Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Suihelibe!, vol.1

By Naomi Azuma
Released in the US by CMX Manga


Slu
gline: Alien gamekeeper after school club

Tetsu is looking to join a school club and decides to join the biology club. As soon as he checks it out, he has to defend the club's existence to the school council, along with helping Lan, an schoolgirl alien, recover some alien animals around the school. Tetsu manages to convince Lan to join the biology club so that it will continue, and over the course of the volume gathers another three members to reach the minimum size of the club of five members so that it can continue to exist in spite of the school council’s opposition. Of course, along the way Tetsu and the new members of the biology club help Lan recover some of the alien animals that she has been sent to Earth to recover.

This is definitely a kid’s title, since it is so very, very mild. The art style is very open and rounded so all the characters look and feel very young and wide-eyed. The challenges that the character face are not that, well challenging or dangerous, which fits the intended audience. The characters are only lightly sketched out, with Tetsu being the most with Lan the alien all, well, surface. The other three members of the club are pretty much stereotypes. Just because this is a kid's title doesn't mean it shouldn't have any depth, but despite that lack it is solid and not bad. Just the story has all the dramatic tension of overcooked pasta and thus not very enticing.



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

-Ferdinand

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