of trust in the reviewer.

I really liked this Manga which is basically about a love triangle between two guys and a girl. Tachi Ichinose always sees this girl Futaba Kuze around at school and this year she is in the same class. One day he finds out that she has a crush on one of his friends, Toma Mita. Toma Mita is one of those super popular high school athletes that everyone loves. Futuba is super awkward so Tachi volunteers to help her try to express her feelings to Toma with interesting results. 
The artwork is super cute and I always love reading Japanese Manga as it always reminds me of living in Japan. I'm excited to read the next volume in this Manga to see what happens.