Title: Rainbow Days Vol. 6
Author: Minami Mizuno
Publisher: Viz Media
Language: English
Format: Paperback
Pages: 192
Genre: Romance, Comedy
Publication Date: October 3, 2023
The Story
Volume six of Rainbow Days was charming, to say the least. It is comprised of two major stories with a small break in between.
As for the first story, Spit Girl (Tsutsui) has to sub in for her basketball team because someone sprained their ankle. Tomoya planned on watching the game and then confessing to her shortly after; however, he runs into Rina who starts to put the moves on him. After possibly getting somewhere with Spit Girl, she just happened to walk by to see Rina in action. This gave her the wrong impression and it leaves Tomoya with a near-impossible situation that he needs to try and fix. Luckily, he’s going to get a chance.
During her game, Spit Girl collided with another player and knocked herself out. He carried her to the nurse’s office and stayed by her side until her brother came to pick her up. Anna wanted to go pay her a visit and asked if Tomoya could come which she harshly rejected but Tomoya wasn’t going to take that answer sitting down. He did some detective work and found his way to Spit Girl’s apartment. Things seemed grim until a stroke of luck happened!
Then, we take a bit of a break to get a story with Chiba and Taizo. All I will say is… wow… that’s one big keychain that Chiba lost!
Our second big arc brings us to Christmas. We’ve come full circle; however, this time, it’s going to be different! Hashiba asked Anna to hang out on the 24th and she accepted. He even went so far as to get her a gift and plan out an evening for the two of them. Things were going great until Anna received a text on her phone and ended up ditching Hashiba! The 24th has repeated itself once again!
Characters
So, due to the two major arcs, it’s clear that this volume focused on both the Tomoya x Tsutsui and the Hashiba x Anna pairings.
As for the first, it’s nice to see Tomoya committed to Tsutsui. He truly has changed from being a playboy to someone who has true feelings for a single person. His willingness to never let go is a testament to that change in him; however, it’s also that iron will that is causing a change in Tsutsui as well.
Her shell is cracking more and more and you love to see it but I wouldn’t say it’s about to break. She still loves Anna and there is no way in heck that she fully trusts Tomoya… but after what happened at her apartment, that might just be changing… slowly… but changing nevertheless. I’m reminded of the song Polar Bear by Puscifer.
“I see you chipping away again.
Your old icicle island.
…
I know that look of fear
I’m well aware
And no need to brave it all alone
I’ll be there”
I think those lyrics perfectly encapsulate Tsutsui and Tomoya’s budding relationship. Tomoya is the one chipping away at the icicle island… aka Tsutsui’s shell. He’s well aware of her fear, or rather, her hatred of men. And there is no need to brave that fear all alone as he looks to prove to her that he can be the one who will be there for her. At least, that’s how I envision it in my head.
As for Hashiba and Anna, I don’t really have any song lyrics to liken their journey to because, to me, Hashiba is like that cute little puppy that was left all alone on Christmas Eve. That puppy went out and embarked on a journey to find someone who would take him in, care for him, and love him… all the while, because he was abandoned, he wasn’t sure of himself or his decisions. He wasn’t sure if he was making the right choice but that seemed to disappear as he felt that he had reached the end of his journey… on the same day he was abandoned. It was symbolic, it was packed full of meaning, and to see how things wound up… well, I’ll leave it at that so I don’t want to spoil the ending.
Final Thoughts
I really loved the character development here. I mean, why wouldn’t I? When romance is my favorite genre, it would be easy to love a volume where two of the biggest pairings got all of the attention. I loved how everything went, though. Each scenario had a lot to unpack and none of the situations felt out of place. The characters reacted exactly as I would expect them to and because of that, I thought everything was built and had progressed naturally and at the right pace!
So, needless to say, this was probably the best volume of Rainbow Days thus far (for me at least). We’ll be kicking off Volume 7 with the fallout from Hashiba’s side of things so it’ll be interesting to see where it goes. I have a few ideas but, again, I don’t want to ruin that ending!
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This item was provided for review by VIZ Media.