Manga 132519 Sekimen Shinaide Sekime-san

Right so here everyone, we've got Sekime-shinaide, Sekime-san–a nothing and I *mean nothing but wholesome* manga. It's a very simple plot; the same ol' high school romcom that most who read it can enjoy. Now I've read some other reviews here with low ratings and... I can't say they're completely wrong about Sekime-shinaide being quite typical to all the similar romance manga and stuff etc., but it actually gives a heartwarming feel. Of course that "feel" is pretty much subjective, however, this manga is really all just sweet fulff vanilla.
(Also TL;DR at the very last part btw- all the same, really =3=)

Story:
Sekime-shinaide is a ... slice of life so what exact plot do we have here? None. It's just about the relationship development between the two mc's which is pretty cute ngl (however some may find it repetitive and boring, perhaps even annoying–but chill bro, it's a simple story so see it simply without expecting anything =3=..)
Tbh, I can't actually remember why these two fell in love in the first place ._.
There is absolutely no drama. None of the characters receive any backstories whatsoever, so this whole manga is literally: "the everyday life of a high school couple (consisting of popular girl and ordinary boy who blush in every chapter) and friends ft. a few adults and little sister.."

Characters:
The characters... are all nice. That's it. That's literally how you can describe each and every character in this manga; "nice."
Nothing very interesting about them. Th'all have similar personalities and not much of a distinction among any of them. It's not truly a bad thing tho- perhaps it's better than a super annoying chara who's there just for plot convenience. Well, all the extras in Sekime-shinaide are for plot convenience.........
But I did enjoy the relationship of Takadono (mmc) and his friends cause you can see they're real bros ig lol
However there is no amusing character. In my opinion, the author might've focused on developing the relationship among all the characters so perhaps, in order to not make things difficult, the result was like placing the exact same amount of delicious batter into each cupcake mold and identically placing each topping as it is– what I'm trying to say is, although the characters are good- yes, they're good characters- they all have the same amount of everything the other has. Just average and nice, every single one of them.

Art:
No probs with the art here folks. It's all good.
It's a cute style, kinda chubby faces and bodies. Simple and nice to look at (but not the kind I'd be willing to stare at all day unlike, let's say, JSHK/TBHK).

Enjoyment:
Certainly, I did enjoy this manga, without a doubt. All of it was vanilla, sweet fluffy, plain, cute and simple. Look, this story, Sekime-shinaide, was not meant to be taken seriously. It's a romcom for goodness sake~! Don't expect fanservice because here we don't have any–and that.. is actually what I appreciated the most. Seeing how most high-school romance have intercourse chapters, I was glad to see this one did not.
It was refreshing really, but it could have been more. The main issue is truly the lack of expressions with the characters, but eh. It's a smooth ride, and the relationship development between the main characters is good. It wasn't rushed and you can compare the Sekime (fmc) from the earlier chapters to the last (unfortunately not Takadono/the mmc..)

So I can recommend this, yes, but it's better to read if you want to relax. When there's nothing important going on cause you won't really get to enjoy it (unless your tastes are opposed to mine ofcs ^^; there's no need to try it out if you think reading this particular manga is a waste of time).
Warning you tho: "Sekime-shinaide Sekime-san" is only a pure innocent and completely nice manga–nothing more and nothing less.

I'm usually a pretty big fan of these sort of gimmicky vanilla non-harem rom-coms, but there's not much going on here. Most of the humor revolves around the male protagonist trying to hang out with his girlfriend, who despite being the popular girl in school, gets really nervous around her boyfriend. Both the main boy and girl are relatively boring and inoffensive, so a lot the funniest parts come from side characters. If you get to the part with the baguette, you'll see what I mean. The chapters are mostly episodic in nature, however there are a few multi-chapter "mini-arcs" toward the end that were ... so funny that this manga probably could have gone on forever if the mangaka could have just channeled that energy from the beginning. The ending was very cute and didn't feel rushed.

tl;dr: A manga with an overtly simple premise that doesn’t evolve at all and gets boring pretty quickly.

This manga is about Takano who is going out with a girl named Sekime, but Sekime gets embarrassed incredibly easily when Takono is involved, so despite going out it’s hard for them to do couple like things. As such, them just normally interacting can be pretty funny. But the problem with the manga is that this is pretty much all there is, short chapters involving just normal interactions playing out in an amusing manner. It’s fluffy so it is pretty enjoyable at first, but its incredibly repetitive. Takano ... and Sekime don’t seem to have anything to their character at all beyond the initial premise which is incredibly simplistic. And without anything more they grow dull very quickly.

It’s not like there isn’t anything to them beyond the fluff at all, but it’s very half hearted and doesn’t really feel like it contributes enough to have an impact. There’s relationship development I suppose in terms of how their relationship is seen by other characters, such as at first keeping it hidden but eventually being open about it. However, this doesn’t really feel like it comes about as a result of any relationship development within the couple themselves, its just kind of thrown out there. Similarly, while there are moments where Sekime feels like she’s growing more accustomed to Takano, these are kind of randomly placed and it doesn’t really feel like there’s any sort of progression. Thus overall, it doesn’t really feel like there’s any sort of relationship arc or character arcs in this manga, and thus it’s hard to get invested in the characters or find them all that likable.

There’s also not really much in terms of overarching plot threads. The vast majority of chapters are stand alone. There are some multi-chapter arcs towards the end that are going for long term jokes that focus on side characters and try to move away from being solely focused on Takano and Sekime. However, these weren’t all that well written and didn’t land all that well, and thus don’t really help much. The side characters in general felt pretty lacking in that they were even more flat than Takano and Sekime and didn’t really contribute much to adding any variety to the comedy. So in the end it comes down to just Takano and Sekime and they’re just not enough to hold up the manga.

The art was pretty mediocre. The color art is fine, but with the style and character designs used the black and white looks too basic and not at all interesting. Furthermore, a lot of panels felt pretty rough and overall the art felt somewhat rushed and not very high quality.