The Manga That Betrayed Us All 

So THAT is what people mean when they say "please dont Usagi drop us" when a new found family series shows up.

It's kinda funny that the usagi drop anime is what got me to not be afraid to one day be a dad and then the manga made it impossible for me to admit that openly lmao

I wish I could write psychological horror as mentally damaging as this manga.

I will ALWAYS remember a fan letter directed to the mangaka herself from a real father-daughter duo who were fans of this series. Their distraught, betrayed reaction, particularly from the father, felt really heavy and disgusted and hearbroken, I could FEEL it just by READING it.

So this manga can be summed up as "they had us in the first half, not gonna lie."

I heard rumors that the anime studio deliberately chose to animate only the first part of the series because they don't like the second part. And at this point in time, no one will be asking any studios to animate Usagi Drop's full manga.

That why I liked Buddy Daddies so much. The ending was "hey lmao we raised this child properly"

Imagine meeting up with a guy who you went to a parenting school with and asking about their daughter only to find out _he’s sleeping with her_

Considering that people will say "Be careful, I hear this series pulls an Usagi Drop", one could say that Usagi drop's purpose is literally to serve as a warning to others.

I was huffing the copium too, when I started to see Rin’s feelings I was like “oh this half is about Rin going through puberty and struggling with who daikichi is to her as both a father figure and someone she does not see as her dad, with hormones making things worse” then the manga laughed in my face and drop kicked me

I remember when I read Usagi Drop. I remember thinking it was one of the most real and beautiful stories of family and parenting I'd ever read-a masterpiece of storytelling that explored themes of insecurity, isolation, and fear, as well as familial bonds, personal growth, and understanding. It was one of the greatest explorations of the human condition I'd ever had the pleasure of reading. I ended up putting the story down after the first act, citing that I wasn't a fan of the time skip, and that I could tell the story was going down a different, but still believable direction than I'd wanted (I figured Daikichi and Yukari not getting together was one of those things where it's just more believable that they'd never get romantically involved, even if I wanted them to). I knew I probably wouldn't finish the story, but was confident I'd forever remember it as one of the greats. Words can ill express the brain shattering psychic damage I endured when I learned how the manga ended.

I remember watching a series of lectures by Brandon Sanderson on writing, one of his lessons was on setting the readers expectations for your story. This is practically a case study in betraying that.

This is the first time in an anime history where people said "don't make a season 2."😂

What's actually unbelievable is that the entire rest of the world of this series gaslit Daikichi into thinking it was okay when he clearly didn't want to initially

The manga about grooming that groomed the audience into almost believing it wasn't a manga about grooming. The insidious way the writer frames the story so that a child having a romantic relationship with their father figure is treated as acceptable, normal, and encouraged is just gross. It's groomer propaganda.

Identity theft is a crime and the mangaka was the victim. That's the only explanation that makes sense. The person who writes the first part of Usagi Drop CANNOT be the same person that wrote the second part. Someone got killed and replaced. Call the cops. Get them on the case, once they're done burning every copy of the manga.

When you said there was a time skip and that the main guy HADN'T gotten with the other single mom my heart dropped. I KNEW what the ending was.

When Spy Family first began, every body said "Its gonna Usagi Drop us!" So glad it didn't

So this manga betrayed me twice because I loved it in middle school but then dropped it when I realized what was happening in the second half. Fast forward to me a couple years back and I see a screenshot of the manga on Twitter and I'm like oh yeah! I wonder why I never finished that manga. It was really cute right? Let me read it again. Cue shock and horror a second time, along with a sudden rush of memories from when I first abandoned the manga.

Watched the anime, loved it and picked up the first two manga on a whim. Heard everyone _screaming at me to turn back now_ and went 'whelp.' The way you've described it it really seems like it wasn't planned from the beginning and the author needed someone to slap their hands away from the drawing board.

Damn this hits me personally. I am 35 and when I was 28 I decided I didn't want kids, and I was ok just being a bachelor till i died. Well when I turned 30 my estranged sister, died in a car wreck and her oxycontin addicted baby daddy didn't want anything to do with the girl he had with her. My parents are also gone, so if it wasn't me she would be going to an orphanage, or some group home. So I got full custody of her, and it was one hell of a shock for me. It was pretty rough, and I was unsure of it, until once she broke a glass, which I didn't care about, it was a cheap glass, but she hid after she did it. After I found her, she broke down into a sob, and started begging to not send her away. She basically knew that nobody wanted her, and she truly thought she was trash to be thrown out if she did something wrong, well that did me in, and I started crying along with her. Now I don't cry, I played football, and was a soldier for many years and I have a high pain threshold but that moment was a spear straight into my heart. It was a struggle getting her self esteem built up, but we did it. Anyway, she is now 14 and I had to beg one of my female employees into taking her underwear shopping. Other than that we are doing pretty good. Just us two against the world.

I actually read this series in middle school, because the first part was available in my public library. the first volume of the second part was available, but none of the others were. I'm starting to realize that might've been deliberate.

This Manga didn't just betray it's reader, it also put asterisk on every child raising stories that is not completed.

I remember once seeing a post on tumblr say it’s a major red flag to stay away from someone if they defend or like the ending of Usagi Drop and I still agree with that statement

You have no idea *how much* I hoped the story was just trying to use Rin's crush as another way of exploring an aspect of adopting an older child; letting us see her confusion, grow to really understand the different types of love there are, and move on for her to end of dating someone else. Someone where the reader can see similarities to Daikichi, but Rin tells us about all the ways their different and she liked him for that.

They literally could have had her like him as an attachment disorder porblem and had daikichi gently navigate the manifestations of her attachement trauma as she forms identity adolescence

12:30 I paused right at "Rin has romantic fee-" and started going like michael scott in the office "NOOOOO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO"

This series ending is the embodiment of the meme of when your credit card is declined when going to a psychiatrist.

All because of Usagi Drop, I will always have a tinge of fear in the pits of my soul every time a new "reluctant man adopts a little girl" anime/manga is released...

Literally just binged the entire anime today, because I was feeling depressed and wanted something wholesome to cheer me up. Watched it and loved it, so I went to YT to see what other people thought of it... and here we are. What a manipulative gut punch to put readers through this mess.

the thing that most ignore is that this manga was written by a woman. so it's not as simple as "some creepy Japanese guy's grooming fantasy." women can have some messed up fantasies too.

Holy hell, that is harsh, and explains why the Anime ends in part 1 implying the mc will end up with Yukari.

You know, there was this manga of a boy who was attracted to his own mother that I remember seeing once. He had obsessive thoughts about her at times, even. Yet, in that story? He is pretty upset about having that irrational attraction and the story actually delved into the psychology of why he felt so obsessed in that way. It ended with him growing past those thoughts and learning to actually love her as a parent, finding someone his own age to date and grow up with instead. It was a trippy but interesting and surprisingly wholesome experience that held the misleading tagline "Boy is in love with his mother". It had taboo, uncomfy topics that were resolved to instead be a sort of case study about relationships and how people view one another. In a better world, Usagi drop could have been like that as well; Exploring the confused and easily-influenced feelings of a young woman growing up with someone who basically walked miles over hot coals to take care of her. Of those thoughts and feelings that are invasive but controlling and the way that they could be overcome by parental responsibility and the discovery of a growing woman's identity. But this is our reality and we got this, instead.

The thing is, they pulled the forbidden card after all those wholesome chapters. They quite literally trapped you by luring you in and having you commit because after all those chapters.

As someone with an adopted daughter when I read this, the ending made me fucking sick to my core.

You know it’s bad when on Rin’s wiki page Daikichi is listed as *’Nephew/Adopted Father/Husband’* Also the implication that Rin intends to commit incest with her and Daikichi’s child is HORRIFYING

"Before it wasn't a sacrifice because he loved his child now it wasn't a sacrifice because he gets to make love to his child". I feel you man I'm gonna be sick too

This anime doesn't have a manga, its completely original, the story ends in the anime :)

I literally remember watching this anime in middle school and enjoying it so much because it was so wholesome to me. I ended up googling what the ending was because I was curious yk! And then finding out that she confessed to him and they even got together in the end made my heart drop to my ass I was all like 'no wayyy'. Ever since then I've been like super cautious over stories like this ;;;

This anime was always one of my favorites I cried for hours after learning about the second half. This was the anime that my uncle watched with me to learn to read. He would pause every line so that I could read it out loud. We did it every week when it came out.

The reason why the whole "raise a little girl to adulthood and then have marries with her" is so prevalent in Japanese fiction is because it is part of Tales of Genji.Which is like THE origin of all Japanese fiction and continues to be taught in schools to this day. It's like the most extreme version of grooming, he totally kidnaps Murasaki, raises her to be his ideal wife. and once things don't work out with the woman he wants, he marries her.

I think it would be more interesting if his daughter stuck around not because she wants to marry him, but because she’s scared of leaving him in his old age and wants to return the favor since he took her in when no else wanted to and how this causes problems with her romantic relationship rather than “I want to marry my dad don’t worry we’re not blood related! It could also be about him letting his child go.

I finally watched the last ep after a year of delay as I didn’t want it to end. It’s a beautiful, wholesome little show that warmed my heart. I’ve heard the ending was bad, but I always thought it meant Rin was given to her mother in the end which does seem like a betrayal. I never would’ve thought it meant grooming and incest. How disgusting.

Kids that have had an unstable life are unable sometimes to differentiate different types of love. I’m so glad I never got involved with this manga because the fact that that is the ending is disgusting. Bro really turned a wholesome father daughter relationship into pedophilia and incest

What god level foreshadowing that the second half of the title predicted how readers by the second half of the story would drop this manga

It sucks that the first part is one of the best found family tropes out there. It told a great story, showing off all the struggles of suddenly having a child. Rin was refreshing, she was different from all the other children characters out there. She wasn't just there for cute overwhelmingly positive kid, she had real thought put behind her.

I remember dropping it after only a handfull of chapters because I saw the red flags I am so tired of "Dad" manga's with the trope a girl half the protagonist age falling in love with him that I didn't even feel like giving the writer the benefit of the doubt

Never seen this before but your review is really good. Great delivery

The fact that the mangaka along with their editors made the readers think that it is a wholesome manga yet at the same time dropping several hints of the wrongdoings at the first half and then bamboozling the readers starting from the second half makes the Satan himself being a prominent fan of their work.

The anime was a 10/10 masterpiece, they even hired and directed actual kid actors to potray kids in the anime. It feels grounded, realistic, heartwarming and also gutwrenching. The pallete colours were really awesome. It was a (near) perfect family drama. And, we dont talk about the manga

I crackled like an evil witch when I started seeing the hints. It was like a slow motion train wreck where I was reading and thinking "Okay. Is it going to hit the breaks or not?" It didn't and cracked up. Truly the best worst endings I've ever seen.

Every. God. Damn. Time I see a new family manga or a family centric dynamic, I can't even see them at face value anymore, I just have to randomly reminded of Usagi Drop at the back of my hand.

Just randomly turning everyone into a piece of toast and eaten by birds would have been a better than that horrible route.

That's wild. I remember Usagi drop was everywhere when I was a kid. Literally everyone recommended it and talked about it nonstop. Every time i looked for a new manga this would always be on the top ten list. One day, everyone freaked out all at once, and then silence ever since. Wild stuff. This 100% could've been a modern classic from praise it got back in the day.

Woody Allen would love this manga

The sad thing abt this story was that the author had an opportunity to speak AGAINST grooming. I’m all for making Daikichi the bad guy is that means we can educate and speak against this horrid thing. Either way, this became a horror story anyway; because at the end we see Rin, who we watch grow up, get sucked into an abusive relationship. I don’t care how “good” Daikichi treats her- this. Is. Abuse.

The first red flag was when Rin refused to take Dakichi's surname. Not weird on its own, but looking back its a lot more sinister.

The gross foreshadowing of the grandpa father with the young mother. It was right there since the beginning

This video is just me staring at the screen, with the digital circus music slowly getting louder and louder as the story gets explained.

me before this video "how bad can this be, the internet sure do love to exaggerate things" me after this video "...oh"

It's worth noting that one of the oldest novel, and the most famous work of Japanese literature, The Tale of Genji, specifically includes a storyline that's just "Hey, what if you raised a child to be your wife? Wouldn't that be fucked up and evil?"

Before reading usagi drops, i always said that "if the journey is good, even if the ending is bad, i can accept it". This manga made me stop thinking this.

Thank you so much for making this video. I read two volumes of the manga some years ago and absolutely loved it. I'd forgotten the title and was looking for it when I found this video. I dodged a whole ass nuke thanks to this.

Thanks for the review, you've saved me from randomly finding it and reading it thinking it's and adorable story

The worst part of the series is that it has forever tainted the perception of all future manga/anime about single dads. I remember seeing comments about both Sweetness & Lightning and Kakushigoto from people afraid of those series ending up like Usagi Drop. At least Yotsuba&! still exists as a palette cleanser.

Never heard of this story before The first half seemed great! Second half hit me in the head with a golf club

I fully planned to read this after watching only half this video a while back. So glad I came to finish this video first.

Well, that went south quickly! This video was a fever dream, even though it surely didn't go as far into detail about the story as the manga itself did.

Usagi Drop is the reason I have trust issues with father-daughter storylines. the 10yr timeskip was such a slap to the face. And like you said it really got into parenting. It is so weird how often I find a forum bringing up Usagi Drop (mainly mangas or novels about father-daughter stories) and there will be one person who is like "I loved it! i saw it coming the whole time Rin was a real mature kid and never saw Daikichi as her father so it's ok" and I just think about the bed wetting storyline and the shared bathing, the buying children school supplies, clothes, undies, setting up playdates with other children, all the sacrifices Daikichi made as a legal guardian for what was best for Rin and I think THE WHOLE TIME!!! It just so infuriating. Its just grooming. I just spent so much time reading a story about a man who fell in love with his daughter (blood or not) He immediately married her out of highschool! She doesn't even need to move into his house since she has been living with him since she was 6! Are their kids going to look back at old photo albums and ask why they are no photos of grandpa and Rin will be like "Oh Grandpa died when I was 6 your dad raised me!" Is Daikichi going to bring up remembering their mom every time some paternal moment happens since that was the beginning of his relationship with Rin? "You lost your tooth...oh I remember collecting your mother's baby teeth" "oh you wet the bed! I remember cleaning up after your mother after her accidents when she was young!" "I remember when your mom was a too cool kid to hug me when she was a grade-schooler" Like there are age gap romances and then there is just -I was the legal guardian of my spouse.

The entire time he was exposing the “Wife Husbandry” part I was just repeating to myself it “it should’ve ended at the child arc, IT SHOULD’VE ENDED AT THE CHILD ARC!” [Edit: Thanks for all the likes but JEEZ this has become an entire thread!]

intro got me hooked up I immediately went to read this manga I dont think I should've

I found a copy of this at my local library and couldn't remember where I had seen the art and story from and then I remembered that it's from this video! Didn't get the book from the library because I felt uncomfortable when I remembered.

Lowart I made a bad choice. I watched the first half-ish of this video, and thought to myself if this sounds like a delightful read. So I read it, and went through the exact experiences you described in the second half of this video. Never have I felt so foolish for not having finished a RU-vid video.

I'll never forget how good I felt after finishing the anime... And then 2 of my friends told me about what happens during the 2nd part. I really thought they were trolling me at first...Now I live in constant fear of wholesome anime/manga.

I picked this one up but before I got too far into the story I recognized the name and art style and remembered your video. Thanks you for saving me.

''The Manga That Betrayed Us All'' Is such epic title that i had to watch this video

the thing that gets me about these types of stories where all the characters excuse and forgive the behavior of the main character, it really makes you wonder why there is not a SINGLE person pointing out this disgusting dynamic. really makes you wonder why the author would only have people approve of their relationship…

I've never had a dad. So when I read this as a kid I loved it and felt so much comfort from it. Until the last half. It broke me. 13 yr old me didn't know what to think of it.

I really like the fact that part 2 of this video starts exactly in the middle of it to the second.

I had a feeling of the twist even on the first half as you were explaining it an emphatising so much the "love" part lol

All i can think of is “what was the author imagining during these scenes?” What kind of things were they thinking in the scenes we felt were heartwarming? Did they see that as development twords the ending? The best possibility is that they actually did pull this out of their ass and that they didn’t intend it from the start.

The fact Japan has a huge problem with teen girls running away from their home because their fathers saw them in a way a father should never see a daughter, makes this manga even more disgusting to me.

Good lord have mercy 😭😭😭 I saw this manga when I was a kid and I wanted to read it because of the minimalist cover. I’m so glad I didn’t. Thank you for your unintentional sanity sacrifice and for making this video.

I have never heard of this series before and even I feel betrayed. Can't imagine how it must've been for the readers when it came out.

It somehow took these characters less effort to accept the idea of a relative being in a love relationship with her dad than to accept her existence in the first place

Anyways I think this is, if anything, extremely interesting on the effect it has on certain people. It makes it funny in a dark way to see the reactions. Good video.

this manga was the first manga I read in real-time, waiting for releases etc., and I've never followed a manga since. thanks, Bunny Drop!

What’s so crazy about this is how well the author did at telling a believable, well-written, wholesome family story. If it were left alone it would be considered one of the classics, a timeless piece that lived on fondly in people’s memories. It’s hard to believe that the same mind who came up with such wonderful writing could also come up with such a horrible idea and actually go through with it, for no reason. The story didn’t need this twist, it was already amazing. And now it’s shit.

The worse thing is that this manga really does presents itself as purely wholesome cute family manga. And even when the most disturbing romance ends up developing it still does it in a sweet slice-of-life way like this shit is meant to be cute 💀 this scarred me as a middle school when I read it.

Its wild that this is the first video I watched from you, and then the second one i watched was the 8 hour Sonic Archie retrospective.

I remember seeing the cover of this when it first came out and hearing what it was about and how much people love it iand thinking "Idon't trust it" just knowing japan and anime in general

I don't know if it's intentional or not, but the word "Usagi" as in "Rabbit" is such a befitting word for the title of this manga, since rabbit is one of the most common species to do inbreeding. They're quite known for their behavior of mating with their own offsprings, siblings, or whatever as long as they've sexually matured, ironically, unlike wolves.

Usagi Drop: I can excuse a partental figure marrying their child (whom they've raised since they were in first grade), but I draw the line at marrying someone you're blood-related to. Every Sane Individual on Earth: You can excuse a parental figure marrying their child?

the moment you said "ten year time skip" and "daikichi and yukari still arent together" i immediately was like "i have read enough manga and webtoon to know exactly where this is going.

The second part always felt to me like something happened to the mangaka behind the scenes and for the second part his publishers panicked and put someone else at the helm and that it didnt matter what this second one had in mind for the story as long as they could mimick the first one's artstyle.

i like how this whole masterfully crafted story is just an excuse for i n c e s t

Story went from wholesome father daughter story to grooming the future wife 💀

I watched Usagi Drop when it first it came out, and as everyone I thought it was adorable. But I don't remember well why but somewhere along the way I got The Vibe that something was not right so I googled the spoilers, dropped down the score for anime too and never thought about it again until I came across this video. thoughts and prayers though, no one deserved this manga happening to them

I'm really glad that I have a habit of reading reviews first before diving into a show/book. I was gonna read/watch Usagi Drop, but thank God for the reviewers. I dropped it before I even watched it lol.

Years ago, my mom and I were bonding over the anime, so I got her a couple volumes of the manga for her birthday or Christmas. Thank God I only got her the first 3 volumes. When I read online that Rin falls in love with Daikichi, I just announced to her that we wouldn’t be reading any further and to not ask why. Man, I can still hear that bullet whizzing past.