Nana is the story of two women who share the same first name and end up living together in an apartment in Tokyo. One of them, Nana Osaki, is a punk and lead singer of the band Blast who has come to Tokyo to promote the band. The other, Nana Komatsu, is a bubbly girl nicknamed Hachi. The two are polar opposites, and yet are close friends.
Highlights
This volume covers the emotional rollercoaster that is Nana Komatsu’s life as she finds a new job and tries to find a new boyfriend amongst the other men in her life. Meanwhile we learn more about Nana Osaki’s life before coming to Tokyo and her connection to the immensely popular band of Trapnest. We also learn of another Blast member’s connection to Trapnest as well. An odd but funny part near the end of the volume is that two of the side characters talk with other side characters in a minor fourth wall breaking parts that review everything that has happened up till that point. It doesn’t have any bearing on the story but was still funny to watch.
Overall
For a romance anime, I really enjoyed this series. The characters are funny and the music is great. What else I loved was that, while normally I’m able to know how a story is going to advance before hand, I was surprised at how certain events panned out. The dialog of some characters was great. One example is from one character who mentions being a woman, who looks like the lead singer of Trapnest. It was just so out there and casual that I didn’t even see it coming.
A word of warning would be that this Box Set is not for anyone under the age of 18. Mainly being that there is a lot of drinking by the main characters and smoking by several other characters. While this is normally a given, it’s always good to have a heads up so you don’t buy this for anyone who isn’t old enough.
ComicsOnline gives Nana Box Set 2, 4 out of 5 guitar picks
