The Meaning of Love | Kaguya-Sama: Love is War

Kaguya-Sama: Love is War is a brilliant take on young love by Aka Akasaka. Relating to the youth who rely on completely unrealistic and flawed sources to get ideas on a topic deemed taboo yet so celebrated by society, Romance.

What even is True Love?

Before I dive deeper into how he delivers a seemingly real yet magical story, let me begin by justifying the title to this blog. This Manga/Anime shows us what true love is, and how you deem it that "perfect" title, from the very naive eyes of high schoolers. From what I understood, "True Love" is when you subconciously become a better person when in presence of your beloved. Of course, they clearly show that when an external force drives you to change, it is just a mask, but when you truly love a person, you change by yourself, without even properly knowing it. This, this simple yet powerful fact dictates what love is true, so now that we understand the "What", lets understand the "How".

How do you make the audience understand?

Simply giving your thoughts is not enough, you need to arrive at the answer with your audience, step by step. The protagonist is the audience's window into the show, and we are quickly introduced to the leading pair of the show, Miyuki Shirogane and Kaguya Shinomiya, the president and vice president of Shouchin Academy, a high ranking school in Japan, filled with children of the most important people of the country. Kaguya Shinomiya is the daughter of the head of Shinomiya corporation, making her extremely rich. However, she is also very talented and highly intelligent, only second to Miyuki Shirogane in terms of grades, who comes from a humble background but is hardworking and simply works his ass off to achieve his goals.

Although the ideas it ultimately conveys are quite deep, the show itself is a romantic comedy, starting us off with the thought that each relationship has a power dynamic, and the one who confesses first is lower in heirarchy for the duration of the relationship, losing the ultimate game... no, war of love. This important realization, is the central conflict of the show. Both Shinomiya and Shirogane like each other but refuse to declare their love first, planning strategies and playing mental chess to get the other person to admit it.

We see the cold Shinomiya, going to great lengths such as planting romantic movie tickets at their council member, Fujiwara's house, just so that she can offer them to these two since her family wouldn't allow her to see it, in hopes of backing up President Shirogane into a corner to finally prove that he is the one who wants to actually go out with her. However, as the story progresses, we see her character evolve, becoming warmer and helping out another fellow council member, Ishigami, with his grades. She also goes from extensively planning to going with the flow, even dropping hints like her hands are cold for shirogane to offer to warm them up with his.

We also see Shirogane become a hollistic person, by not only focusing on his grades but also improving his skills in sports like volleyball, and singing and dancing. Moreover Shirogane becomes friends with women, going to them for training and advice in areas where he lacks skill.

Why should we care?

The saying, "You are what you eat", can also be interpreted on a mental level, meaning you become more like what you consume, healthy food keeps your body healthy and likewise healthy media keeps your mind healthy. On top of being funny, this series implicitly teaches us important life lessons which I am going try to illustrate in the upcoming paragraphs.

Starting off with the most obvious character, Yu Ishigami, initially a shy and reserved person, who barely attends council meetings and runs away to his home at the slightest misunderstanding, turns into a confident and knowledgable version of himself who even gets the girl he likes to fall in love with him, all by taking one step outside his comfort zone and joining the cheerleading squad. Ishigami is rejected by the society due to a mistake he made in the past but reclaims his life back with the help of his friends, ultimately teaching us what Irrfan Khan taught us with "Gadi bahar nikalo, take your chance baby".

Miko Iino, who is the head of the disciplinary committee and later part of the student council progresses from someone who lives their life by the rulebook, not letting themself or even others enjoy life, start to go easy on others and develop compassion for people who might not be completely in the right. I personally agree with the author here that she still does care about the rules and doesn't let people break it willy nilly but adapts according to the situation and takes every rule at what its worth, Rules are not supposed to dictate your entire life but are also not supposed to be broken all the time, A balance in life between discipline and fun is needed to live a happy life.

The biggest lessons come from our protagonists, it might be obvious to us that love is in fact, not war, and there is no winner or loser in love. Or that a healthy relationship is where you work hard together, lean on each other when tired and support each other to grow in life, but it is definitely not obvious, at least to me, as to what qualifies as love, but we are very beautifully shown different kinds of love in the show. Let's begin with the simplest, Kashiwagi and her boyfriend, We are shown a guy who is nervous and not confident in himself, seeking advice from the president, ultimately take the plunge and ask out a girl he finds attractive, after which they slowly get to know each other and bond over their shared interests after the honeymoon period fades away. This is great because it shows the most realistic kind of love, one where your initial confession is mostly arbitrary and love develops gradually. There is no guarantee that there will be true love, you will encounter rocky roads in this journey and your love will be continuosly tested as you and your partner change and progress through life. Then there is Ishigami and Tsubame, where ishigami finds positive changes in his life when tsubame is around, he accidentally proposes to her but she takes time to understand him better instead of rejecting him outright. They go on a few dates but ultimately don't end up together, which showcases another aspect of love, mutualilty, uni-directional love will not work despite its strength. Ultimately, Shirogane and Shinomiya become a great example of true love being simple, no schemes, no games, just pure care and respect. You should choose a partner whom you would deem worthy to be your opponent because then only you will be able to appreciate their qualities and be able to examine your flaws.

Conclusion

Kaguya-sama: Love is War, is a solid 8/10 show, which most youth would find relatable and hilarious, although the show starts of a little slow, if you make it past the first few episodes you would find it heartwarming and sufficiently interesting to keep coming back for more. You can watch it on Crunchyroll at the moment but it might be available on other platforms like Prime Video and Netflix depending upon region.