Sesesese! Mezase Hatsu H! Doutei Joshi no Tokimeki Daisakusen · review
Sesesese! is about a male virgin loser who becomes a middle-school loli who's obsessed with having sex. It's a more comedic take on the 'failed male' incel wanting to become a girl phenomena. That somehow their problems would be solved by becoming a little girl. But instead of taking it seriously like Inside Mari for example, this manga makes fun of it using the extremely vulgar, shameless MC. The whole point is that the MC's obsession with sex comes from the lack of love or loneliness in his life. He lacks the empathy to consider the other person's feelings and circumstances, only wanting sex because it'sseen as the ultimate cure to loneliness. However, the MC also denies the idea that sex is an act of love, which is ironic because his desire for sex comes from his subconscious desire for love. This denial comes from his fear of confronting other people and himself. He's afraid of being rejected because he hates himself for being a loser, so he pretends as if he doesn't care about love, that sex is only an act of biology and whatnot. He runs away from his problems, and as a result, he suffers.
All of this conflict is thinly veiled under the wacky, exaggerated humour. He approaches people who seem bad, but they turn out to be (somewhat) good. When he's rejected by these good people he feels sad, which exposes the fact that he's really doing it for love. When he actually approaches someone bad, he gets saved before anything crazy happens. And when he does get saved, he realizes that he doesn't really want to have that kind of violent, loveless sex. By doing this, the story manages to stay kinda light despite the touchy subject matter.
Personally, I like this comedic, exaggerated approach of depicting mental illness more than a serious one, because I find laughing at your problems to be more relatable. It also makes the serious scenes hit a little harder due to the contrast. Now I don't actually find the manga to be that funny, but it's thematically interesting haha.
So overall Sesesese! is a very interesting read. It's a very honest and unique depiction of a specific issue people have. I'm not sure if I can recommend it to everyone, I just hope this review can help you see past the taboo elements in this story and appreciate it for what it really is, a love story.
notes:
- I'm not sure if the MC actually wants to be a girl or they're just accepting the situation, maybe someone knows more about this
- SPOILERS: I think the ending where they unite by having sex symbolizes a sort of self-acceptance/him finally being able to love (at least a little bit). Then Ayano still being a girl who still can't have sex shows that these problems don't just solve themselves that easily? Or maybe the manga was just trying to be funny? idk the ending is a bit weird