I Shall Never Return

Review Date: 2007 November 30 14:53

Reviewed by: Azure

Released by: Aurora Publishing

Publishing Country: USA

Author: Kazuna Uchida

Age Rating: 18+

Page Count: 190

ISBN-13: 978193449605

ISBN-10: 1934496057

Summary

Ritsuro and Ken have been friends for a long time, but their friendship is under extreme strain. Ken has dropped out of school and is making money through prostitution. Ritsuro does his best to look after Ken, who just makes his life difficult stealing girlfriend after girlfriend. Things finally come to a head when Ken sleeps with Ritsuro’s current girlfriend Moeko.

Review

"I shall never return" is another in the Deux yaoi line. This time it focuses on best friends Ritsuro and Ken, whose intense friendship slowly develops into something more as outside pressures make them re-examine their relationship. Ken is the aggressive one of the relationship pursuing Ritsuro and doing his best to destroy his relationship with Moeko. Despite sleeping with Ken Moeko still has her heart set on Ritsuro, whose feelings become confused as both pursue him.

This is a classic love triangle set up, and thankfully Ritsuro actually has some spine to him. There are actually some great moments scattered throughout the manga, such as Moeko’s cutting her hair as her relationship with Ritsuro disintegrates. Sadly to balance this out there are very few romantic moments, the relationship between Ken and Ritsuro seems driven by a physical attraction other anything else. So much so in fact both men are lead to question how much they really actually love each other. The dialogue is reasonable throughout except for the love scenes which are utterly cringe worthy.

The art is typical of the genre, with a reasonable number of backgrounds and solid toning. The characters are easily distinguishable from each other if a little generic.

I shall never return is pretty much an average manga, since I’m not a yaoi fan it’s difficult to really see the appeal especially when you compare the manga to shoujo equivalents such as Mars.

Rating: 6/10