Kimi ga Bokura wo Akuma to Yonda Koro

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Japanese: 君が僕らを悪魔と呼んだ頃

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Type: Manga

Volumes: 14

Chapters: 154

Status: Finished

Published: Aug 16, 2017 to Aug 5, 2020

Genres: Suspense

Theme: Psychological

Serialization: Magazine pocket

Authors: Sano, Takashi (Story & Art)

Statistics

Score: 7.70¹ (scored by 2,283 s)

¹ indicates a weighted score.

Ranked: #1774²

² based on the top manga page. Please note that 'R18+' titles are excluded.

Popularity: #2900

: 8,009

Favorites: 161

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Kodansha USA

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7.70

Ranked #1774Popularity #2900 8,009

Sano, Takashi (Story & Art)

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Volumes: /14

Chapters: /154

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Back When You Called Us Devils

Volume 1
€10.99

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Synopsis

Yusuke Saito is a normal high school kid...well, normal enough, except that he can't anything from his life except the last six months. But when he starts to get confronted by people who insist they're from his past, who allege that he did horrible things to them...suddenly Yusuke's missing memories become crucial to . Otherwise, the skeletons in his closet may just make him a skeleton, too...

(Source: Kodansha USA)

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Background

Kimi ga Bokura wo Akuma to Yonda Koro was published digitally in English as Back When You Called Us Devils by Kodansha USA from May 25, 2021, to June 28, 2022.

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Characters

Saitou, Yuusuke

Main

Ichinose, Akari

ing

Aizawa, Youjirou

ing

Reviews

May 15, 2025

yorokobisenpai

Recommended

What makes a “good” person good, and a “bad” person bad?
Good people do bad things, and bad people do good things, so where is the line? Why do we consider someone good when they do bad things to someone we’ve already deemed bad? Can people truly change? And who gets to decide what, or who, is unforgivable? These are just a few of the questions I found myself asking after reading this.

The manga is complex and chaotic, and it may challenge your moral com. It tackles something I think is very important, something that's much easier to examine in others than to confront within ourselves. ... There are a lot of moral and ethical dilemmas here, and I believe judging the manga based on whether you agree with how those dilemmas are portrayed is unfair. It's like disliking a book simply because a character doesn’t align with your beliefs or morals. When reading this, you have to set that aside and really dissect the complexities and messages being presented.

The art is good, fitting for the story being told. The mangaka captures internal aspects of the characters very well, whether light or dark, even when those feelings are masked. For example, at times, you get the sense a character is wearing a smile they don’t mean, just like you might notice in someone you know. There are moments where the art becomes palpable, where it communicates emotion so visually and effectively. I really commend that.

The story’s flaw, in my opinion, is that it tries to do too much. Some moments are overcomplicated. A twist might land well at first, but then get buried under layers that weren’t necessary. Sometimes simplicity is best but because of this, certain moments lose their punch. The mangaka wants to play with and tease readers, which can be done brilliantly, but here, it doesn’t always land, and it can feel drawn out or anti-climactic. This can deter readers but if you can push through, you'll find a journey worth taking. There's something poignant here that makes you question not only your morals, but yourself.

I think some of the side characters were poorly utilised and moments where perhaps they could have added more depth and been incorporated more were not there. It's fair to say because of how little they were used, there comes a point where the story could have done without them entirely. They offered very little which is a shame as they seem like precious pieces at the start only to morph into very little.

You can follow a character who has done something extremely atrocious, but it is not for us, the readers, to justify, forgive, sympathize, or even empathize. You may feel conflicted if you do but this manga doesn't need that from us. It’s our role to bear witness, to observe, reflect, and take from it what we take, whether we understand it, relate to it, or not.

In life, when we witness abhorrent behavior, it’s not our place to decide whether someone is forgivable. That right belongs to the victim. The same principle applies here. You're exposed not just to crime, but to the internal conflict of someone who committed it. It’s heavy, especially when you consider these things were done by someone very young, who now lives with the burden, shame, guilt, and self-hatred. That lingering question: How could I do that? Why did I do that?

It's rare to follow someone who has done something terrible but is remorseful. Villains exist, but how many do we follow closely as they try to undo the harm they’ve done? This manga gives us that insight, we are lurkers in the shadows. It's easy to dehumanize someone who harms others, but we rarely ask why. Instead, we justify why we’re allowed to harm them. And while the story may leave you conflicted about who to , or if anyone is even worth ing, it never forces you to choose. It doesn’t ask for your agreement. It simply walks you through the journey and leaves you with questions only you can answer.

I’m not a fan of how the manga ends, but I understand it. It did what it needed to do. It encapsulates the message of the story, which is open to interpretation. Whatever you take from it is what you take.

I liked the story more often than not. I was able to understand characters who are very different from myself and that’s because of the journey I took with them. The protagonist may or may not be good or bad. That’s up to you. I don’t think a label is necessary. The story is more complex than that. It’s about the journey, the questions that arise along the way, and the person they become through it all.

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Nov 7, 2023

hexashadow13

Mixed Feelings

Funny

Well-written

tl;dr: A manga that is full of terrible writing but can still be surprisingly deep at times.

This manga is about a devil of a person who ceases being a devil. Yusuke was a complete monster throughout middle school that performed a long string of vile acts just for the fun of it. However, soon upon entering high school he lost the memories of the past fifteen years of his life, and comes out a pretty normal and reasonably nice guy. But it’s not like the crimes he’s committed have gone away. As such, this is a story of him trying to find some sort of ... life he can accept living despite the evil of his past. The manga deals with a number of related themes and manages to make some profound statements about the human condition, but these are essentially just short glimmers in a sea of nonsensical writing.

The first arc which takes up the first third or so of the manga, involves him just trying to survive not having any of the memories of his past and others taking advantage of that. There’s a mystery of sorts involving his past that he’s trying to solve, but it’s mostly just him going around haphazardly until he triggers memories. It involves exploring how he acted as a devil and his relationships with his victims. Characters aren’t fleshed out very well and there’s a lot of aspects that feel really forced. It’s also not particularly well paced. It tries to make some overarching statements about how sins never go away and how one can atone for them, but it feels pretty superficial.

The second arc is pretty distinct from the first arc and takes up the majority of the rest of the manga. The core of the first half of the second arc is supposed to be somewhat of a thriller where it isn’t quite clear at all what’s going on. I feel the intent of this was essentially to make the reader question how much they trust the protagonist as that itself somewhat plays into the larger overarching themes in the work in whether someone evil can ever be truly trusted to be good. However, that doesn’t really work in context, because it becomes less a question of whether the reader trust the protagonist and more so whether the reader is willing to believe that the author would completely just drop all the progression that occurred in the first third of the manga. And from that perspective, this portion is overtly slow and not particularly interesting.

The second half of the second arc turns into somewhat of a battle of wits. It’s somewhat interesting in that the battle of wits is pretty much entirely oriented around who’s willing to trust in whom. Still, beyond that it’s pretty stupid with none of the twists or moves feeling all that intelligent or particularly well planned. This also touches on themes relating to how people with the best of intentions can cause terrible things to happen and also delves into how good people can be pushed into doing terrible things due to just small nudges here and there and thus that even devils may deserve some sympathy. However, the situations surrounding this were ridiculous to the point it doesn’t really feel like these points landed properly.

The epilogue plot wise feels incredibly forced. There’s hinting at it through random cuts to the future in the second arc so it’s not like it wasn’t planned. But despite that it still doesn’t feel cohesive at all. This part is the most direct in trying to try to convey a message to the reader regarding forgiveness and empathy that permeate through the entire work to the point that it gets pretty preachy. Still, I would say that it does a better job than the entire rest of the manga so I would say it works out well as being the conclusion to the work thematically as it’s very clear what the manga was trying to say. Still, that doesn’t change how it doesn’t really fit the flow of the manga at all and plot wise is full of massive gaping holes in logic that it’s attempts to write around don’t really do much to fix.

The art in the manga is okay. It fits the atmosphere and type of story it is reasonably well, but it’s pretty rough and it never looks particularly good or well drawn.

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Nov 23, 2023

Chufal

Not Recommended

I binged this manga over the last week or so and I regret doing so

In this manga we have the story of a "Devil" a man that committed such heinous crimes (SA, extortion, extreme violence etc) in middle school and his life and the consequences after the fact. The manga tries to tackle the redeemability of such a person when they have lost their memories of these crimes and a story of penance with the guilt and weight of them.

The manga was interesting enough to finish reading online but after finishing it I cant say id recommend it. I feel like the story never really ...

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Kimi ga Bokura wo Akuma to Yonda Koro
Back When You Called Us Devils
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Kimi ga Bokura wo Akuma to Yonda Koro
Back When You Called Us Devils
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