The Perpetual Deferral of Conclusive Mourning and the Ignition of Hope : An Analysis of Characters’ Patterns of Action in the Comic

This article examines , a Korean BL comic by Summer, to show how mourning is not represented as a psychological stage to be overcome but is narratively performed through delay, repetition, and transference. Rather than treating Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s stage model as a universal law of psyche or mechanically mapping scenes onto predefined stages, the study uses the widely shared schema of mourning as an interpretive reference point, focusing on how it is invoked and transformed within the text. Methodologically, the analysis combines close reading of dialogue, narration, and panel composition, centering on the post-loss actions and utterances of the three surviving figures—Seonwoo, Jiho, and Sujeong—as well as the placement of a recurring birthday celebration held in the absence of the deceased. To clarify moments in which norms of mourning are imposed and negotiated, the discussion additionally draws on Jacques Rancière’s notion of dissensus, Im Hong-bin’s theorization of shame, and Byung-Chul Han’s concept of non-transparency. The findings suggest that reorganizes post-bereavement life as a technique of regulating distance under the premise that mourning cannot be conclusively closed; mourning is thus framed not as a narrative of completion but as an ongoing process through which survivors sustain and repair one another’s lives. The three characters do not attempt to eliminate the void produced by loss; instead, they continually renew the meaning of mourning through the reconfiguration of relationships around that void. In particular, the recurring birthday ritual—where celebration and commemoration overlap—destabilizes the closure-oriented logic presupposed by the stage model and reveals that meaning-making emerges from within delay itself. Finally, while situated within the BL category, the work minimizes conventionally erotic-centered expectations and foregrounds a post-loss relational ethics, thereby repositioning genre expectations surrounding representations of mourning.