Trigger warning: sexual violence & domestic abuse

Most relationships fizzle out with time. Beyond the first greetings shared between you and a stranger, their place in your future is left largely to chance. Fate, the stars, or whatever you want to call it, has predestined our affinities with one another. Yet, this does not stop us from forging new connections. Ai Yazawa’s Nana is a testament to this phenomenon: the most beautiful of stories still start with the simplest ‘hello’. 

“Hey Nana…” 

“Hey, Hachi…”

Two girls, two stories and an inexplicable, undeniable sapphic tension. Yazawa utilises the manga format for her work — similar to visual novels or comics — both drawing and writing to design the staple Japanese series. Perhaps the most iconic of scenes is the first meeting of our protagonists, Nana and Hachi, on a stranded one-way train to Tokyo. This brief, fleeting encounter makes way for the first, weighty message of the manga: people need to be given a chance. In today’s society, where we are absorbed by screens rather than conversation, the casual first chat between Nana and Hachi in early 2000s Japan is perfectly nostalgic, even if Nana has her earphones wedged in for the first part. Nana clues us in to the stark disparities between herself and her seatmate; forgetting the stark clash in personalities and philosophies, even their dress senses appear pointedly different from one another. Hachi ties neatly with the coquette, girlish aesthetic, whereas Nana adorns Vivienne Westwood jewelry over her punk-gothic style. Though Yazawa dedicates only a small portion of the second volume to their initial encounter, it is implied that this meeting is not the last. So, when both conveniently move into apartment 707 in a dingy Tokyo neighbourhood, you know their bond has become inseparable.

Hachi (left) and Nana (right) on the iconic 7th volume cover. Incidentally, Nana means ‘7’ in Japanese… You can probably guess why this is the most sought after copy of the series.

‘Hey Nana, do you remember the time we first met? I believe it was fated for us to become good friends. I figured that it’s part of our destinies, so smile about it.’¹ 

Up until the end of the third chapter, readers are left with the impression that they are following Nana and Hachi’s present lives. Later, they will learn this is not the case; I shall return to this momentarily. The first volume, comprising two chapters, serve as dual prologues of the girls’ lives prior to their Tokyo moves. Hachi makes the capital-city move after scraping her money together for two years, seeking to move in with her boyfriend, Shouji. Nana, on the other hand, chases her not-so-far fetched music dream to make it big with her band Blast. Her story initially appears as more fraught  than Hachi’s, with the scales of her love for soon-to-be ex Ren and musical ambition proving a significant burden to the young protagonist. Unlike Hachi, who only yearns to be in the embrace of her college boyfriend, Nana rejects the choice to accompany Ren to Tokyo, blatantly stating that she ‘fears being his housewife.’ For each of them, love is definitive in their original perceptions of Tokyo: however, different motives power them towards the bustling city. In this way, Ai Yazawa takes us to Tokyo through the eyes of two dreamers, letting the reader in on Hachi and Nana’s independent flaws and circumstances until their fateful meeting. 

This is exactly how Yazawa reveals the extent of her craft, as the reader slowly understands the distorted timeline of the series. Indeed, the manga is deliberately framed as one large flashback, occasionally ‘voiced over’, so to speak, by Hachi, who addresses Nana with several yearning, heartfelt questions. You are left with the impression that something has befallen Nana, especially when Hachi expresses that she is willing to wait five, ten, twenty or even more years for her to return. Eventually, you discover that, by this point in the narrative, Nana has vanished without a trace. Nobody knows where she went or when she will come back. In the absence of her beloved roommate, Hachi calls out to her repeatedly but receives no response,  and so takes it upon herself to reflect on their time together in hope that someday Nana will return to her.

Most of the story revolves around Hachi’s time with Nana, of course, but also encircles Nana’s Blast bandmates and Trapnest, the star-studded group where Nana’s ex-lover Ren is a guitarist. Slowly but surely, with Hachi’s occasional narration, an incredibly raw, jagged yet somehow fervent story emerges between the pages. Nana soars, rekindling her love with Ren while dominating Japan’s music charts with Blast. Meanwhile, Hachi lacks ambitions beyond finding her soulmate, which causes her to fall apart several times. First, Shouji cheats on her with his co-worker Sachiko. This is a grievous wound to Hachi, whose fear of Shouji’s infidelity likely stems from her own involvement with a married man during her prologue in the story. The existence of ‘another girl’ is light-heartedly joked about several times by Hachi even prior to Shouji and Sachiko’s meeting, suggesting the long-term insecurities she felt as a result of her own adultery. But Hachi rightfully pushes him out. Unfortunately, when she eventually leaves Shouji, she finds herself adrift and fully vulnerable, and is soon drawn into a destructive relationship with the abusive Trapnest member Takumi, an acquaintance of Nana’s. 

Takumi takes full advantage of Hachi’s idolisation of him. As one of Trapnest’s — and especially Takumi’s — biggest fans, hence why Nana introduces them, she is used for passionate sex that is only met with emotionless indifference. The relationship starts as a clear karmic mirror to Hachi’s affair with the nameless married man at the manga’s beginning. However, the parallel is obvious for everyone except Hachi, and she repeats her mistake. Even when she finally finds her placid tranquility with her later boyfriend Nobu, one of Nana’s bandmates, Takumi rapes her in rage, causing her to fall pregnant. She chooses to carry the child despite Nobu’s pleas, thus ending their relationship and trapping her with her abuser. Yazawa chooses to present the child in this way: not as a new life, but a set of old chains. Even Nana cannot bear to see Hachi stay with her abuser, leading her to flee their shared apartment. 

Even after having read Nana several times myself, it is difficult to ascertain what made Nana abandon Hachi at such a crucial moment. Part of it is certainly the repugnant malice that oozes from Takumi and Nana’s disappointment in Hachi’s blindness to this. Perhaps it is even guilt for having introduced them in the first place, even if their paths were bound to cross eventually. Another trigger for Nana’s flight certainly stems from her immature, possessive habits towards Hachi, which she later admits to. On a deeper level, I believe Nana’s actions arise out of jealousy. The core of Nana is the intrinsic tie between the two Nanas. Confusingly enough, the real name of romance-obsessed ‘Hachi’ I have been referring to is ‘Nana Komatsu’, whilst the titular Nana is Nana Osaki, the Blast star and focus of it all. Partially for ease and partially for character depth, Yazawa has Nana Osaki nicknamed Nana Komatsu as ‘Hachi’, or ‘eight’ in Japanese. Likely a pun to make their names more memorable. However, Yazawa has another reason for selecting ‘Hachi’, short for ‘Hachiko’, as Komatsu’s new name: it is also an outright reference to the famous Japanese folk tale ‘Hachiko’,  a loyal dog who sat outside a train station every day of its life, dying whilst waiting for its owner to return. Despite Nana’s more than occasional mistreatment of Hachi and her subsequent disappearance, Nana Komatsu stays dedicated to preserving the memory of her  flawed friend in a flawless light. Thus, as the story progresses, the nickname ‘Hachi’ becomes an irremovable testament to Nana Komatsu’s unwavering dedication to Nana Osaki, a loyalty that stands true unconditionally. They share many romantic moments in the manga, even sharing a fleeting kiss. From Hachi’s relentless pursuit of Nana to Nana’s extreme desire to protect or even ‘collar’ Hachi, as the former puts it, the bond shared is easily interpretable as one held by lovers. Yazawa certainly points to it:

‘Hey Nana, if you and I were lovers, would we have been able to fill the emptiness by holding each other?’² 

If you had been a man, Nana, we could've lived a perfect love.³ 

Through Hachi’s admissions, the story transforms into one of compulsory heterosexuality; is Hachi aware of her deep-rooted feelings for Nana? Is it love? Does Nana stay with Ren to bury her feelings for Hachi? After all, In Hachi’s sparkling memories of Nana, Nana never once loses her shine, even as Hachi describes the singer’s lowest and repulsive moments.The difficulty of reviewing this manga is that it contains far more depth than other literary formats; it forgoes lengthy prose in favour of coupling shorter quotes with striking artwork. Half, if not more, of Nana’s tale is found in its artwork. The marked, piercing expressions of the characters do more of the storytelling than words ever could. It is difficult to forget Nana’s piercing look when Takumi forcefully announces his and Hachi's marriage.

The scene in Chapter 28 where Takumi asserts his control over Hachi to Nana.

But Nana is more than a story of love’s twists and tales. Beyond our two protagonists, other characters are used by Yazawa to echo Japan’s unscrupulous youth subculture. None of the characters are perfect, and some are barely even ‘good’. Nana’s turbulent relationship with Ren is marked by toxic possession and co-dependency. Shin, the fifteen year old member of Blast, sells his body to older women, frequenting Japan’s disturbing ‘love-hotels’ to earn pocket-change, his fragile emotionality acting as a thinly-veiled criticism of children’s vulnerability under Japan’s ‘13 is consent’⁴ law. Enabled by her bandmates Yasu and Nobu, Reira — the stellar, undeniably beautiful singer of Trapnest and Nana’s foil — is a groomer, prostituting Shin to supposedly fill the void of real affection she lacks as an idol. The borderline of low morality and blatant illegality is often leapt over by the cast, making you criticise, hate and even loathe them. But Yazawa prevails in sympathies: aside from the clearly villainised Takumi, you can't help but relate to most characters.

Most of this critical information is hidden behind the image of Nana that has been popularised online. Without having read the manga  or watched the anime, your impression would likely be skewed into believing Nana is an idealistic lesbian romcom, where a coquette girl falls for a punk-goth rocker. People have been fooled by Hachi’s unreliable, romance-clouded narration of her turbulent twenties spent with Nana Osaki. Nana is possessive, resentful and sometimes downright invidious. Hachi flits between men without note of her hypersensitivity, compromising her agency more than once for less-than-mediocre partners. Their selfish actions drive the manga forward, with many of their self-inflicted problems resulting from immaturity. Even the girls’ eventual separation is born of an unwillingness to yield on their ideals.

This review, long as it is, barely captures a snippet of Yazawa’s genius. It is a generational story that refuses to pass by, a legacy that not just embeds, but scars its sentiment onto you. Rather than a story of love, Nana is a tale of unbridled emotion. It shines a bright light on our souls, refusing to dim unless we question who we are without others, and how sometimes, staying true to our own beliefs can sacrifice even the most precious of relationships.