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by Oh!great
Published in the U.S. by Del Rey Manga
Dishonorable Mention
This book made me laugh. It was almost as funny as Samurai Champloo, in fact. Problem is, I don't think the writer intended it as a comedy.
Oh, and the publisher had to change the girl's assless chaps into jeans for the front cover. Because if you're flying through the air on magic rollerblades, assless chaps are exactly what you want for those rough landings.
- Miranda
by Tohru Fujisawa
Published in the US by TokyoPop
Slugline: There's a rose on her hip. I don't know what the "zero" is all about.
Rose Hip Zero is a series from the creator of GTO, which would normally be a great motivator for one to check this out, but not so much in this case. Rose Hip Zero is about an almost supernaturally competent female teenage assassin, Rose, and the bad boy cop Kyoji as they take on the teen terrorist organization ALICE. It is an exactly manga-by-the-numbers action story. With a teen girl in a school uniform who likes to do flips (no fan service there!).
There are a couple weird story bits, which in GTO reflected the wackiness of the main character and his effect on the world, but here just seem odd when compared to the terrorist-derived storyline and the implied stakes in the story. I tried to find out more about the story and series, but apparently this is the second of a three-series set. As far as I can tell, Rose Hip Rose, the predecessor story, has been released in the US, and Magnum Rose Hip, the successor is currently being serialized. I suspect they may shed more light on some of the things here.
While the art is nice, sometimes parts of it are mislaid so that the full impact of the story is lost. For instance, there is a full page spread, which is nice, but an important story bit is hidden in the crease so that you can't see it. So while this is a good action story, that's all that it is, despite attempts to try to draw you in and build a backstory. - Ferdinand
by Shungiku Nakamura
Published in the U.S. by Blu
Slugline: College student Misaki falls for famous author Akihiko and Hiroki falls for Nowaki. Caution: explicit gay porn.
This is a story in two parts, and Akihiko seems to be the only connection -- Hiroki had a thing for Aki, but it's not clear if this is parallel to Misaki's story or not. Maybe it doesn't matter. The transition threw me for a loop since I kept confusing Hiroki with Misaki's brother.
I'm not a big fan of romance stories, partly because there seem to be a set number of ways for the relationship to develop and one of them involves what would normally be prosecutable cases of sexual assault. That would be the style featured in Misaki and Akihiko's half of the volume. The theory that the ends not only justify the means but somehow make it more "romantic" has never sat well with me. Hiroki and Nowaki's relationship reads more easily, after an initial case of home invasion.
Both stories contain well developed characters with heartaches and fears and a life outside their porn, but the plot focuses solely on getting two guys in bed with each other. Along the way, some funny moments and snarking kept the drama from getting too thick. The art is all right -- the guys are prone to having gigantic shoulders, though, and too-small heads -- and the sex is explicit without being hardcore, obviously drawn within the bounds of Japan's censorship laws...
- Miranda
by Sung-Hyen Ha
Published in the U.S. by Tokyopop
Slugline: Pil-Hyun desperately wants to be more "manly" and apprentices himself to a manga artist to do so.
...because they are such paragons of manhood. Especially the female ones. Yes, the kid is doomed.
This is, in fact, an interestingly different look at the "femmy" boy character type. I'm not saying that all guys who like teddy bears or wearing dresses should aspire to be more "manly" -- I think you should be yourself and hold out for the people who will understand you, but at the same time I know how hopeless that can seem when you're a teenager.
Overly "feminine" boys turn up frequently in manga (this is a manhwa, though) and they don't seem to face the same problems that such a guy would in the U.S. Pil-Hyun's quest for "manliness" gives the reader a window on how masculinity is defined in Asia -- where it's obviously both similar and different from the American definition.
Along the way, I'm sure there will be a look at the less glamorous side of being a professional artist, which is also worth seeing.
If it weren't for that, Queens would be a moderately amusing comedy of failures, mistakes and bad luck. Those aren't exactly uncommon, though this one puts a bit more effort into developing the characters. The art is competent but unexceptional. I'm a bit surprised to be recommending this title and looking forward to volume 2.
- Miranda
Created by Sakura Tsukuba
Published in the US by CMX Manga
Slugline: Beware armed penguins! (Which is true only in the most metaphorical way.)
I usually do not like shoujo titles, because they seem to use the same three or four plots over and over. When I first read the cover copy for Penguin Revolution I was very tempted not to bother. We have cross-dressing characters and it is set in the talent agency. I've only read about a dozen titles in that ballpark.
But while Penguin Revolution is not the salvation of the shoujo genre, neither does it fall headlong into all of the traps that I expected. The cross-dressing, while played for laughs, isn't because of romantic misunderstandings. While the reason that it is happening isn't an especially sound one, let's admit it, how many sound ones can there be? And our lead character isn't trying to beat the odds and get people to see her obvious talent, but instead just trying to help out a friend and trying to avoid living on the streets.
The main character Yukari has the ability to sense a person's creative talent by seeing an otherwise invisible set of wings on the person, the greater the wings, the greater the talent. Considering how she grew up, she craves stability and wants to avoid the entertainment industry but she still ends up living with a talent crossdressing as a girl and she has to get into entertainment to help keep his secret. While she is fond of him, she is not reduced to a simpering mess by his or any man's presence (except by the brilliance of his wings, but then again any set of wings can affect her) and she can defend herself.
The art is straightforward and tells the story effectively and while there is nothing in the title that speaks of brilliance, sometimes executing the same old thing in a good way is worth more than you think.
Finally, this is a CMX Manga title, which may leave a bad taste in fans' mouths, but the company has learned from their previous mistakes and this book at least seems solid.-Ferdinand
Story by Noriko Ogiwara, Art by Harahiko Momokawa
Published in the U.S. by Tokyopop
Slugline: Daughter of a missing princess turns up in a small town, and is chased by mysterious bad guys.
It's a story that turns up often enough in the fantasy fiction shelves -- princess disappears with her lover and a pretty girl turns up a generation later wit all the indicators of royal blood. At the same time, there's trouble in the kingdom from a mysterious cult/coven/etc.
In this version, so far, Firiel has no apparent abilities other than making sure the boys in her life stay fed. Except for a lucky kick she gets in. Still, it's the kind of story that can be entertaining when it's done well and there are some interesting details. A book of standard Western fairy tales makes an appearance, but they're not well known stories in this world. Firiel's friend -- and her father's apprentice -- may have a dark side lurking within.
Volume 1 is a standard beginning to the story: Firiel finds out about the missing princess and is stripped of her childhood -- and volume 2 will be a big influence on my opinion of the series. Though if it were a fiction book and the first 200 pages couldn't tell me if the story was any good I'd have gotten bored already, but hey, it's manga.
- Miranda
by Marley
Published in the U.S. by Net Comics
Slugline: Sunbi is plagued by evil spirits and the strange new world of the big city, but she gets some advice on how to fight back.
This volume has it all: horror, philosophy, jokes, Korean folklore, tragedy... I get a lot of manga for free, but I went to the store and bought Dobeki Bride and I plan to do it again.
Here in Seoul without her grandmother's guidance, Sunbi struggles to settle in while being tormented by various nasty spirits. It's not easy to sit through class with a demon chewing on your head. Her human acquaintances range from the cousin who hates her to the paranormal buff with the Kirlian camera to a monk who helps Sunbi out of a bad spot. She's hurt and confused by it all, but remains proactive and starts searching for ways to protect herself from these demons.
The art has occasional perspective problems, but segues easily from the mundane world to hyper-detailed horrors of the paranormal. It's not a horror story, though. It's the sort of strong heroine story that I would recommend to anyone, along with Polly and Eternal Sabbath.
I'm hoping I can find an equally good boy-centerd series to go with these, in all honesty.
The back page says v.3 was due in September '06... I'll have to see about that, and order it straight from the source if my book store isn't keeping up.
- Miranda
Written by Kimura Noboru and Illustrated by Ken-etsu
Published in the U.S. by TokyoPop
Slugline: Whose brilliant idea was it to have distraught schoolgirls battle each other and have 'children'?
This is one of those manga that at first glance seems relatively, but when you start really taking it apart it starts mildly creeping you out. The two female leads, Mai and Natsuki, are driven by duties to others. Because of these duties they create mystical creatures called children with the main male lead Yuuichi, and even though they do not like him, their try to focus on their child. They are called princesses (the English translation of hime) and they are both protected and isolated, made to serve others. And in the process of doing so, they are revealed to the male eye in tons of fanservice. I've never formally studied feminist theory, and my thought processes do not usually turn to it, but this work I suspect revealed far more about what the expected Japanese roles for women and gender relationships than the creators intended.And to show how bad I am at feminist theory, I am now going to put it all aside, and try to talk just about the manga as presented.
The story is basically about an Academy that is under attack by entities called Orphans, and school students called Hime use their psychic abilities to defend the school, with the story revolving two of the Hime and the new male transfer student who is a Key that helps the Hime create Childs, psychic creations that boost the Himes' abilities. Okay, one of the non-lead female students says to the male student "Please, open my keyhole..."
Ewww.
Okay, the art at times is a little confusing, with lots of fan service and the plot is, well, thin. Painfully so and unrealistic even by manga standards. I find that there are some good character touches and moments that rang true, for instance, real sexual tension in this sort of highly charged environment must have considering the sort of relationships that exist between Himes and Keys. I haven't watched the anime that this is based on, so if you really liked it, this is supposedly a re-imagination of aspects of the original story and you may want to read it because of that. Otherwise this is just something to looked at, experienced on a surface level if you like fan service and pseudo-sexual imagery, but otherwise, eh, not enjoying it.- Ferdinand.
by Shiki Satoshi
Published in the U.S. by Tokyopop
Slugline: Bored teenager wants to be a secret agent.
This story is so resoundingly ordinary that I have very little to say about it. It's been decked out with various science-fiction trappings -- underwater cities, super-duper-jet-skis, government agents in scanty outfits -- but it's just another bored teenager with an unlikely job and a couple "oddities" thrown in.
Ai spends her time in school or test-driving high-speed jet-skis because her dad is a muckety-muck scientist and she gets involved in chasing some escaping terrorists and running into the special agents assigned to eliminate said terrorists (I'm sure there are "secrets" the government's suppressing that the terrorists want to educate everyone about) so Ai wants to be a secret agent and she's kidnapped by the terrorists but saves the day and... gratuitous boobs, hooray.
There's nothing particularly bad about Daphne, but there's nothing noteworthy either. This author also wrote Kami Kaze, which I found more interesting and I'd recommend over this title.
- Miranda
by Suu Minazuki
Published in the U.S. by Tokyopop
Slugline: "Eve", possessed by "Judas" (no relation to any Biblical characters) must slay lots of bad guys.
But there's more to it than that, it seems. The "bad guys" are themselves possessed by another spirit, one claiming to represent life to Judas's death. There's an organization involved, somewhere, and recurring cross-shaped hypodermics. And at the end we meet Zero, who's cast as Judas's nemesis.
That's the interesting stuff. On the other hand, Eve is a boy and a crybaby to boot. Mizuki, a 16-year-old medical/computer/all-around supergenius, joins their quest to kill 666 after Judas kills the priest who ran the orphanage Mizuki grew up in. The group also picks up Kogiku, who seems to attract animals and is slightly more useful than Eve. Judas himself is tiresomely petty and bossy, most of the time.
But there are some genuinely strange moments and enough of the underlying world-building, mentioned above, to hold my interest. I found the artwork to be occasionally unclear about what was going on, sometimes forcing me to backtrack in the middle of an action sequence. It's not so great when a portion of the swirling cloud effects turns out to actually be a giant scythe. I'd like to know about these things before we get stabbity.
Whoever wrote the back cover blurb didn't read it, I'm thinking -- there's more to this than just killing 666 people. At least, that's what I'm hoping. 3 stars, with a bullet.
- Miranda
By Scott McCloud
Published by Harper Paperbacks
Slugline: Everything else you need to know about making comics .
I've said before that we will occasionally review stuff here that are not precisely manga, but will be of interest to manga fans even if they do not seem to at first blush. In the western comics, Scott McCloud is one of the foremost theoreticians of comics. Calling him a theoretician makes him sound very dry and possibly boring, but he approaches his work in a very entertaining style, packing it with ideas that explode like grenades in your consciousness just a few minutes into reading the book. And reading the book is not a very difficult task, considering it is a comic book with Scott McCloud himself guiding you through the work.Making Comics is not about art, or how you draw chibis, but instead about the more abstract and more important issues about what you draw, how you frame, how much space should be between panels or should there even panels at all. He doesn't give you any concrete answers, but points out what the questions should be. If you have ever looked at a page and wondered why it just didn't feel right, Making Comics offers a concrete list of questions you can ask to help you discover just why that is.
While he does mostly focus on western comics, McCloud has been looking at some of the regional differences between comics, and he does have a short section about some of the differences between American and Japanese comics.
Considering just how many "How to Draw" books there are on the market, and how many of them are manga-focused, if you want to learn how to draw that is well covered. But if you want to do more than just arrange them one after another, if you want to tell a story with your pictures, to turn something good into something great, Making Comics is an invaluable toolkit to have, just as important as pencil and paper.- Ferdinand
by Kim Young-oh
Published in the U.S. by Dark Horse Manhwa
Slugline: Neither rain nor snow nor dark of night... and not siege armies or monsters either, apparently, will stop this delivery man.
This is the sort of fantasy world where everyone wears neo-traditional garb except for the teenage girl (of which there is only one.) She, of course, must wear something inspired by current teen fashion.
The three kids, including Banya, all work for the Desert Post Office (without a boss or even a town in the vicinity) and are similar go-getter personalities. Bany is particularly known for his over-the-top stunts to deliver a package, so when a wounded messenger has to pass his burden on, it goes to Banya. Bad guys show up in pursuit of the message, and the chase is on.
There are plenty of over-eager, over-competent teens in manga, plenty of mysterious bad guys, random monsters that eat your camel, and plucky girls to back up the main man. Overlook these sorts of standard fantasy tropes and Banya is a fun enough action story. There may not be any noble sacrifices -- everyone's got to pony up the delivery fee -- but it'll be a fun romp since nobody seems to be taking this too seriously. At least not until people start getting killed.
Well, maybe not even then.
- Miranda
By C. Lijewski
Published by TokyoPop
Slugline: Re:Play is another one of TokyoPop's OGM's created by a winner of the Rising Stars of Manga contest, in this case Christy Lijewski. Though she was discovered that way, she is also producing a monthly comic for Slave Labor Graphics, which after reading Re:Play makes me want to check it out.
Re:Play is a musician manga, but I'll try not to hold that against it. Eh, it's not that I have anything specifically against manga featuring musicians, but it seems to be popular out of proportion to its actual usefulness. I mean manga, or any comic for that matter, can not actually convey the music that is such a central part of the story. Of course, that may be the attraction, that you don't have to be concerned about the music.
Cree is the singer of a small-time band that was starting to take off when their bassist ditches both the band and her. But fortunately she finds a new bassist Izsak, who is a amnesiac homeless street musician. Nothing can go wrong there, right? Needless to say she starts to fall for him, despite her best friend Rail's misgivings. There may be something to his concerns, since there are some very odd people that are overly interested in Izsak. Plus Izsak himself has some strange needs.
Okay, I said earlier that I usually have problems with musician manga, well this is one that proves the rule by being the exception. The art is a jagged style, which fits the characters and the story. Cree is fairly well established character-wise, while the others are described as far as they are needed to keep things moving. Surprisingly enough, Izsak's secret wasn't revealed at the end of the volume, which would have been a good capper, but instead the story ends on a emotional note. There is some strangeness and action, but it is understated and hinting, rather than being full out. I definitely want to see more.- Ferdinand
by Tatsuhiko Takimoto & Kendi Oiwa
Published in the U.S. by Tokyopop
Slugline: Satou has a love-hate relationship with his otaku-hermit lifestyle.
A "hikikomori" is a college-age dropout, usually male, who goes into voluntary seclusion. Apparently it's a growing phenomenon (or is perceived to be -- sounds a lot like my brother for the last ten years) in Japan. Satou says he's been a shut-in for four years and he's starting to try to emerge from the solitary confinement.
This is, of course, easier said than done.
The story is rather disjointed, as Satou is prone to massive overreactions (in his own mind, at least) and is easily distracted. His internal self-flagellations are both amusing and sadly familiar to any shy person struggling to pry open their own shell. Safe to say that Satou's gone a bit stir crazy in his confinement, and the two friends he makes aren't terribly helpful.
One is Yamazaki, hentai collector, who is also a hikikomori and seeds a crazy idea in Satou's head to invent an erotic video game.
The other is Misaki, a pretty girl whose existence tortures Satou with visions of porn. She claims to have a sure-fire cure for hikikomori (I suspect it includes a job and a girlfriend) and she lures Satou out of his apartment for "sessions."
NHK is funny and fast-moving, but it's also guaranteed to be a long string of failures and humiliations for its hero. It has some raunchy moments and some predictable moments, and the characters aren't quite as unique as they sound. So I put it in the middle of the pack.
- Miranda
by Toru Yamazaki
Published in the U.S. by Dark Horse Manga
Slugline: If Madmagazine is too tame (or, possibly, too high-brow) for you these days, then suffer no more. Truly bizarre gross-out comedy has been brought to us by the good folks at Dark Horse.
This isn't a Dishonorable Mention, but I'll be brief because I'm not usually found hanging around the horror/comedy crossroads. I need to go bleach my eyeballs after reading this.
Octopus Girl is a semi-anthology of two girls who sometimes have the bodies of an octopus and an eel and who have strange, gory and sh*t-filled adventures. The art is hideous, but that's intentional. The dialog is flat, but that hardly matters. Believe it or not, I'm giving it two stars for inconsistency -- not all the stories are pointless or even sh*t-filled.
If you've got a friend who's into gross-out comedy and you're looking for a present for them, there's three volumes of this stuff for sale at Amazon.
- Miranda
Created by Morgan LuthiPublished by TokyoPop
Slugline: A fluffier, more easy going but still destructive Akira.Morgan Luthi is another of the TokyoPop artists who were discovered through the Rising Stars of Manga contest. He actually has an interesting story about winning, in that he had been applying for several of the contests in a row, being turned down each time, but slowly gaining in skill until he finally was one of the winners published.
Snow is a story about the apparently identity-less newcomer to the Hub, the back end of the galaxy, a galaxy that seems to be under random assault by the Warmongers, a race of giant robots, whose greatest weapon is the Ghost, a psychic of unprecedented power. On the Hub, there is a gang that battles the other gangs to help the city function, called the Crows, led by Katarina. Needless to say the other gangs do not share the Crows' altruism, and the Warmongers are looking for the Ghost.I wanted to like this, and to a certain extent I do, but when I start unpacking the story I keep on hitting on elements that just didn't seem to work. Katarina's unusual background comes up, but then doesn't really change anything. The reveal of the Ghost is handled casually, and the reveal at the end of the episode is anything but believable.
The art is very open and fluid, both futuristic and old at the same time. The story moves very fast, but there does not feel like that there is much story actually there. Part of that may be the panel layout, which is very open, which means that there are fewer panels per page. Luthi has a very good sense of design, with the title pages and other administrativa of the book seamlessly flowing in with the story pages.
I think this series still has potential, and these structural flaws can be fixed, so that is the sole reason I haven't given this manga a lower score.- Ferdinand
by Kosen
Published by Yaoi Press
Slugline: Saihoshi agrees to bodyguard Prince Anel on the way to meet his arranged bride. Needless to say, things go wrong. Caution: softcore gay porn.
Yaoi Press has been boldly forging ahead with an all-OEL list of titles. This is the first story of theirs that I've read, and it was a pleasant surprise.
It's a fairly amusing story of a horny young prince trying to catch his bodyguard's eye and getting into trouble when his journey is interrupted by an ambush. It's a fantasy world stocked with gay boys (did I even see a single woman? will his "bride" be female?) who like a lot of leather straps. And get this, Saihoshi wields a giant pair of scissors for a weapon. He runs with scissors. It had to be done, I guess.
As noted, the porn is softcore -- no frontal nudity, just a lot of butt shots and convenient drapery. Not that there's anything wrong with nice butt shots.
The characters are solid and even have an occasional twist, the story is straightforward and the dialog got an occasional smile. I read a special edition handed out at a retailer convention which included a short, yaoi version of Gawain and the Green Knight that I'm less impressed by (I'm a little too fond of the original) and an snippet preview of a title called Stallion (which looks pretty formulaic.)
As yaoi goes, Saihoshi is light and angst-free and that's a nice change of pace once in a while. I am kind of curious to find out if his "bride" will turn out to be a boy in drag, or maybe a hermaphrodite (in the apparently-well-entrenched hentai style...)
- Miranda
by Ueda Hajime
Published in the U.S. by Del Rey Manga
Dishonorable Mention
Review of v.1
Since this was written by the creator of FLCL, I should've figured the second volume would resolve exactly nothing.
Amusingly, these two volumes comprise the entire story. I think the translator's note at the end says it best, and I quote, "So what happened? I wish I could tell you."
Thanks for killing tons of trees so we can all be confused together.
- Miranda
Created by Lindsay Cibos and Jared Hodges
Published by TokyoPop
Slugline: A pet primer and younger kids title, all in one.
Peach Fuzz is one of the first of the TokyoPop original creator titles, and is aimed at younger readers. Amusingly enough, I am pretty sure I remember its creators, Lindsay Cibos and Jared Hodges, for the adult work that they did beforehand.
Amanda wants a pet, and so at the pet store she chooses a ferret which she names Peach. However, Peach's apparently gentle nature at the pet store is mostly because she was napping, and once she awakes she is not happy. Peach saw herself as a princess, and now sees herself as a prisoner of a dungeon, under the sway of the evil Handra, which she has to fend off with bites. Amanda's mom doesn't want to keep an animal that will hurt her daughter, but Amanda wants to keep Peach.
What I like, in its humorous and roundabout way, is that this story points out that pets don't look at the world the same way that humans do. Peach Fuzz hides it under the idea that Peach sees the world as a medieval kingdom with as her as a princess, but when Amanda uses animal behaviors that Peach learned from her ferret-mommy, Peach and Amanda finally get to an accommodation, one that is limited by the fact that Peach will still on occasion nip just to make a point.
I actually would suggest giving a copy of this book to a kid who wants a pet, to help illustrate that what they think and what the pet thinks may be entirely different things. And the unmeaning and casual cruelty they may unknowingly visit upon the pet. As a story, the art is very good, very open, very friendly to non-comic-experienced readers. I do feel that while the story is more geared to younger readers, older readers will find some bits to entertain themselves with. - Ferdinand
by Kei Toume
Published in the U.S. by Del Rey Manga
Slugline: Jintetsuo tries not to get involved with two old friends and the politics of revenge.Volume 1 review
One gets the impression, from this volume, that Jintetsuo doesn't know what he wants -- other than to not get involved, which he doesn't do a very good job of. And I'm not sure what happened to the interesting ideas I saw in the first volume, because other than the hero waffling back and forth, the stories are retreads of standard Japanese-style revenge by underage, overenthusiastic orphans.It seems, also, that Jintetsuo is less of a robot in this volume -- he eats, he drinks, he still doesn't talk but the talking sword now claims it can read his mind. Which may be more convenient for the writer, but it removes most of the mystery and another point of uniqueness. And if Jintetsuo's just another closed-lipped samurai watching others kill each other and feeling guilty, what's the point?
It may be that in v.3, he will find something to do that can carry the further volumes, but as sophomore slumps go this is a tough one and I don't know if I'll be there to find out about v.3. I've got a lot in my to-read pile. - Miranda
