Again

Well its 2017.. 105 chapters!? I know how odd (105 eng sub chapters so far that i could find). I'm writing this because I believe it is a little underrated. And for anyone who falls upon this manga with prying eyes.

Now I went into this through recommendations. Cliche really.. but with an open mind of not knowing what to expect and thoroughly enjoyed it (y'know what they say undersell it, so when they see it KABOOM mind blown - to an extent).

Time travel.. *wipes away the drool* well lets start that Again!! ;)
Time travel, who wouldn't wanna do it or at least try it in their life time.
Imamura Kinichiro the MC who had an uneventful/no social life in his high school days gets to restart it all from his first day of high school!? Because he fell down a flight of stais!! With someone else!!!? Heck yeah!! Won't be no accident, i'll throw myself off. Of course going back in time you would think you could change the future (which was the present). But if you never had a single friend and never did anything, where would you start?

What makes Again!! so unique of course isn't just the MC overcoming his traumatic life but also the character build. Each individual character have their own added taste into the story which molds the protagonist into someone who, by the end of it your cheering for. The way they introduce each character is like having multiple MC . You get a feel for all of them no matter how big or small a roll they have.
Throughout the manga from beginning to end there a lot of plot twist and turns. Some you can see and others you can't (something i like anyways) and the story progressed just right for my taste.

All in all it felt like a roller coaster ride having never putting it down once i picked it up.

Definitely will read it Again!! (if the other 31 chaps ever come out in eng lol)

At the risk of reiterating a plot summary that's been said in many different ways many times, I'll avoid the long story synopsis and give a brief summary to help explain my thoughts a bit.

I think that the story is interesting not only because of the premise behind it (going back in time to change the things you regret) but because of what it could eventually lead to.

We start off on graduation day where our main character, after looking back on his high school years, despairs that he didn't accomplish anything and regrets not living his life to the fullest (joining clubs, making friends, etc). After graduation, he enters and old building and runs into a classmate (who I'll refer to as A-ko) and, somehow, the two end up travelling back in time to the start of their high school careers.

Comparing the 10th grade main character to the graduate we originally met, we can see very distinct differences in their situations, etc. This, for me, is where the potential for this story lies. Although the main character begins merely by joining a club he regretted not joining, who's to say he can't use his knowledge of the future to create an entirely different life? We can see a bit of this with A-ko as she attempts to rebuild the life she had upon graduating 3 years too early.

For me, this manga raises an interesting moral question: if given the chance to go back in time and relive a part of your life, what would you change? Would you use your knowledge of the future to make yourself a billionaire, or prevent a loved one from dying, or perhaps try to recapture your original life like A-ko? Would you do it even if it meant creating an entirely different future that could affect everyone around you? I'm really interested to see what the main character chooses to do in his redo and how that will affect the natural flow of time.

I like this whole story of regrets and second chance, but what keeps me hook into this story is if this is a dream the main character is having or it's some sort of coma he is in right now or maybe he suffer some sort of mental disorder, is very interesting i can wait for the future chapters to explain, the main plot is great as well how all the things that couldn't do or the people he couldn't talk to in his real time now they are talking to him. very good manga with a great theme and very good slice of life. It deserve more praise from more people

I stumbled across this manga , and was instantly hooked,and its just continues to rise on my all time fave list,
The premise is a simple one , if you were given a chance to relive your life , what choices would you make , how would you do things differently and how would those choices affect the world around you.
This happens to our hero , who by chance is thrown back in time , and makes some very different choices , with often very funny and at time really touching results.
This manga packs a punch, you hardly expect it too,and the comedy and (I assume ) Romance are second to none.
A two thumbs up.

Well this kind of manga and one that you do not know what to expect,
for the simple fact that you are not accustomed to the base theme of it,
of course I started to watch by impulse, sometimes the time-lapse sleeves, back to time etc. ..
They are good cliches, this one showed a little different, the protagonist tries to clarify a misunderstanding
with a girl who saw him enter a club room, and because of him looking like a delinquent
the same runs out and ends up falling from the stairs, he follows her and slips and also falls from the stairs,
with this fall he returns to 3 years ago, his 3 years in school were 'dark' without friends, no club
without any school goals, was only there to finish the teachings and with this new chance
he wants to have a fresh start, but he resolves to help the club that he refused one day that was closed shortly after
for lack of members, is expensive the story is very good, the plot and great to accompany, is the kind of manga you rusha as fast as possible
 for being great, is the theme of "cheer" is very good, strongly recommend.
If you want to have a new perspective and a gorgeous plot to see, just read!

Make sure you read the reviews of people that have finished the manga. After waiting three years for the scans of the manga to be finished, i binged it in the past three days with full investment and to no avail did the ending do this manga justice at all. The characters were interesting, the story was even more interesting, but due to the manga being cut early from the publishing company, the ending was rushed and half a--ed. But because of this, many problems were left open and little to NO closure was given. It's like watching your favorite flavored cake be baked in front of you, only for the cake to be dropped on the floor and you only get the icing The manga had endless potential but it was completely thrown out the window. Some people liked the ending, but I know many that definitely thought it could have been better. I fell in love with the characters, but due to the empty hole of an ending, I do not recommend this manga at all, unless you're open to all kinds of endings.

TLDR: Would have been an 8-9, but after finishing the last chapter, it's become a 4.
-very disappointed
-very sad

Time travel has become quite a common device in storytelling that there are several subdivisions of it. Again!! adopts the time travel concept that once interfered, the future becomes unpredictable.

Kinichirou Imamura is a solitary high school student who has lived his life avoiding a social life. He accidentally goes back to 3 years in the past and sees this as an opportunity to make new choices for his life. What he doesn't foresee are all the consequences that come along with his decisions. All hardships challenge him and confront his own anti-social personality. I like that not only he gives himself the chance to try things he never did before, he gives the chance for people to get to know him better. He may be a short tempered loner, but his main attribute is that he is good at reading people's hearts. Imamura may know future facts, but they merely pose as future possibilities due to his lack of action. He learns that being apathetic won't lead him anywhere.

Ouendan are cheering squads. Imamura's memory of a remarkable encounter with Usami Yoshiko, the lonely captain of Kobosu Minami High's ouendan club, sparks an avalanche of events which start with him trying to enter the notorious club. One of the really interesting things about the storytelling is the question of how can we positively influence someone. Just as the ouendan tries to motivate the baseball team, Imamura attempts to inspire his new friends. Initially dismayed by how little the ouendan has to offer to a baseball game, he later learns the power and influence that can be given through encouragement. Although matches start and end with the actions of the athletes on the field, they only got there through the assistance of their friends, families, and in this case - the cheers from the bleachers. Albeit he is merely a young individual, his words and actions carry enormous weight to his friends. No man is an island.

Even though I love many of the characters, I feel like some of the side characters had odd developments that didn't really fit their personalities. Another complaint is that a few times it feels like the author is writing a bit aimlessly. Maybe lack of planning and the publisher's decisions led her astray.

I would divide this manga into three arcs: ouendan arc, drama club arc, and the marathon arc. The first is definitely the strongest. The second starts strange, but it delivers in the end. The third starts awkwardly and slowly grows, but the final volume shifts gears completely and ends everything abruptly. Despite that, I don't regret reading this manga.

Is the ending unsatisfactory? Yes, it is disappointing. Could the story be much better? Definitely. But before reading or giving a rating to this manga, ask yourself this: Does a weak ending ruin everything that came before? Or is it just one more flaw in something good?

Imamura is completely apathetic to school life even as he's about to graduate. He always kept to himself, has no friends, and has a face that makes other kids think "school shooter." The one thing he's instead in is the school's Ouendan that was disbanded his freshman year. But when he goes to check out its old clubroom, he and a girl named Fujieda end up falling down the stairs all the way into three years ago.

Again!! is a really fantastic manga for its writing. It just does a really good job in establishing interesting and unique characters that don't exactly get along, creating a lot of lively and atypical interpersonal conflicts, and yet at the same time, you can see how these characters could work well together as friends if they could get past their conflicts. For instance, Fujieda could have been a boring, popular sidekick to Imamura's time traveling, but instead she's kind of an idiot who ruins her once charmed high school life by having no clue how to act in the past to not ruin everything, so of course she ends up following Imamura around and blaming him. Imamura could have been a typical boring, friendless loser, a Gary Stu of a protagonist. And while he does have a bit of the Gary Stu angle, the device of going back in time really allows his character to shine. He feels free of the anxiety of reprocussions that held him back from acting in his original life, and so he ends up opening up to really show his true personality. So while on one hand, the fact that a completely friendless loner suddenly acquiring all these friends feels a bit like an implausible wish fulfilling fantasy, on the other hand, the outlandish circumstances make it much easier to swallow.

There are a couple of things that might turn off certain readers though. For one, you might be disappointed that more isn't done with the time traveling premise. Realistically, the characters don't recall the exact details of how events played out, and so rarely do they use their foreknowledge to change things. Really, this is more of a club manga, and about Ouendan, that is, Japanese style cheering, at that, which many readers will not be interested in reading. The time traveling device is however used to great advantage to give characters a motivation to do things they wouldn't under normal circumstances. The one other thing is that sexual harassment is often used for comedic relief, which can definitely be a turn off.

Have you ever thrown away a chance that may have changed the way your life had become? This is what happens to the high school social recluse, Imamura Kinichiro, and the manga, "Again!!", is the heartfelt tale of his second chance in life.

The basic premise is nothing short of relatable and heartfelt. It’s the day of graduation and Imamura reminisces how his high school life had been wasted. Upon going to the old cheering squad’s clubroom, a club he regrets his choice of never joining in, he scares Fujieda, Akira, a girl who led a relatively normal highschool life. Together, they fall down a flight of stairs and somehow get transported back to the opening ceremony, the moment where Imamura was first inspired to join the cheering squad but never had the backbone to actually join. The storyline is pretty simple enough, but what sets it different from most mangas like this is that it’s relatable. We’ve all had moments when we had a chance to do something life changing but something stopped us. We regret this choice for the rest of our lives, wondering what might’ve been different if we had done things different. This is just the surface of the wonderful story of "Again!!" and the different choices Imamura Kinichiro is the rest.

"Again!!" has a lovely cast of characters. Our protagonist is definitely different from most, in the sense that he tries to change his life for the best. Not only that, as the story progresses, he turns out to be resourceful, able to utilize his brain to attract more members for the cheering squad, or deviating a plan to beat the antagonist of the story, the cheerleading squad, at their own game. As well as having a strong mind, Kinichiro also has a firm heart. He doesn’t become easily swayed by false flirtations from the antagonists nor does he completely quit from trying to join the cheering squad. Besides Kinichiro, other memorable characters are the Usami Yoshiko, the sole member of the cheering squad. Her passion and spirit is unmatchable, deeming her quite a heroine. Even through the poor reputation she has gained, Usami stands strong for what she believes in. Fujieda Akira and Shibata Reo are less memorable but still fleshed out as characters. Fujieda Akira is perhaps the character I can relate to other than Kinichiro. She’s your ordinary school girl who makes plenty of friends to last through her entire high school life. When she gets a second chance along with Kinichiro, she discovers the true nature of her friends and ‘boyfriend’, dealing with the new life Kinichiro has paved for the both of them. Less should be said for Reo but she’s also a girl who’s led a normal life until Kinichiro came along.

The art is rough and coarse at times. Not the most extraordinary but that’s the beauty of it. "Again!!" is not a story to blow your mind away. It’s a story to touch your heart and get you relate to its characters. And its art successfully does this, having one of the plainest and typical hairstyles you may catch teenagers today having. With the exception of Kinichiro’s ridiculously long hair in the beginning, there’s no character you can’t picture a person having in real life. Besides hairstyle, its artwork in other fields (scenery and character design) is effectively drawn. It’s not exquisite, but it fits with the mood of the story. And sometimes, simplicity is refreshing.

"Again!!," a simple story that will surely leave a powerful taste behind. Not powerful in the sense that it will change your life forever. After all, "Again!!" is not a story of changes. It's a story of second chances, and the ability to achieve what you desire despite everday problems. That's the simple components which makes up "Again!!" And surely, if you give it a try, you'll find yourself reading it over again.