Monday, April 07, 2008

switch, vol. 1

By the Naked Ape: Saki Otoh and Nakamura Tomomi
Released in the US by Viz


Slugline: For a story about detectives, there is not a lot of logic here

Kai is the newest member of the Narcotics Control Division, but despite having a baby-face, he has a violent streak hidden well below the surface. Still, that means he is supposed to be trained detective, since they are so few slots for theses narcotic specialists, so instead we get a guy who seems out of a shoujo manga. The story seems to be trying to be realistic, dealing with drugs and the like instead of unstoppable assassins (Rose Hip Rose, I am looking at you) so the attempts to have what amounts to be a bipolar detective completely forces you out the story. I am sorry to have skipped me usual short synopsis of the story, but it seems not to matter much, because the story itself seems jumpy, as in sometimes it skips over material I think should be included, or conversations between characters not really seem to be connecting with each other.



switch, vol. 1 is also available from Right Stuf, Intl., an online retailer specializing in anime and manga.

-Ferdinand

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I loved the manga Switch, it wasnt confusing at all if you just pay attention, and the plot is really good. ~

Prospero's Manga said...

It has been almost two years since I reviewed this title, so my recollections of it are foggy. Maybe my review was biased because of some manga I had read just before it, but it seemed that the characters were not properly fitted for the plot and vice versa. Maybe later volumes in the series smoothed that problem over.