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The Otaku Love Connection Manga Celebrates Love
I love when we get anime and manga series where the lead couple is surrounded by folks who support them and their relationship. The Otaku Love Connection is a manga that takes that concept and makes those side cast members the focus right from its first volume. …Then it kicks it up to the extreme for the sake of comedy. But still, the fact is that we get to see some happy and healthy relationships, alongside some potentially unhealthy obsession, and it’s just so fun to ready. Editor’s Note: There will be minor spoilers for volume 1 of The Otaku Love Connection manga below. Yuzuru Kakoi and Chihiro Kawai are the high school power couple. The two have been together for years. They’re both absolutely adorable individuals. They also seem like genuinely good people with a healthy relationship dynamic. How do we know all these things? Because the actual star of this The Otaku Love Connection manga is Wataru Otonari, a classmate who sits next to Yuzuru and is a huge fan of the couple. He thinks they’re wonderful, he fully supports their relationship, and just getting to see them being happy makes his day. Image via Square Enix Of course, the unhealthy part of this is that he is so over-the-top about this. So much so that he’ll talk with his friend and fellow classmate about it. Also, he’s pretty obvious about his gawking. So we have the juxtaposition of him being completely supportive, but also an incredibly outspoken member of the crowd that admires the two. Because of course, Yuzuru and Chihiro are so captivating that others notice their antics. So much so that the person who is captivated by Wataru also knows and references that he’s a “stalker.” Said additional person is Mashiro Tomaki, and her inclusion helps enhance this dynamic. Because while she isn’t crazy about Yuzuru or Chihiro, she is a huge fan of Wataru. Because he’s actually gorgeous too, and his “otaku” tendencies get in the way of that. Since she’s captivated by him and the fact that he is a good person deep down, as well as her thinking Yuzuru and Chihiro are cute together, she supports and bonds with him over his “hobby.” And because she can be more open and herself around Wataru and fangirl over the main couple, she goes from being someone who’s just in the background to another individual that’s incredibly adorable. Which leads to already a fun sort of situation in the first volume of The Otaku Love Connection manga. Due to Wataru and Mashiro hanging out together to people watch and see what Yuzuru and Chihiro are up to, folks get the impression the two of them are together too. As such, they become their own sort of “draw.” So much so that the two of them together attract the attention of Yuzuru, and then Chihiro too. It’s a series that could have been really awkward! It could have been creepy to watch Wataru constantly stalking Yuzuru and Chihiro’s private moments. But the addition of Mashiro tempers that. Especially since the two of them together have their own sort of chemistry. Plus, it highlights the fact that while these two are the supporting cast members of the main couple’s story, they’re actually the star of their own story, deserving of and getting their own degree of attention. Like many first volumes of a new manga series, The Otaku Love Connection is initially about establishing characterizations and relationships. However, the dynamics here really do come into play pretty fast. That pace means that we can hopefully see the rest of the story focus on the fun dynamics that comes from the one OTP shipping the other, and then vice versa. Volume 1 of The Otaku Love Connection is available now through Square Enix, and volume 2 will debut on June 10, 2025. The post The Otaku Love Connection Manga Celebrates Love appeared first on Siliconera.
I love when we get anime and manga series where the lead couple is surrounded by folks who support them and their relationship. The Otaku Love Connection is a manga that takes that concept and makes those side cast members the focus right from its first volume. …Then it kicks it up to the extreme for the sake of comedy. But still, the fact is that we get to see some happy and healthy relationships, alongside some potentially unhealthy obsession, and it’s just so fun to ready.
Editor’s Note: There will be minor spoilers for volume 1 of The Otaku Love Connection manga below.
Yuzuru Kakoi and Chihiro Kawai are the high school power couple. The two have been together for years. They’re both absolutely adorable individuals. They also seem like genuinely good people with a healthy relationship dynamic. How do we know all these things? Because the actual star of this The Otaku Love Connection manga is Wataru Otonari, a classmate who sits next to Yuzuru and is a huge fan of the couple. He thinks they’re wonderful, he fully supports their relationship, and just getting to see them being happy makes his day.
Of course, the unhealthy part of this is that he is so over-the-top about this. So much so that he’ll talk with his friend and fellow classmate about it. Also, he’s pretty obvious about his gawking. So we have the juxtaposition of him being completely supportive, but also an incredibly outspoken member of the crowd that admires the two. Because of course, Yuzuru and Chihiro are so captivating that others notice their antics. So much so that the person who is captivated by Wataru also knows and references that he’s a “stalker.”
Said additional person is Mashiro Tomaki, and her inclusion helps enhance this dynamic. Because while she isn’t crazy about Yuzuru or Chihiro, she is a huge fan of Wataru. Because he’s actually gorgeous too, and his “otaku” tendencies get in the way of that. Since she’s captivated by him and the fact that he is a good person deep down, as well as her thinking Yuzuru and Chihiro are cute together, she supports and bonds with him over his “hobby.” And because she can be more open and herself around Wataru and fangirl over the main couple, she goes from being someone who’s just in the background to another individual that’s incredibly adorable.
Which leads to already a fun sort of situation in the first volume of The Otaku Love Connection manga. Due to Wataru and Mashiro hanging out together to people watch and see what Yuzuru and Chihiro are up to, folks get the impression the two of them are together too. As such, they become their own sort of “draw.” So much so that the two of them together attract the attention of Yuzuru, and then Chihiro too.
It’s a series that could have been really awkward! It could have been creepy to watch Wataru constantly stalking Yuzuru and Chihiro’s private moments. But the addition of Mashiro tempers that. Especially since the two of them together have their own sort of chemistry. Plus, it highlights the fact that while these two are the supporting cast members of the main couple’s story, they’re actually the star of their own story, deserving of and getting their own degree of attention.
Like many first volumes of a new manga series, The Otaku Love Connection is initially about establishing characterizations and relationships. However, the dynamics here really do come into play pretty fast. That pace means that we can hopefully see the rest of the story focus on the fun dynamics that comes from the one OTP shipping the other, and then vice versa.
Volume 1 of The Otaku Love Connection is available now through Square Enix, and volume 2 will debut on June 10, 2025.
The post The Otaku Love Connection Manga Celebrates Love appeared first on Siliconera.
