Popularity=/=quality

Quality is in the eye of the reader.

At about 70% of the story, I don't think I'm hasty. And if FF generates so much comments here, it's because while the characterization is good, the way their story is told gives a lot of frustration. It's nice for a moment and you anticipate impatiently the next strip, but after a while it has the opposite effect and you dread the next cockblock.

Maybe it's something cultural to Korea and this story is tailored to a Korean audience who likes to be blueballed.

Giving the audience what they want is one of the worst ways to write a story as quiet and slow-to-develop as FF. The moment you do that, you drop the only stakes and suspense you have to work with, and have potentially killed the drive of the story as a whole.

Not giving the audience might alienate some, but it will create die-hard fans among the majority of the audience. Why? Because people want to see their favorite characters working toward not just any goal, but a seemingly impossible one rife with obstacles and frustrations. That's why shows like Game of Thrones and The Walking Dead are so popular. More than that, the possibility of gaining satisfaction/reward, constantly reinforced by small indications of progress here and there, guarantees that people will become even more determined to see this story to the end just to get rid of this frustration and replace it with feelings of satisfaction. It's pure psychology.

As for the Korean blueball theory, all you have to do is take a look at the audience on this website to know how wrong that is. If anything, this is just more proof that FF appeals to a wide range of people from different cultures because of the formula it uses. You just happen to be an outlier.

last edited at Mar 14, 2016 10:32PM

The story can be as much about what Norae doesn’t do as it is already about what Seola fails to do. Right now it feels like Seola is already at the finish-line – but she can only cross it together with Nora. And Norae is far behind just doing nothing.

I must be the only person who thinks Norae is actually trying to move the relationship forward, or at least feels more confidant about it, but that Seola is skittish and easily overwhelmed by this thing between them that she constantly runs away from it.

To give examples, when their kiss a few chapters back was interrupted and Norae (off-handedly) invited her back home with her, Seola said yes and then ran off to bed, blushing deeply. And then when Norae was playing the guitar and Seola grabbed her hand, yes, Norae was being oblivious but it was Seola who cut things off abruptly by leaving the room. And now a drunk Norae breathes on her neck and Seola practically throws her off - NOT because Norae is drunk (which means she didn't actually initiate anything), but because, in Seola's own words, it was unexpected. It caught her off-guard and made her retreat.

I really do enjoy seeing Seola so unraveled by Norae, since she's usually so assured and confident when she approaches romantic relationships, but while she's more reactive and blushes a lot more easily, she's also been cockblocking herself in a lot of instances. If she held her ground during any one of these times, I think Norae would have met her halfway (case in point: the hand-holding scenes, that time Seola slept on Norae's shoulder and she let her).

Anyway! Fluttering Feelings is the third yuri (or something close to it) that I've ever read and I'm seriously enjoying the heck out of it, frustration and all. I think it would've lost its appeal a long time ago if it gave the fans exactly what they want out of it. Instead, the tension builds with each chapter and Sundays have become my favorite day of the week because of this.