About:
Warning:
There will be spoilers for the manhwa series Love is an Illusion! - The Queen.
Trigger Warning: There may be references to mentions of arranged marriage, slut-shaming, violence, relationships between bosses and subordinates, classism, obsession, age gap, and implied male pregnancy, as it appears in the manhwa.
Synopsis:
Seung-ah has been tied to alpha Do-gyeom, one of his best friends and first love, for twenty years, all by choice, initially as her friend but ultimately as her secretary. Unfortunately, this has given Seung-ah a front-row seat to all of Do-gyeom's sexual conquests and escapades. Seung-ah does his best to keep his longing for Do-gyeom under wraps. His only comfort is that Do-gyeom has no intention of getting into a relationship or marrying, meaning he can always be the closest one to Do-gyeom, even when he feels he has no right to be.
He's pretty content with this arrangement until Do-gyeom, after seeing her brothers getting married and starting families, decides that she wants to start her own family, too. Suddenly, it's not enough that Seung-ah has to chase away one-night stands; now, he has to chase away the one-night stands and try to find her a worthy spouse. To his surprise, that person manifests in an unrelenting female omega, an employee of Do-gyeom, and a one-night stand. Seung-ah was willing to give Do-gyeom over to a worthy omega of the same class and power, but this was just too much for him to bear.
Unable to see his long unrequited love get married to someone beneath her, who isn't Seung-ah himself, he runs to their longtime friend Mujin, who is happy to comfort Seung-ah in any way he can.
Review:
Let me quickly get this out of the way: I love Fargo. I am extremely biased here, so, of course, the art to me is perfection. Do-gyeom is stunning, Seung-ah is adorable, and Mujin is everything I want in a man and more. I especially like how distinctly the alphas and omegas are drawn from one another. It would be so easy for Do-gyeom to look like an omega with her feminine features, but she embodies that alpha energy and looks no different while standing beside a male alpha. Same with Seung-ah. He looks right in line with all of the female omegas. It really emphasizes the importance of the secondary gender in presentation over the primary gender, which I really like to see in omegaverse titles. As always, Fargo kills it.
Beyond the art, one of the best parts about this is all the different types of love and attraction we get to see. Female and male omegas pursue a female alpha, a male alpha pursues a male omega, a female alpha pursues a male omega, etc. You get a taste of GL, BL, and het love throughout, which is awesome. Of course, the end game is het, so this can't be categorized as GL or BL, but getting to see Seung-ah with Mujin and Do-gyeom with… well, everyone is a nice change of pace from what I usually see in heterosexual romance and BL romance titles. It really highlights the best part of omegaverse, which is that sexuality is fluid.
Something I'm not all that into is the asexual representation. Asexual representation is great, but in this instance, it is used by Seung-ah as a means of avoiding his feelings for Do-gyeom. That reinforces beliefs that asexual individuals are lying or faking for one reason or another and that asexuality does not exist. Thankfully, Mujin and Do-gyeom do take his asexuality seriously and validate it up until the point it is revealed to have been a lie. I would've much preferred if Seung-ah discovered his sexuality had changed or evolved, perhaps discovering he's demisexual instead. It's just so unfortunate that an already underrepresented and misunderstood group is used in this way when another reason could have been used. It also sets up a neverending slew of misunderstandings between everyone, which isn't my favorite way of creating tension in fiction, so there's that.
I want a series about Mujin so bad I can't even stand it. BL or het doesn't matter. He deserves love, not Seung-ah. Seung-ah was cruel to Mujin, knowing Mujin would be willing to do anything for Seung-ah, though Seung-ah would never truly love Mujin. Meanwhile, Mujin gave up his studio to take a job that he didn't want so as to support Seung-ah and had to watch Seung-ah ultimately choose Do-gyeom. It's just so terribly sad for Mujin after everything he did for both Seung-ah and Do-gyeom, and I was so upset that we never really got to see where he ultimately ended up. I'm still putting it out in the world that we might possibly get a series for Mujin because he's too sweet of a character to let fall to the wayside.
Results:
This was a tad disappointing. I love Do-gyeom, I love Mujin, and I love that we get to see a relationship between a female alpha and a male omega, but Seung-ah is hard to love. Being that he's our main character makes this hard to love, too. The love triangle feels lacking; much of the tension is based on misunderstandings or lies, and our endgame couple hurts far more people than necessary before finally getting together. I'm so happy Do-gyeom ended up with the one she loved and we got to see their child, but I just wanted better for her.
Have you read Love is an Illusion! - The Queen? If so, what do you think? Do you agree with my assessment? Do you not? Let me know, and comment below!