Kicking the passion up a notch in Gal Gohan’s eighth volume

So far in Gal Gohan, the feeling of there being a bit of a “love triangle” in Marii Taiyou’s manga series Gal Gohan has been just sort of bubbling along in the background. Although new rivals have been introduced at various points in the narrative, so far everyone seems to have been getting along just fine.

We’re now in Gal Gohan’s eighth volume out of ten, however, so something has to give, surely — and, indeed, the back-of-book blurb on this one promises that our leading lady Miku Okazaki’s “rivals are getting more aggressive”, as well as Miku herself “trying every weapon in her Gal arsenal to win him”.

At the same time, though, for the most part Gal Gohan has remained thoroughly wholesome, nice and actually drama-free, despite the premise. There’s a brief moment in volume 7 where leading man Shinji Yabe has to rescue Miku and her friends from some unwanted attention at the beach, thereby providing a rare instance of their age and power gap being emphasised, but up until this point, we haven’t seen anyone really getting genuinely hurt by the whole unfolding situation. Can things stay that way?

It’s an interesting situation, because all three of Yabe’s admirers — Miku, student council president Fujiwara and Yabe’s old college senpai-turned-work colleague Nagisa — have the potential to get hurt, and all of them also have a strong argument in favour of them being “the one” for Yabe.

The connection and chemistry between Miku and Yabe is obvious, of course, since Gal Gohan has, up until this point, primarily focused on their relationship. But Fujiwara is clearly both smitten with Yabe and a lot more mature — plus one can argue that she has had a surprising number of intimate moments with Yabe in her own right.

And then Nagisa, of course, is a much more “socially acceptable” partner for Yabe, what with her being much closer in age and, oh yes, not his student. Therefore she would appear to be the “correct” choice for him, particularly since they have a previous connection — and that Nagisa has already admitted that she harboured feelings for him in the past.

In Volume 8 of Gal Gohan, Nagisa’s narrative comes to a bit of a head on a drunken teachers’ night out, at which both she and Yabe are in attendance, along with a number of other faculty members. Nagisa ends up getting absolutely trolleyed — which one of her female colleagues notes is very much out of character for her, based on her previous experience with her on “girls’ nights out” — and becoming rather more amorous with Yabe than he is comfortable with.

Ultimately, the pair of them end up in a bathroom stall, that oh-so-romantic venue beloved of many hentai manga and anime — and Nagisa is clearly very much Up For It, so to speak. Taiyou reflects this with some exceedingly provocative images of Nagisa taking a drink of water from the bottle Yabe provides — but Yabe, of course, is having none of it, and does his best to escape at the first available opportunity.

Following this, we see a rare moment of genuine, raw emotional vulnerability from one of the characters in Gal Gohan: Nagisa locks herself in the stall to “get her face back to normal”, ostensibly from embarrassment, but it’s probably fair to say there would be a few tears, too.

Elsewhere in Volume 8, we see another instance of something that has rarely occurred in Gal Gohan to date: Miku getting unwanted attention due to her identity as a gal. In the chapter in question, Miku has taken on a part-time job in a restaurant in Shinjuku, and Yabe happens to run into her while she’s on the clock. During that time, he witnesses her not only being harassed by someone on the street, but also customers in the restaurant talking about her behind her back, making assumptions that she’s “easy” — all simply because of her appearance.

Of course, at this point, we can be pretty sure that Miku is a virgin — and she quite happily confirms this in a later chapter when all her friends are pondering if Yabe might also be a virgin — and thus that she is anything but easy. Even if she did have sexual experience, however, it wouldn’t matter; it’s abundantly clear after eight volumes of saucy romance that her feelings for Yabe are genuine, and she’s not attempting to deal with them by sleeping around. She wants him to be the one; no-one else will do.

Yabe, of course, is incensed by the way people are treating Miku, since he, too, knows more about her than is probably decent for a teacher to know.

“I’m sure you’re just doing your job,” Yabe says, “but I don’t like the way they’re talking about you. I don’t want people giving my student sketchy looks!”

That last sentence is obviously tacked on for a sense of professionalism — the bold, italic print in which it’s presented in the manga makes it clear that Yabe is placing particular, deliberate emphasis on it — but Yabe’s true feelings are very obvious. He holds Miku in high regard — even if, in their current respective positions, he’s not in a position to take things any further — and does not wish to see her reputation dragged through the mud for something as shallow as her appearance. And, by this point in their relationship, they can both be very open and honest with one another — so he says so.

Meanwhile, Fujiwara gets her own opportunity to work some things out in this volume, as she attends a shrine at the new year with Yabe — without Miku. She dresses up specially for the occasion, putting on heels, thigh-highs and a short skirt — but is promptly reminded that despite a few vaguely steamy encounters in the past, Yabe has never looked at her in that way, and thus she need not have bothered.

However, that doesn’t stop the pair of them continuing to forge a strong connection with one another; after Fujiwara destroys her first new year’s wish out of embarrassment — it was the selfish but entirely understandable wish to remain by Yabe’s side — the pair of them end up making the exact same wish: for Fujiwara’s future success in her upcoming college entrance exams. Fujiwara ends up seeming more happy about this than anything more physically intimate, because it means that Yabe is thinking about her and wishing her well. On some level, that’s all she wants.

Her feelings are understandable. As we’ve seen in previous volumes, Fujiwara perpetually has a lot on her plate, both in terms of school council responsibilities and taking care of her siblings. One gets the distinct impression that a lot of her hard work goes unappreciated — or at least is not commented on — so for someone to actually give her positive attention and wish her all the best is a big deal for her. One could perhaps argue that this is maybe a flimsy basis on which to fall in love with someone — and perhaps it is — but, despite her maturity, Fujiwara is still a teenage girl, after all. We have to allow her some youthful fancies.

Gal Gohan’s eighth volume concludes with Miku managing to be featured in a magazine called MEGG, a parody of the real-life gal fashion magazine EGG. With MEGG seemingly being a rather Cosmo-style publication, Miku takes the opportunity to quiz Yabe on a number of things that would determine whether or not he would make an ideal gal’s boyfriend. He scores well — but as part of the process (and before she gets into the really fruity questions about sex) she admits that while being a gal is important to her, she would put it aside if he indicated that he wanted her to, or that he would find her more attractive if she did.

There’s a delightful moment of silent, sexual tension between the pair of them as Miku all but demands Yabe pay attention to the amount of effort she makes with her appearance. She’s still not sure if he even likes the gal thing — but after a moment’s awkwardness, the pair of them get into another cooking lesson, during which Yabe makes it clear that he wants to encourage Miku to be what she wants to be, not what she thinks he wants her to be. And that, of course, is an incredibly attractive trait.

“I think I can be myself because I feel so much love for Yabecchi,” muses Miku. “I think I’m cutest as a gal, so I don’t plan on quitting. But let me say this: if you ever told me to stop, I’d consider it. Like, if you said you prefer black hair…”

She trails off, but the meaning is clear. And that’s where we leave things for this volume. Only two more to go! Do we reckon Miku will win out in the end…?

Gal Gohan volume 8 is available in paperback from Amazon. You can also find alternative retailers and links to digital storefronts via publisher Seven Seas’ website.

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