Shinichi "Shin" Okazaki was introduced in the manga series by Ai Yazawa known as "Nana" as the newest member of the band called "Black Stones" a.k.a. "BLAST" as the replacement to the ex-boyfriend of protagonist Nana Osaki, Ren Honjo. He comes off looking off as the pure and innocent youngster starting to get big. In respects to the series, Shin is the representation of the "young blood" while characters such as Nana O and the other members of BLAST being considered as "old blood." One could call Shin as the "diamond in the rough."

He is introduced to Nana after the first several chapters after Nana O is convinced by friends and former band mates Nobu and Yasu to reform Blast with the support of the other protagonist Nana Komatsu a.k.a. Hachi. As soon as Shin tries out and gets accepted by the other members of Blast, he finds himself with a big chip on his shoulders. Nana O has told Shin to surpass Ren. So far, Shin seems to be quite enigmatic at first.

The most interesting part is that while being the youngest and newest member of Blast, Shin has some interesting skeletons in his closet. As the story progresses, the other band mates eventually learn about Shin's secrets. While not staying with Nobu, Shin actually moonlights as a male prostitute to make money. To make things more interesting, Shin is going through his rebellious streak. In turn, it makes things more complicated with the members of Blast and Trapnest. In Hachi's pursuit of love, Shin's situation makes things more complicated.

Things become more complication as Shin gets dragged into a web of adultery and extramarital affairs when Reira of Trapnest becomes one of his clients. Eventually, the two of them become lovers in a secret and forbidden romance. This is due to Shin being fifteen and Reira being twenty-two at the time. The relationship with Reira is perhaps the biggest highlight in Shin's character plot arc in the series. At the same time, this is the one focal point that could lead Reira down a path of ruin due to the laws of statutory rape in Japan.

So far, Shin makes one of the most important support characters in the series. It leads to many of the main and major characters acting as "guardians" for Shin. At the same time, Shin could be the one factor that could destroy Trapnest. He is also responsible for creating the dirty secrets that Reira now has in her closet.

While Shin is the youngest, he knows a lot of "bad things" much to the chagrin of Nana O and the others. This was due to constantly sleeping around with a client named Ryoko, who is an airline stewardess. Despite all those secrets, Shin is not as flawed as Hachi. On top of that, Shin has a very keen intellect to back it up. His intellect is almost on par with Yasu. Plus, he is not afraid of confronting Takumi.

Overall, Shin is perhaps one of the most interesting characters in Nana. What makes Shin more interesting is that he has plenty of room to develop and learn. Currently, it is shown that sometime in the future that Shin has left music and has become an actor. However, it is unknown how that transition came to be. Unfortunately, the series is on hiatus due to Yazawa being ill at the moment.

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