Tokyo Tarareba Girls vol. 1 by Higashimura Akiko (a Neo-Tokyo 2099 Manga Review)

A fascinating romantic comedy manga series about women in their 30s wanting to get married before the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. But will Rinko and her friends find someone to marry by then? Find out in Hgashimura Akiko’s “Tokyo Tarareba Girls”!

MANGA TITLE: Tokyo Tarareba Girls vol. 1 (Tokyo Tarareba Musume)

BY Higashimura Akiko

FIRST PUBLISHED IN JAPAN: Kodansha Ltd.

PUBLISHED IN USA BY: Kodansha Comics

RELEASE DATE: June 26, 2018

“I spent all my time wondering ’What if?’ Then one day I woke up and I was 33.” Rinko has hustled her whole life, but one day she wakes up and finds herself a writer of a cheap online soap opera with only two friends (with whom she goes drinking most nights). In a booze-fueled delusion, she swears to get married by the time the Tokyo Olympics roll around in 2020, but it’s not going to be a straight line…and there won’t be any fairy tale endings!

For those not familiar with our reviews, we refer to names in the Japanese style, so family names first, first name second

Mangaka Higashimura Akiko is best known for her manga “Princess Jellyfish” but after seeing women discuss wanting to get married or a woman’s happiness depended on a man, she started to think about marriage and how she felt that happiness isn’t something you get out of marriage, it’s something you have to find out yourself.

And the truth of the matter, there are many people who are still unhappy after marriage.

But when her friends started talking about wanting to get married, wanting to have kids and were tired of living alone, it set the motion of creating the manga “Tokyo Tarareba Musume” (Tokyo Tarareba Girls) which has been released in the US courtesy of Kodansha Comics.

The manga revolves around Rinko and her friends talking about getting married before the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. A decade earlier, an assistant director named Hayasaka-san was in love with her and even gave her a ring. But she rejected him because he wasn’t handsome and wasn’t her type.

Now that she’s 33, she is now a scriptwriter for web series, while Hayasaka-san became a director and also looks handsome. But now that she is thinking about being in serious relationship and getting married, like her other friends, she thinks that she has a second chance with Hayasaka-san but instead he wanted to meet with Rinko because he wants to give a ring to her young assistant with the intention of one day getting married.

Upset, she meets with her friends and they get drunk talking and while they are loud and drunk, a young man at the pub is blunt to them and tells them that they should accept their age and flat out disses them.

Needless to say, the young man pisses them off.

As Rinko and her work look to hire a new talent, they are looking to a popular young model who is trying to become an actor, named Key. And Key happens to be the young man that dissed on Rinko and her friends.

As her work wants to hire the model, can Rinko put away her differences and write a story tailored for Key?

And will Rinko find real love?

For those who enjoy romantic comedies will no doubt want to give “Tokyo Tarareba Girls”.

While not like other manga romantic storylines which involve teenagers, this storyline focuses on women in their 30’s who becoming more driven to marry, have children and trying to find the right guy to settle with and not being so picky.

And part of the enjoyment is that Higashimura writes these characters in a realistic manner and setting. For example, Rinko and her friends are no doubt part of that group that was part of the end of the bubble era, influenced by TK music of the ’90s and were carefree women who lived life having fun, working, making money and it was all good. Until they hit their 30s and the realization that each of them are single and wanting to get married before the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, have them a bit more driven to find Mr. Right.

Unfortunately, their discussion didn’t go all that well as it was overheard by a young man, who happens to be a popular model named Key, who is becoming an actor. An actor which Rinko’s workplace is desperate of hiring.

And Rinko is not so happy about it!

While manga readers can sense a predictable storyline, perhaps that is what Higashimura wants readers to think. But what we do know of is Rinko feels more pressure of being in her 30’s, not married, not in a relationship and still upset she rejected a guy who she later starts to like a decade after she rejected him.

Overall, this is a good start for vol. 1 of “Tokyo Tarareba Girls” and I look forward to see where this storyline is going and reading vol. 2!

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