Bocchi the Rock Chapter 76 Review - Anxious Heart to Heart
Written by Rei Caldombra 5/13/2024 Video Version: https://youtu.be/m7vICQO29ok
Next Bocchi the Rock Chapter review: https://www.blogunderalog.com/blog-collection/bocchi-the-rock-manga-chapter-77-review-hard-work-and-memories
Rei Caldombra here for the first of my reviews of Bocchi the Rock’s manga chapters. After watching and absolutely loving the anime, I caught up with the manga starting from where the anime left off. I don’t think enough people who enjoyed Bocchi the Rock’s anime have picked up the manga. The anime does have many standout aspects that elevate the manga, but the manga is still extremely good and has the core of what makes Bocchi the rock great. Which is not the music or visual gags, it’s the great comedic writing and huge cast of endearing characters. I understand wanting to wait until the second season so everything is new alongside the adaptation additions, but I really recommend reading the manga. I am not going to go at length about my series wide thoughts so I can focus on the chapter and I may do a whole post on the series as a whole or specifically on the anime. My short version thoughts are that the series is excellent on every front, the anime is legit a 10/10, Nijika is best girl of Kessoku Band, Seika is the waifu, Hiroi is hilarious and the adult characters as a whole are just as great as the band members and a big reason why this series stands above so many others. I’m actually wearing my official Kessoku Band t-shirt as I’m writing this.
I’ll explain some relevant important details for anyone who hasn’t kept up with the manga. Kessoku Band is now signed with a music label, Stray Beat. There are two new major characters that have been introduced. Miyako is an employee at Stray Beat who manages things with the band, such as helping them with their official activities. She is the only employee at Stray Beat we know of currently and is effectively Kessoku Band’s manager. She is not in this chapter, but she is very relevant for Kessoku Band now that they are signed. Ame is a composer for the band Klimt’s Night, another band under Stray Beat. It’s a duo band where Ame composes under an alias with little public info about her, and the other member does the performing. They are a decently popular group, with them even having a song in an anime, which is a fun nod to how that basically Eliza’s dream. I really hope the 2nd season of the anime takes advantage of this and has either the opening or ending done by Sick Hack. They first met Ame in chapter 70 when they were going to a meeting with Stray Beat. She suffers from severe social anxiety and is a major focus of this chapter.
The chapter starts with the debut single that they have been working hard on being released. In chapter 73 we saw them recording the music video for it with their unique director Hal-san. This is Kessoku Band’s first professionally made single and music video. Bocchi goes into her usual delusions of grandeur from a successful endeavor, where she is thinking about how the single is topping the charts and pushing her into stardom. We get a funny callback to the 3 party bros they met at the beach of Enoshima that made Bocchi pop like a balloon. The others who are actually in reality look at the community reactions.
There are lots of positive comments online, as well as from people they know. The exceptions are a useless drinking post from our resident drunk Hiroi and a fan who is afraid that Kessoku Band will get popular and change. There are always those people who are doom and gloom about their favorite creators being successful, which is a toxic way of being a fan and just brings unwelcome negativity. Thankfully the girls aren’t hampered by this comment. Everyone is happy about the positive reactions and solid views, but not thrilled that it did not do much better than their other songs. It can seem like they are making a good situation negative, as their single doing well is great, but when you put extra effort into something you will naturally desire better results. Getting better results helps motivate you to continue putting in the additional effort. Thankfully this is not getting the band down too much as far as we can see. Ryo is acting cocky and self-absorbed per usual, but deep down she worries about it and Nijika knows this. Nijika is a bit down that it didn’t surpass their previous work, but being the good leader she is, she brings the focus back on this still being good and more reason to continue working hard.
Back to Bocchi, she is mulling over the average success and wondering what she could do to help. We return to the recurring point of whether Bocchi should leverage her Guitar Hero account (the one she has been doing Youtube music covers on) to bring more attention to the band.
The choice is not about if it would work, it’s about if Bocchi really wants that for herself. And for right now she doesn’t, but we’ll get to why in a bit. She considers doing stealth promotions using her account instead, but her paranoid delusions appear and make her afraid that she would get caught. Which would get her canceled for stealth marketing her own music. Thankfully she has a great dad who would be proud of her cancellation and support her.
This train of thought is interrupted by a DM from Ame, who has figured out Bocchi is Guitar Hero. This chapter does a great job of reminding us where Bocchi was at the start of the series and how much she has grown. It also uses this knowledge to give us a deeper look at Ame.
Both of their origins are pretty similar. Ame and Bocchi both started out self-taught, uploading their music online and garnering a solid following. Where they diverged is how their online personas tie into their professional careers. Ame seems to have tied her online person to her professional life, presenting as the same person. While Bocchi is the opposite, who keeps them entirely separate.
Ame presses Bocchi on why it is that she keeps it a secret, and we get a great explanation from Bocchi about why this is.
We saw from the beginning that Bocchi cannot play as well in a group as she can on her own. So initially it was about not disappointing her Guitar Hero fans. Once she got properly invested in the band and got acquainted with the band mates, she decided that she will continue keeping it separate so the band can grow naturally as a unit and be what it wants to be. She also wants this to be her opportunity to properly grow as her true self, Gotoh Hitori. This is a sign of how much she has gained a proper sense of self, where she does not want to tie herself down to her a persona that was full of lies and attempts to be conventionally popular. She wants the band to be about her and her bandmates, quirks and flaws included. This ties in with how Ryo taught her to do what she truly wants to do rather than what she thinks is the “best” thing to do. From the standpoint of being optimal, she should use Guitar Hero to get them more attention. But that is not what she really wants deep down, and now she knows that she should be her true self. Once she has improved at being a guitarist for a band, and both her and Kessoku Band has grown to what they truly wants to be, then she will reveal it. She wants to surpass Guitar Hero both in skill and as a person.
After hearing this, Ame gives her backstory. It turns out that Ame has been a fan of Guitar Hero since Bocchi first started. She was there through the cringe aspects of the account (such as Bocchi leaving weird false comments about being popular and having girlfriends, which we knew of beforehand) and the moments where she was getting hate and criticism (which is new information to us). But despite these issues she kept at it. This had a huge impact on Ame.
Like Bocchi, she struggles to have the to strike up a conversation and accurately verbalize her feelings, but when it really counts, she is able to as we see here.
Ame can serve as a reflection of Bocchi’s past self. She is not exactly the same but is suffering from many of the same issues Bocchi has. She struggles with being around people, has very bad negative self-talk, and struggles to communicate directly. And because of what Bocchi has done as Guitar Hero and what she has learned from meeting her in person, Ame has idolized Bocchi. Bocchi continuing to do her content despite her issues gave her comfort in continuing with music through her own problems. We have seen Bocchi grow from someone who needed a box over her head to be on stage to being able to do it uncovered. She thought she would not be able to make friends or be in a band, but now she is. Bocchi was able to do this in large part to the support of the Kessoku Band members. They supported her through her struggles to improve. Ame was able to get support from Bocchi’s efforts online in the past, then gets motivated by her again when she learns that Bocchi is a fellow recluse who was able to improve. It definitely means a lot to Bocchi to see how she has been able to help someone push forward, like how Kessoku Band pushed her forward. This part shows how much meaning Guitar Hero has outside of just an outlet for Bocchi. It may have its issues of being a false presentation of who she is, but it was able to have a positive impact on someone. This also gives Bocchi a renewed sense of purpose and reminds her of the positive impact she can have despite her problems. She may have flaws, especially before Kessoku Band, but even then, she was able to help Ame continue doing her music and become successful.
The most important thing for the introduction of another anxiety ridden character is that she feels sufficiently different from Bocchi so we do not feel like we are only retreading on old territory but also enough similarities that she can serve as a point of comparison of Bocchi. Being different is also important for the portrayal of anxiety, as anxiety and people’s behaviors while suffering from it come in many shapes and forms. I do not want social anxiety to feel like an oversimplified condition that is used just for a character quirk for laughs and endearment. Thankfully it has been done very well through Bocchi and continues to be done well here. I have struggled a lot with social anxiety and negative self-talk. I am much better now, but in High School especially it was really bad. One thing that I’ve done and still do we see in this chapter is Ame working up the courage to send the DM, but not mustering up enough courage to actually see and acknowledge the response until hours later. “She just like me fr fr” jokes aside, this series does a great job of showcasing the true struggles of social anxiety and showing how people can grow and have an impact despite them. While simultaneously also using it for great jokes without any detriment to the messages.
After Ame cuts of the call, we see her happy about how she was able to talk to Bocchi but falls into despair over how awkward she was. They really are two anxious peas in a pod. The chapter closes out with Bocchi doing a minor bit of self-promotion in the opposite direction, getting a big head over Ame praising her as Guitar Hero. This leads to a great reality check joke as the character has no idea who Guitar Hero is.
This was a really great chapter! I like Ame as a character and am glad to have gotten more introspection from Bocchi. I appreciate the deep dive into social anxiety we got here, with the comparison and relatability between Bocchi and Ame. Her social anxiety is at its best when it is not used just for comedy, but also to make her a genuinely relatable and dynamic character. If you are interested in keeping up with the Bocchi the Rock manga, please follow for future posts. I love this series and intend to keep doing reviews for each chapter going forward. Thank you for reading, and please support Bocchi the Rock with more than just your words if you can! The manga volumes have started to be officially translated into English and are published by Yen Press. Currently the first two are out and as of now are being released every 3 or so months. This is what I’ve been waiting for so I can go through the early parts of the story in the manga. Please consider getting the manga and merch to officially support Bocchi the Rock and thanks again!
My Patreon: patreon.com/ReiCaldombra
Next Bocchi the Rock Chapter review: https://www.blogunderalog.com/blog-collection/bocchi-the-rock-manga-chapter-77-review-hard-work-and-memories
