When 30-year-old Daikichi Kawachi returns home for his grandfather's funeral he learns about the existence of Rin Kaga, his grandfather's illegitimate six-year-old daughter by an unknown mother. The girl is an embarrassment to all his relatives and is treated like an outcast.
Annoyed by their attitudes, Daikichi decides to take care of Rin himself, even though he is single and has no experience in raising a child. As Rin becomes part of his life, Daikichi experiences the hardships of being a single parent.
Usagi drop comes across as a manga I would want to read, I love interpersonal drama. Saw a few clips of the anime on tiktok, it seemed wholesome and heartwarming.
But wait
Ten years later, Rin is a high school student and the remainder of the series focuses on her trying to figure out how to deal with her feelings for Kouki, and her decision for a career. Rin discovers that she is not actually related to Daikichi by blood, and the series ends with Rin wanting to have a child with Daikichi.
Why are they like this??
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Did you steal this from /r/hobbydrama?
What is "usagi drop"?
Usagi drop, also known as bunny drop, is a manga series which ran from 2005 to 2011. The premise is that the mangas protagonist, Daikichi Kawachi, returns home to attend his grandfathers funeral where he meets a 6 year old girl named Rin. He then discovers Rin is the illegitimate daughter of his grandfather, and decides to raise her himself after his family disowns her. In the vein of similar manga such as sweetness and lightning, the manga is a slice of life about single fatherhood and all that comes with. There is also an anime and a live action movie based on the manga, neither of which follow the mangas ending (you'll see why very soon).
The drama:
During the mangas run Usagi Drop gained a small but dedicated following, which was helped by the anime adaption being released in 2011. Being praised for the art style, characters and story line, the manga and anime became a staple of "heart warming anime", "anime with single dads" and "slice of life" lists. (seriously look up any myanimelist lists of single dad / slice of life stories, I can guarantee you this is at least in the top 3). The relationship between Rin and Daikichi was praised for being an accurate and well written representation of fathers and daughters, and some people even recommended the manga / anime to their own dads. So what could possibly go wrong to make people go from loving to despising the story of Usagi Drop? Well.....
In 2011, volume 8 and 9 of Usagi drop were released. In them Rin, after considering why she doesn't have crushes on the guys in her school, comes to the realisation that she's in fact in love with Daikichi. She then confesses to Daikichi, who tells her that if she's still in love with him after graduating high school he'll consider a relationship. And the manga ends with Rin, now a high school graduate who hasn't fallen for anyone else. Oh yeah, and it's revealed Rin was never biologically related to Daikichi, so the relationship is toes legal now! And the manga ends with Rin thinking about having Daikichi's children.
yeah.
So as you imagine people were PISSED with the ending, and the fandom was divided. On one hand there were people who genuinely liked the ending and defended it, claiming the relationship was totally fine and legal (Did I mention Daikichi was been raising Rin as a father figure from SIX YEARS OLD). On the other hand were people who hated the ending with every fibre of their being, claiming the twist turned what was a heart-warming story of a father and daughter into the plot of a bad hentai out of nowhere, with no foreshadowing or implication that Rin and Daikichi's relationship was anything other than strictly parental.
So while this shitshow was happening on all corners of the internet, a very important question was asked: would the anime adaption follow the ending? Thankfully as mentioned above neither adaptions followed the mangas ending, instead finishing before the timeskip. Again this split the fandom as many fans claimed the anime ending was the true ending, with others refusing to acknowledge the mangas ending or just the manga in general. ("there is no manga" became quite a popular slogan amongst the fandom at this time; just look at the comments on this video). Other fans, even those who disliked the ending, claimed ignoring the mangas ending was dramatic and stupid no matter how bad it was. Eventually this drama did die down after the manga and anime ended, with no new content to draw in fans aside from the movie. However, the ending of Usagi drop is still brought up and discussed in (mostly discussions centre around how bad it was).
The aftermath:
I think it's fair to say that Usagi Drops ending destroyed the mangas reputation. While the anime is still fondly remembered and recommended it's rare now to find anyone who recommends the manga, and even rarer to find people recommending or praising those final volumes. The ending is still infamous in anime and manga history, and it still gets referenced as being one of the worst endings to a story in manga and anime history. The director of the anime even said he had "mixed feelings" on the ending, which is presumably why the anime adaption never included the ending.
And that's the tale of usagi drop! I did find some other details to the story, including the mangas author either expressing regret or publicly apologising for the ending, but I couldn't find any official sources for that. I hope you liked this post, and if you want some non incest heart-warming family stories sweetness and lightening, gakuen babysitters and poco's udon world are some of my personal favourites. (I'm a fan of this genre just in case you couldn't tell lol).
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keep yourself safe
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this shitshow literally only occurred amongst super weebs on tiny forums
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Lmao actually no, hand to god
I got hella mad after I got baited into reading the synopsis by watching some innocuous scenes
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