Manga 1185 Katsu

I would rate the first 3/4 quarters of this manga 8.5/10. The art is nice, the humor is good, there's good tension in between the main characters and the boxing ties nicely with the romance. It's typical Adachi but feels more shounen than usual, which isn't bad at all and fits the theme of a manga about fighting perfectly.

Unfortunately the last quarter is a confusing mess, with a lot of unnecessary drama and weird arc conclusions. Over half of the manga is dedicated to becoming the best boxer in high school nation wide, but in the end it ends up not mattering, and the title ... becomes trivial. After that we have the final arc that should be about pro boxing, however everyone starts acting weird and against their beliefs. I don't think the last arc is necessary at all. It should've ended with high school boxing and an open ending with a happily ever after.

The personalities of Katsuki-kun and Katsuki-chan are probably my favorite out of all the Adachi characters so far. They're funny and pretty straightforward with each other and the people around them when it counts. It feels like they actually grow up from the first year of high school to the third, and start acting like adults.

Overall, 8.5/10 for the journey, 7/10 for the story in general, 5/10 ending (final 30 or so chapters).

One of the most notoriously glaring things about quality in the manga is the production.
the art (which reminds me a lot of Tetsuya Chiba), and about the cartooning? I just say that it is good and to me, efficient. I also think that the relationship between the characters is good.
What I don't like about the manga is precisely the boxing part, because although I find it interesting that the main characters' parents are linked to boxing, and I understand that it does make sense for them to box, I believe that the way in which the manga ... works boxing is too professional... Also, I think that satoyama's rise in boxing is completely unnatural because it's extremely fast and, like HNI, the protagonist never loses!! (I'm being hyperbolic, of course) I also have the belief that he is flawed in raising us to the fight, because despite having a great comic, he fails in the psychological aspect (this one never addressed in the manga).
In addition, the end is rushado.STRONG HUG TO THOSE WHO HAVE READ THIS HERE!!

28 chapters in, there's still nothing to care about. Things are happening, but we haven't been given any reason why we should be invested. Mizutani is training to fight her childhood friend, but given either outcome, what's the point? She doesn't have particularly much to prove, all the boxers are already aware of her ability. This childhood friend hasn't shown himself to be an asshole, or given really much of a reason for wanting to win either. We can infer that he wants to be able to stand up for himself since she used to defend him, but again there's no payoff in that; we ... don't have a reason to sympathize particularly with that goal of his. At some point, he will become stronger by default in any case.

Satoyama suffers from the same issue. In the other Adachi work I've read, Rough, there was an obvious point of conflict that carried the story; the feud between families and the question of whether their children would be able to resolve it. But Katsu has nothing like that. Typically a sports story works by having the main character work to be recognized, but there just aren't challenges that have been put in front of the characters like that here.

It gets a perfect 5 because it's a record of a series of events that happened, like reading a report. Nothing good, nothing bad. Did I remember to mention that the reader has no investment in it?