Manga 124520 Boys Run The Riot

How wonderful it is to see a trans manga written by a trans author! This way the depiction of being a trans man is fully authentic and realistic. Inner struggles, binding, misgendering, love, coming out, social life, school life and many other aspects of transgender adolescence are tackled in a great and accurate manner.
Without spoilers, the storyline about the queer blogger was also very interesting, and very realistic (especially the end). I didn't expect those sort of topics to be addressed. It made the story feel all the more real.

It was also refreshing to see a queer story that, while keeping the character's identity as ... an integral part of their being, doesn't focus on their queer storyline alone. The main character is a very interesting guy with a strong personality! He's an artist, and the main plot is about him and his friend starting a clothing line to express themselves and do what they love, and working hard to succeed! Goes to show how trans people don't have to be enveloped in their identity, that they're human beings with character, ambitions, interests, and stories of their own.

The art is also great! My only complaint is that, while preaching about their clothes being non-comforming and a way of expression, the clothes they ended up making seemed pretty bland and boring, haha.

Overall, I believe that queer people (especially trans) will feel seen and heard through this manga. I believe straight and cis people would enjoy this plot and the characters as well, and maybe even get more educated on LGBT subjects. I recommend it.

I will watch this author with interest. A solid first outing but very uneven.

The writing struggles to convey what the characters think vs what the author thinks. There is often very little differentiation between characters and the way the speak as they often go on huge motivational speeches often in public as the other character cheer for them. They also start and end conversation abruptly. The internal monologue is very good but the external is bland at best. I know next to nothing about the other characters.

So many subplots could have made the other character interesting but they are dropped. Camera boys family? Dropped. ... Jins dad? hardly expanded upon. Jins mother? Dropped. Other kids at the school being angry at the exceptions made for the main character? dropped. Potential love interest for jin dropped . Main characters family angry at him coming out? dropped. Main characters brother? Dropped. The list goes on. This manga could have been double or more in length.

Still, a solid read and a nice look in to the world of trans characters.

I'll go ahead and be the one dissenting voice in a sea of positive recommendations.

To begin with, this manga is only going to appeal to those who are already interested in, or at the very least wholly sympathetic to, trans issues. Obviously, if you are not interested in identity politics, a manga about a transman's struggles will not be for you. If you have any mixed views on trans issues or are not a lockstop ally on every aspect of every issue, this will not be for you. You don't need a review to tell you that. This is a manga meant to preach ... to its own choir, it is certainly not meant to change any minds or hearts. With that in mind, I would still not recommend it to the intended audience.

The supposed secondary protagonist's story is a short side story about independence and trusting one's friends. On its own it may have been good, but it's pretty forgettable, and our main protag's inability to ever let anything not be about them seems to have narrative sway. So let's focus on that main character and their story.

Our protag is exceedingly self absorbed, and that self is completely defined by their gender identity, and what composes a masculine identity to them consists entirely of superficial visuals. It begins in a way sympathetic enough to why the protag cannot simply identify as, dress as, and act as a male, in a modern Japanese setting. It shows the distress this causes and the awkward ways they try to express masculinity privately, for themselves, by wearing a tracksuit instead of the female uniform, or later by stealing an older brother's uniform. The character goes on to make a fashion brand for those with an identity in a similar manner--focusing on the subtle, private satisfaction of a label that's hidden but labels the wearer as they wish to be. Unfortunately, the irony of that label, being unashamed of one's self (no shame in my game, hidden shamefully) is never addressed. Even more unfortunately, the story never effectively explores this character's idea of what it means to identify as male beyond looks.

Looks, and liking girls, though the latter is addressed so poorly and selfishly this is a negative point; one confirmation of the protag's masculinity is that they enjoy kissing a girl. Asking for 'one more kiss' with a finger in a phallic position, the girl who kisses our protag deems that clearly, because of enjoying kissing another girl, our protag is male. Later, the lead is upset that female classmates do not see them as a love interest but as another girl, and is then also upset that those same girls upon knowing the protag identifies as male are no longer comfortable changing in front of them. The story fails to ever address the fact that the protag's desired gender identity finally being respected means losing out on the privileges of their mistaken gender they've enjoyed up until now.

When the protag's best friend, a girl the protag has a crush on, breaks down and cries because she had no idea the protag was suffering so much all this time despite being their best friend, feeling bad for never noticing, there is no hint that this best friend feels the protag should have trusted or told them. The friend has the picture perfect, ideal world reaction; she is not sad she was not trusted, she's sad her friend has been and is suffering with something as difficult as gender identity disorder, and vows to be there for them no matter what. Our protag makes no move to comfort this friend at all, but instead is upset that her friend dares to have her own feelings, upset the spotlight is off of them in even the slightest capacity, and upset that this friend will not change to see them as a love interest now but still as the platonic best friend, whom she is not afraid to change in front of. This is in defiance of the other girls who do not have this bond with the protag to trust them--and perhaps whom she actually shouldn't be trusting, given she is seen as a love interest by our protag, who doesn't risk changing things by expressing that. Despite severe disappointment that having their transmasculine identity outed didn't change how they were seen as a romantic interest, they take no comfort in still being able to be close to this crush of theirs in a way which only developed as it did to now because of being mistaken as female. Instead, it is a tragedy that individuals will not hold differing views of the protag in exactly the way they want to be seen in every dimension, and it is framed as most unfortunate and unfair that other people in society with whom they interact are able to form their own opinions or have their own feelings in regards to their relationships.

The protag attempts to get a job, and the workplace is agreeable to regarding them as male and allowing them to wear the male uniform, however the company draws the line at changing in the men's room out of respect for the comfort of the men, who do view biological women's bodies differently. This is framed with no nuance, and is written entirely as an unfair and unreasonable stance... the protag finds another place to work where the uniform is unisex, and the changing room is shared, but the girls (being so small in number) change behind a curtained off area. The protag is told by the males to change behind the curtain for their comfort, and the irony or comparison or the fact that other people beyond the transperson do have some level of say in a person's social identity, by virtue of being social, is never addressed. The character never has to have any consideration of other people, and rarely is conversation about anything but themselves.

A coworker at one point falls in love with the protag; when their romantic interest is rebuffed because they identify as male, the coworker remains civil but states that they are ultimately unable to see the protag as anything but female and expresses that it's best for them to not be friends but merely coworkers. Rather than respect the coworker's own boundaries, our protag tries to awkwardly force themselves to enact masculine stereotypes they heretofore did not, and ultimately jumps of a bridge, threatening continued self harm until the coworker agrees to (pretend to?) see them as the male they want to be seen as. This is the kind of behavior that gets transpeople labeled mentally ill, and it's interesting that the transman choose the most effeminate manner of acting out and attention seeking to confront this problem. This is portrayed as a brave and positive choice, though this 'cherished' friendship the protag simply cannot let go of is never seen again throughout the rest of the manga in any capacity. This friendship exists purely to validate the protag's ego and once fulfilled, the protag has no need of this person again.

This is not an accident. The story seems to continue to hammer the theme that identity is strictly personal, despite being a social label on some level. At one point, a transfemale youtuber is outed as having told blatant lies for years about their sexuality and their identity, which they're actually not certain of. When the public is upset that a popular transfemale giving life advice about accepting one's self and how they knew they were a female at heart because they just couldn't ever imagine sleeping with a woman, turns out to be a nonbinary biological male who secretly enjoys sex with women frequently, the protag and their fashion brand are presented as heroic for making clothing announcing the Youtuber's outing is 'none of our business' and encouraging the public to ignore that the person has made a career of lying to a vulnerable population.


The story can be summarized as a transman crying a lot over people not agreeing to just see them exactly how they wish to be seen; typical adolescent stories deal with the topic of how one wishes to be seen versus how one must interact with reality, and this story loves to ignore that, hoping sheer trans sympathy will carry the water.

If you're trans and you want story that goes "I get it" to your woes, you might like it, if you can get past the shallow concepts it has of gender identities. But if you want a story that's actually going to wrestle with adolescent or trans issues as an individual in society with relationships, something to chew on and think of it realistically, you'll be sorely disappointed.