Akane-banashi Volume 1 is about Akane who seeks to become a master Rakugoka after her father was suddenly and ceremoniously expelled from his Rakugo school while attempting the test to become a master. Akane has the talent and the drive to bring honor to her father, she just needs a master to take her under his wing.

This was an interesting title to have translated into English. I do not believe Rakugo is entirely well known in America overall, and some otaku may know of it, but it felt even further odd to put it under the Shonen Jump brand. There are no traditional action scenes, instead we have scenes of Rakugo performing on stage, sitting in front of a live audience. Rakugo is typically uses well-known stories to the Japanese in its performances as well, something the uninitiated in America would also not have the prior knowledge of upon reading this manga. The manga does a fine enough job giving context to each of the referenced stories in each performance, and the expressions of the characters do a wonderful job of showing what archetype they are presenting for a character, but given my limited knowlege of Rakugo, I didn't take to this manga as I had hoped I would.

The art is all well done, the expressions exaggerated when needed, the characterizations are well crafted, and overall screentone application was balanced. The panels were laid out in a readable manner and there were a couple of dramatic two page spreads as well. I also appreciated that Akane, the main heroine, is not overly sexualized like in a lot of Shonen manga. She is always wearing an appropriate amount of clothing and no one seems to have any sexualized thoughts about her except one person commenting that she was cute. It was nice to see this kind of female representation in a manga written for teen boys.

Unfortunately, this manga didn't quite hit home with me and I think it is really due to the focus on rakugo itself. I see quite a few people have given this glowing reviews so it may be a case of "this wasn't written for me" and that is fine! I am glad this series exists in the world and offers more variety into the shonen landscape that is often filled with buster swords and bustier women.