[Note: there are many spoilers for the series ahead] Whenever I read romance manga, I always wonder if there are any scenarios where the main couple could have possibly not ended up together. Often in shojo manga, timing is everything when it comes to the main couple confessing their feelings or actually being ready for a relationship. In Daytime Shooting Star, one moment that could have easily prevented Mamura and Suzume from working out or entering a relationship in the first place immediately comes to mind: when Shishio, Suzume’s high school teacher and first love, tells her he never loved her.
I genuinely believe that if this scene, which happens in volume 7, had played out even slightly differently, Mamura would have never stood a chance. If Shishio, who called off his budding relationship with Suzume after her uncle found out about their romance, had instead told her the truth that they had been caught — or if he had at least not lied about never loving her — I believe that Suzume would have continued to hold onto her feelings for him. But it was only because he crushed her hopes that she was able to let go of him and move onto Mamura.
As far as male love interests in shojo manga go, there were several strikes against me ever rooting for Mamura. I typically dislike quiet love interests who treat the main female character coldly — I often find them boring. And I usually have a problem with male shojo manga characters who hate women, so Mamura really didn’t stand a chance with me.
Then there’s the fact that Shishio is a much more interesting character. Whether you love him or hate him, there’s no denying that Shishio’s struggle between loving Suzume and not wanting to hurt her makes him fascinating. Even though he’s 24-years-old, Shishio is in no way mature and is far from having figured out his life: he was unable to say what needed to be said at the right moment with his ex, Tsubomi, and once again makes the same mistake with Suzume. And it’s because of his indecisiveness that he ends up losing her.
Even though I logically knew that Shishio was a completely inappropriate love interest for Suzume because of his age and his status as her teacher, I found myself struggling with whether I wanted to root for him because of how strong Suzume’s feelings for him were for much of the series. I wanted Suzume to be happy, and for much of the series the source of her happiness is Shishio. I think the problem is that although Daytime‘s author, Mika Yamamori, clearly shows that Suzume and Shishio’s romance is unhealthy because they have to keep it a secret, she created so much chemistry and tension between the pair that Mamura simply feels like a third wheel. It doesn’t help that Mamura’s romantic interactions with Suzume are timid and awkward.
The other problem is that Suzume spends quite literally two-thirds of the series in love with Shishio. Mamura feels like a background character for much of the series, stepping into the limelight to confess his feelings for Suzume in volume 3 after she is rejected by Shishio and then as her fake-boyfriend after she and Shishio are over.
In volume 2, Suzume’s enemy-turned-friend Yuyuka, who initially has a crush on Mamura, tells Suzume that love “isn’t something you can reason out…It’s something you realize when that person is right next to you.” It’s this conversation that leads to Suzume realizing her feelings for Shishio, but what’s interesting is that I feel as though it can be applied later on in the series, when Suzume is trying to discern whether her feelings for new-boyfriend Mamura are actually love.
It may seem as though I disliked Daytime Shooting Star, but that’s not true at all. I sympathized with Suzume as she struggled to overcome her first love, and enjoyed watching her friendship with Yuyuka deepen. I even felt sorry for Mamura, who for much of the series fears he may be a placeholder in Suzume’s heart.
If anything, Daytime Shooting Star is actually the most refreshing shojo manga I’ve read in years; in many ways it surprised me. Despite student-teacher romances being a staple of shojo manga, not many series with this type of plot get licensed in the U.S. So when I first began reading the series, I wasn’t sure how the love triangle would be resolved. To be honest, I think I expected for the series to skip ahead past high school, which would have provided Shishio an opportunity to pursue Suzume without the obstacle of being her teacher.
Because Suzume spends much of the later volumes running away from her feelings for Mamura, afraid that she may still be in love with Shishio, I wasn’t convinced that Suzume’s love for Mamura runs deep or that their relationship was built on a solid foundation. But in a way, that’s part of the beauty of it. Daytime Shooting Star tells the story of two fragile loves: one between Shishio and Suzume that ended before it could begin, and one between Suzume and Mamura that starts on the sand, shifting and unsure, but glimmering with hope.
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