Hey everyone it’s Deven and I’m coming at you with a little manga review and it’s for Saekano!
Now normally I’m not the guy to do the Saekano posts but I’ve been recently reading the spinoff mangas, Egoistic Lily and Koisuru Metronome, and I wanted to do a post on them.
Let’s first talk about Spinoffs in general.
Generally a spinoff is an off shoot of a popular manga, original anime, or light novel. They typically show off the side characters doing their own adventures seperate from the main protagonist of the main series.
I have to admit that I like spin offs. They make some time for the characters that don’t get much love in the main series. As I write this I can only really think of the Sword Art Online Spin offs which are as follows:
1. Sword Art Online: Progressive(manga and light novel)
2. Swort Art Online: Girls Ops(manga)
Progressive retells the events of the first arc, Aincrad, from the 1st Floor all the way to the completion of the game from Asuna’s perspective which a lot of fans like since Asuna’s a fan favorite to the point her name is now the number 1 name for anime fans in Japan to name their daughters.
Girls Ops tells us about some of the adventures that Silica, Leafa, and Lisbeth get into in ALO while Kirito and Asuna aren’t around. This should be an awesome manga for their fans since Kawahara is well known for tossing heroines out after their arc.
But we’re not talking about Sword Art Online. It’s all about Saekano right now.
So there’s two manga, Egoistic Lily and Koisuru Metronome.
Egoistic Lily focuses on Eriri while Koisuru Metronome focuses on Utaha.
Egoistic Lily pretty much retells the events of the anime up to the Summer Comiket arc and then stops there.
Even though I’m not Eriri fan, I have to admit that it’s not the best. It’s really just a retelling of the anime just with a few different scenes. Then again I can’t really judge it much since this manga ended before the anime ended.
There were a lot of bonuses in this one though. There’s a lot of Megumi in this. She’s pretty much the second main heroine in this manga.
And we also get some more scenes with Eriri’s parents and we learn even further that Eriri’s mother is a hopeless fujoshi to the point where she starts thinking up yaoi scenes between Tomoya and Iori.
She is really cute though. I see where Eriri gets her looks from.
I’d give Egoistic Lily more of a 7/10. Mostly because it was a retelling of the anime with less Utaha. If I had read this first then watched the anime I would have enjoyed this more though.
Next up is Koisuru Metronome.
Koisuru Metronome is completely different from the original light novel and the anime itself. Tomoya doesn’t even meet Megumi and the majority of the manga starts when Tomoya’s doing his interview with Utaha.
What’s different is that Utaha’s editor, Machida Sonoko, is getting promoted to the head of the light novel department so Utaha needs a new editor. Looks like Tomoya’s the best man for the job. The manga focuses on the relationship between Utaha and Tomoya cutting out Megumi, Eriri, and Michiru completely.
While I would have enjoyed seeing the other girls, I think that it was a good decision. I’d like to liken this manga to a visual novel and we’re going down the Utaha route.
We really delve deeply into Utaha’s character and we see the reasons for a lot of the things that she did in the anime and the past that we didn’t see.
The reason that she started calling Tomoya Mr. Ethical, other than the reason that he didn’t want to read the final volume of Koisuru Metronome early.
But he also said that he wasn’t fond of the first heroine, Sayuri, who Utaha based on herself. By him rejecting the character she based on herself, it was like he was rejecting her romantically.
That basically hurt her feelings but Utaha isn’t the type of person to show her feelings directly. She’s sly and coy. She rather just tease the crap out of you and that’s her way to get back you. It’s very similar to Megumi in a way. The difference is that being teasing and sarcastic is Utaha’s default way of dealing with things while Megumi only defaults to it when stressed.
There’s also some jokes that I really like in Koisuru Metronome. They really fit with Utaha’s style of comedy.
I’ve fallen in love with this manga.
So I give Koisuru Metronome a 9/10 because it did what a spin off is supposed to do, give us stuff different from the main story.
So that’s all I’ve got for this review.
So until the next one,
Later Days
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July 20, 2015 at 7:37 pm
Ah it’s been a while since I’ve seen some Saekano on the blog here, good work with these reviews!
I can’t really talk about the Eriri manga as I haven’t read it yet, but after finding out it’s mainly a retelling of the anime with a few new scenes, I might take a look at it, but I’m not sure.
As for the Utaha manga, oh boy do I love this one a lot. Being on Team Utaha I’m instantly in love with this manga as it’s like the icing on the cake for Team Utaha fans. My heart can’t take all of this Utaha goodness at once, she’s so perfect. What I like about this manga the most though is that it really gives the depth to Utaha’s character and we really get to dive into her mind and see why she acts like she does and where her stories are being based off of. True we did get some info like this in the anime, but after reading this it’s like that extra bit of info that you need to fully understand things. The relationship between Aki and Utaha is a lot deeper in this manga and while there are moments where I’d like to punch Aki for the usual harem MC guy he is, in the end he’s able to get Utaha on the right track and help her out.
Speaking of stories, after reading this manga I actually got pretty motivated to work on my own story. Not like I can compare myself to Utaha or anything, but the fact she’s able to be so dedicated to her work and is able to get down and just write, that’s something I truly admire about her and I get inspired to work hard at my story as a result of her. While my story is far from being completed, let alone even reaching the half way point, I’m still working hard at it little by little in hopes to finally complete it one day.
I guess what this is all boiling down to is that Utaha really is my favorite character not just for looks and who voiced her in the anime, but everything about her is something I really like. Her personality, body language, how she teases the hell outta Aki, her passion to write, all these factors add up to making her my favorite and this manga packs them all up into a well executed character driven story that really takes you inside the mind of this interesting girl.
Sorry for the mini review of my own, but I’ve just really been wanting to talk about this manga. Anyways, great review, I really enjoyed reading it and I’m looking forward to more from the Saekano anime in the future!
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July 20, 2015 at 7:46 pm
It definitely is an awesome manga. My heart almost broke when they told her to end the story at volume 2. And it definitely got me writing on my novel again. Seeing Utaha work hard to make her dream come true really inspired me. The Eriri manga would probably be okay for an Eriri fan but I’m not fond of how Eriri abandoned Tomoya when they were little.
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July 20, 2015 at 7:53 pm
I think I will check out the Utaha manga at some point, it would be interesting to see what they do. Although Utaha is in second if their is a Kato *cough* best girl *cough* manga out there, I would want to check it out. According to wikipedia there is apparently a spinoff novel telling the story through the girl’s perceptive, and there is 6 novels when the main series has 8, but I somewhat doubt wikipedia since the novels started only this year, so there are either really short or something to have 6 out already,
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July 20, 2015 at 7:58 pm
Yeah it’s called Saenai Heroine no Sodatekata: Girls Side. I can’t deny that those volumes are coming out really quick. Maybe someone else is writing them?
I’m good for Team Megumi but I’ve officially switched over to Team Utaha after reading Koisuru Metronome. Excellent manga.
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