is a Japanese

romantic comedy Romantic comedy (also known as romcom or rom-com) is a subgenre of comedy and slice of life fiction, focusing on lighthearted, humorous plot lines centered on romantic ideas, such as how true love is able to surmount most obstacles. In a typica ...

manga series written and illustrated by

Aya Nakahara is a Japanese manga artist. She won the 49th Shogakukan Manga Award for shōjo manga for ''Lovely Complex'' ''Love Com'', a romance manga about a tall high school girl who falls in love with a short guy. Works * ''Haru to Kuuki Nichiyobi' ...

. It was serialized in

Shueisha (lit. "Gathering of Intellect Publishing Co., Ltd.") is a Japanese company headquartered in Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. The company was established in 1925 as the entertainment-related publishing division of Japanese publisher Shogakukan. The foll ...

's ''josei'' manga magazine ''

You In Modern English, ''you'' is the second-person pronoun. It is grammatically plural, and was historically used only for the dative case, but in most modern dialects is used for all cases and numbers. History ''You'' comes from the Proto- ...

'' from April 2013 to August 2016, with its chapters collected into ten ''

tankōbon is the Japanese term for a book that is not part of an anthology or corpus. In modern Japanese, the term is most often used in reference to individual volumes of a manga series: most series first appear as individual chapters in a weekly or ...

'' volumes. A sequel series, titled ''Dame na Watashi ni Koishite Kudasai R'', was serialized in the same magazine from October 2016 to October 2018, and was compiled into six volumes. A

Japanese television drama , also called , are television programs that are a staple of Japanese television and are broadcast daily. All major TV networks in Japan produce a variety of drama series including romance, comedy, detective stories, horror, jidaigeki, thrill ...

adaptation, officially titled ''Please Love Me!'' (stylized as ''PLEASE LOVE ME!'') in English, was broadcast on TBS from January 12, 2016, to March 15, 2016.

Plot

Michiko Shibata is a woman who is thirty years old, and yet she has no job, no money, and no real boyfriend. She was let go by her former employment after it went bankrupt. She meets her former supervisor Ayumu Kurosawa, who offers Michiko a job at his cafe "Himawari" until she gets back on her feet. With Ayumu's help, Michiko slowly gets her life back on track.

Characters

; :A 29-year-old woman who loses her job and starts working for her former supervisor in his café until she finds another job. She is played by

Kyoko Fukada is a very common feminine Japanese given name. Not to be confused with Kiyoko. Possible writings The final syllable "ko" is typically written with the kanji character for child, 子. It is a common suffix to female names in Japan. The first s ...

in the live-action drama. ; :Michiko's former supervisor and now current employer at the Himawari cafe. He used to be a former gangster and seems formidable, but he takes it upon himself to look after those who are in trouble, such as Michiko. He is played by

Dean Fujioka , better known as , is a Japanese actor, singer-songwriter, musician, model and film director. He is a talent of Amuse, Inc. Biography Dean Fujioka was born in Sukagawa, Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. Moving with his family, he grew up in Kamagaya, ...

in the live-action drama. ; :Michiko's colleague at her new place of employment. He is her first real boyfriend, and is younger than her. He is played by

Shohei Miura is a Japanese actor and fashion model. He belongs to the talent agency Burning Production. Career In 2007, Miura joined the 20th Junon Superboy Contest, and won the Photogenic Award as well as the Ideal Lover Award. Before he won these awards ...

in the live-action drama.

Publication

Written and illustrated by

, ''Dame na Watashi ni Koishite Kudasai'' was serialized in

's ''

'' magazine from April 15, 2013, to August 12, 2016. Ten ''

'' volumes have been released from August 2013 to November 2016. The series has been licensed in France by Delcourt under the title ''Please love me !''. A sequel series, titled ''Dame na Watashi ni Koishite Kudasai R'', was serialized in the same magazine from October 15, 2016, to October 15, 2018. Six ''tankōbon'' volumes have been released from February 2017 to November 2018.

''Dame na Watashi ni Koishite Kudasai''

''Dame na Watashi ni Koishite Kudasai R''

Reception

Volume 4 reached the 16th place on the weekly

Oricon , established in 1999, is the holding company at the head of a Japanese corporate group that supplies statistics and information on music and the music industry in Japan and Western music. It started as, which was founded by Sōkō Koike in ...

manga charts and, as of August 31, 2014, had sold 56,282 copies; volume 5 reached the 43rd place and, as of January 4, 2015, had sold 69,150 copies; volume 6 reached the 25th place and, as of April 26, 2015, had sold 34,567 copies.

References

External links

''Dame na Watashi ni Koishite Kudasai''
on you.shueisha.co.jp * {{You (Japanese magazine) 2016 Japanese television series debuts 2016 Japanese television series endings Japanese television dramas based on manga Josei manga Manga adapted into television series Romantic comedy anime and manga Shueisha manga TBS Television (Japan) dramas