Sean Gaffney

By Nozomi Yanahara. Released in Japan by Media Factory, serialization ongoing in the magazine Comic Flapper. Released in North America by Digital Manga Publishing.

In general, one of the more disliked traits in manga among Western fandom is the oblivious harem hero who cannot see the obvious crushes that all the girls have on him, and wonders why it is he’s so unpopular. I agree 100% that this can be aggravating, but I have to admit that I am so very happy that Harumi, the start of Takasugi-san’s Obento, is exactly like this. Because the longer he keeps trying to act like a father and close family member to Kururi and doesn’t notice her blushes and googly eyes whenever he’s around, the happier I am. Mostly as despite the threat of this happening, this is a very good manga, with Vol. 2 having lots of great moments.

I’d mentioned in Vol. 1’s review that Natsuki, the snarky girl who was introduced to be the class bully but actually formed a close friendship with Kururi, reminded me strongly in both looks and attitude of Shinobu from Hakusensha shoujo series Teru Teru x Shonen. That opinion is reinforced by my favorite chapter in the book, where they start a new year only to find that Kururi and Mitsuru, the two that she’d bonded with, are in another class, leaving her alone with all of her former friends and cronies, who are very bitter about Natsuki changing her affections to the quiet weird girl. And so the bully becomes the bullied. That’s not what I liked about the chapter. What I liked was the way Natsuki handled it, being totally aware of what was going on, and then taking the earliest opportunity to gain the upper hand and reassert her position. We do see a teacher talk about stepping in, which is good, but I enjoyed seeing Natsuki being empowered again all by herself.

It also helped that she used a bento to do so. This still is not quite a foodie manga, but food certainly plays a major role in it, with Harumi and Kururi constantly trying new things and enjoying seasonal treats – even if their cooking skills don’t necessarily match up with their intentions. This is true of Harumi in general, who continues to be very awkward with most social interaction, and has a tendency to not think about what others around him might be feeling before he decides on a course of action. This is, of course, part of why he’s still an oblivious harem protagonist. The author’s notes said she has fun with him beign a passive, sad guy. Kururi, on the other hand, is a full-blown introvert, and this is also shown very deftly in several chapters.

Finally, let’s go back to Kururi’s crush. It’s still there, and everyone but Harumi seems to be aware of it. I was very grateful for the expansion of Mitsuru’s role, as he’s not only an age and family-appropriate rival, but his bluntness about liking Kururi and reminding her of it – a lot – is refreshing. That said, that sort of guy often ends up on the losing side in these sorts of mangas. His older brother, who’s in Harumi’s workplace, is more a fan of passive-aggressive poking – his queries at Kosaka are clearly meant to force her to admit that she has a crush on Harumi, and since she doesn’t admit it he wants to go for it as well, but is not as self-confident as his younger sibling. Normally all these harem antics would be annoying, but here they are giving a hint that maybe the manga won’t end like we fear.

Despite that fear, I still greatly enjoy Takasugi-san’s Obento, which hits a lot of my buttons, and reminds me of the old CMX shoujo days, despite being a DMP seinen title. Recommended for heartwarming comedy with lots of food.

By Hidekaz Himaruya. Released in Japan by Gentosha, originally serialized as an online webcomic, then in Comic Birz. Released in North America by Tokyopop in association with Right Stuf, Inc.

I’ve generally enjoyed each volume of Hetalia I’ve read, and this new one is no exception. This is the first time, however, that I finished it with the feeling that the creator may have taken the concept as far as he can really go. After a brief resurgence last time, we already have less WWII than ever here, and while many would argue that’s a good thing it does sort of make the book feel a bit light. Discussion of tanks and battles has given way to discussions of customs and what the characters would look like as cats. It’s still fun, but something does seem missing here.

The Nordics are on the cover, and they also get most of the early and late pages in this volume. They’re not as well-defined as the other nations, however, with Denmark in particular finding it hard to separate himself from ‘Prussia’ clone every time I see him. I do think that focusing on Iceland’s self-consciousness was a good way to show off everyone at their best, though. A more interesting chapter is the one where Sealand tries to unite all the other micronations and make friends with them. This not only includes Wy, who we’d met before, but obscure places like Molossia and Hutt River.

We do get an African nation introduced as well, but oddly, we don’t know which country she is! Seychelles gets a visit from a fellow African nation, who seems to be landlocked, but that’s about all we can glean from her. I wonder if she’s meant to be a country like the Congo or Sudan, where Himaruya might want to err on the side of caution. (She can’t be Cameroon, we’ve seen him.)

As for the rest of the cast, most of the regulars get something to do, even if there’s little ongoing plot here, even from chapter to chapter. My favorite gags include Hungary trying to sing Prussia a lullaby (Gloomy Sunday, the famous depressing Hungarian song); Spain’s reaction on finding out he’s NOT getting the 2020 Olympics; Berlusconi being so appalling even Italy is ashamed to be talking about him (another ‘isn’t this supposed to be in World War II?’ moment); and of course seeing all the characters as cat personifications, which is not quite as adorable as it wants to be, but is still cute.

Still, at the end of the volume one wonders how much is really left in the tank. I know that we have more genderbending Hetalia coming our way soon, and the series still runs in Comic Birz, though it’s been far more irregular lately. But honestly, the original webcomic has the most obvious plotline to collect – the continuation of Buon San Valentino, and Germany possibly remembering his past – and has not adapted it at all beyond the first section. This could be partly as it’s more ‘obvious’ about its BL than we normally see in Hetalia, but it could just be that that story would lead to a natural ending, and I can’t see Hetalia ending anytime soon, given its cash-cow popularity. But where is it going from here?

By Rumiko Takahashi. Released in Japan by Shogakukan, serialized in the magazine Shonen Sunday. Released in North America by Viz.

(Warning: This is Ranma 1/2 For Experts, basically – I do refer to future volumes a bit here, mostly the next one.)

As we get deeper into the Ranma 1/2 story, it’s starting to separate itself more and more from its predecessor, Urusei Yatsura. This despite adding two characters who are very much ‘based on’ similar UY characters in these two volumes. But while UY ran on escalation – take a situation, put people in it, and watch it expand till it explodes in comedic chaos – Ranma 1/2 almost seems driven by delusion. So many of the characters have a fixed idea of who someone is, what their goal is, or how people feel about them, and that fixed idea drives the comedy. So we have Kuno’s love for the ‘Pig-Tailed Girl’, Kodachi’s similar obsession with Ranma (and inability to tell that he and his girl side are the same person), Mikado’s ladykiller instincts, and even Ryouga’s delusion that all he has to do is defeat Ranma once and suddenly he’ll get Akane and be happy. Everyone in Ranma is deluded for the sake of comedy.

We start off with Kodachi, who we already know likes to win her matches by disabling her opponent before they begin. Akane isn’t so easily dispatched (in fact, it’s her own misstep that forces her out of the match), so Kodachi resorts to her backup plan – cheating her way through the entire match. Throughout, she bears a strong resemblance to Ryouko Mendou from UY, something that is helped along when we find out that Tatewaki Kuno is in fact her older brother. (Yes, yes, mix and match the romanji. Leave me my bad habits.) Kodachi likewise has a flair for the overdramatic. She’ll stick around, but is probably the least important of the major Ranma harem girls – and the only one who never gets a ‘softer side’, even once we find out about her family situation (we’ve got a few more omnibuses to go there).

Martial Arts Gymnastics in the Kodachi story is followed by Martial Arts Ice Skating with Mikado and Azusa, and I advise the reader to get used to “Martial Arts _______” throughout the entire Ranma series. It’s a useful way to incorporate any silly situation Takahashi wants into the series, and it also serves as an obvious motivator for Ranma, who can’t resist a fight and whose ego says that he’ll always win in any martial arts situation – even if he can’t skate.

Mikado and Azusa are the first ‘arc villains’ we have who won’t be returning, though I think the anime adaptation brought them back a few times. They’re a lot of fun, but there’s not much you can really do with them, and neither of them have either the likeability or over the top madness that tends to bring back the best of Ranma’s recurring characters. I was quite pleased to see that, though they perform as a couple, they don’t actually seem to like each other at all. Azusa (who is Ran in UY with the anger replaced by more cute) also seems to get away with most of the antics she inspires here. Mikado, who sexually assaults Ranma by “stealing her lips”, is a Grade-A creep, however, and he gets the majority of the violence dealt out here.

Ryouga still features heavily here, and his anger remains, but we’re also starting to see his swirling pool of depression, something that will come to define his character for a long time to come. Ryouga is at his strongest when his mood is blackest, but this means that we rarely get to see him be happy. It’s probably not helped that, throughout both of these arcs, Ranma and Akane are still looking quite couple-y. Sure, they grump sat each other, but that seems almost friendly now, and Ranma is quick to whip out the ‘my fiancee’ card. It’s really quite cute.

…and then Shampoo hits the series, literally smashing through a wall and attempting to kill Ranma’s female half. My old memories of this point in the series made me think that it was Shampoo who was a catalyst for what Ranma and Akane will eventually become after this, but to be honest she doesn’t really play all that big a part. Akane’s hair-trigger temper and jealousy just seem to increase naturally, and we see Ranma having to restore her memories later by firing a volley of insults at her, as if all he’s been doing is calling her uncute for the past 3 1/2 volumes. Which isn’t true, as we’ve seen, but it’s another canon rewrite as we read. Ranma and Akane will have their moments from now on, certainly, but there’s a certain tension between them after this arc. Ranma turns to insults more swiftly and loses his ‘I will observe first, then act’ persona. And Akane will distrust Ranma unless proven otherwise… and sometimes even then.

Back to Shampoo, and I will bring up Urusei Yatsura again, sorry. She is clearly meant to be Lum, only here Ranma and Akane have had some time together to make the readers like them, and Shampoo gets a lot fewer ‘cute and likeable’ points. Many have seen this as Takahashi trying to ‘fix’ UY, where she originally wanted Ataru and Shinobu as the couple, but fans and editors made her change it to Lum. The thing is, fans and editors were correct, and I’m sure she realized that very fast. Ataru was the sort of person who worked much better with Lum. But as I’ve noted, Ataru and Ranma are NOT all that alike, and thus the Ranma/Shampoo pairing feels as out of place as Ataru/Shinobu did. He needs someone like Akane, who brings out who he really is – for good and ill.

I was going to discuss Shampoo’s accent, and how it’s dealt with both in the original Japanese and in the English release, but it may be better to save that till Cologne and Mousse show up.

Some random observations… Tofu has already become a one-gag character, and it’s an annoying gag. Kasumi and Nabiki barely appear, though notably when they do they’re trying to fix things up between Ranma and Akane – Nabiki still doesn’t quite have that aura of ‘only out for myself’ she’ll gain later. I quite liked Ranma trying to explain that the tribe’s ‘rule’ that Shampoo had to marry the man who defeated her was ‘from the Stone age’ – he’s absolutely correct, though it does also point out how steeped in ancient traditions Shampoo’s tribe is. And yes, Formula 911 was Formula 119 in the Japanese, but they basically are the same gag – it’s the phone # for emergencies.

By the way, for all that Shampoo is supposedly trying to kill Ranma, she never even gets close. And notably, when she gives the ‘kiss of death’ to Akane, who she’s clearly a superior fighter to, she just wipes Akane’s memories rather than, as Ranma fears, leaving her corpse on the outside of the school. In other words, she doesn’t really look like she’s able to go through with actually killing anyone. We see that again at the end, where Ranma leaves herself open and Shampoo can’t do it – she leaves in tears. It’s a rare serious moment in Ranma 1/2, and sad, because we know that this is the end, and we’ll never see Shampoo again – as she states, and the others imply.

Next time we’ll cover Volumes 5 and 6, where we see Shampoo again. We also get a few more introductions, two major – Cologne and Mousse from Shampoo’s Amazon village – and one minor, Gosunkugi, who is so sad the anime actually wrote him out for several seasons. In the meantime, this was a very enjoyable Ranma volume, and I look forward to gushing more words at you some July.

By Shigeru Mizuki. Released in Japan as “Comic Shouwashi” by Kodansha. Released in North America by Drawn & Quarterly.

As you may have gathered from the dates, this volume covers the majority of World War II – referred to by Mizuki as “The Pacific War”, as it is in Japan. While we don’t neglect the average Japanese civilian back home, there is definitely more of an emphasis on battles, troop movements, and the machinations of war here, with so many Japanese general names flying past you will be grateful there are endnotes explaining who they all are. Interwoven into this is Mizuki’s own storyline, as he continues to fail at most everything he tries until the day he is drafted into the army… and manages to fail there as well, leading to a horrifying cliffhanger.

The narration of events continues to be done mostly by Nezumi Otoko, Mizuki’s filthy coward character from Gegege no Kitaro. He’s a bit less noticeable here, as the narration has to move so quickly it doesn’t allow time for anyone to make yokai jokes. Still, only Nezumi Otoko would stand behind Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo and wrap his arms around them in a ‘we’re buddies’ hug. This isn’t to say his narration is biased, though – Nezumi Otoko is quick to point out the lies and deceit that Japan uses to advance its own thirst for power. In addition, the fact that he is sort of ‘out of time’ means that he can have the occasional chat with Mizuki the artist, appearing as himself in a slightly less exaggerated version of the Mizuki we see living though his late teenage years.

General Yamamoto is mentioned early in the book, right around Pearl Harbor, that if he can turn the tide in 6-12 months, everything will go Japan’s way, but if it takes longer, America will end up winning. Most of the focus of this book is that extended narrative, as we see battle after battle where Japan marches in and takes over… and then the tide begins to turn, more men are lost, less land is gained, and the Japanese government decides to start lying to its people about what’s going on – the Battle of Midway’s true casualties weren’t known publicly till well after the war.

And then there’s Mizuki himself. As I said in my first review, I suspect that he is exaggerating his past self for comic relief, but there’s still a sense that this is a young man who cannot stop aimlessly drifting through his life, and is easily influenced by those around him. He’s also beaten, a lot – those who recall Onward Towards Our Noble Deaths will see a number of similar scenes here. The reward for the beatings seems to be rising in rank so that you can beat others in turn, but Mizuki never even gets that far. The most tragic part of the entire book for me when when, assigned to the bugle corps, he finds the job boring and demands a transfer. His superiors try to talk him out of this THREE TIMES, but to no avail. And so he’s sent to the front, and ends up fighting for his life as we get yet another amazing cliffhanger ending.

A whole lot of this book continues to be a history textbook of sorts. But then again, this is a manga written for Japanese people, telling them things that, at the time of its publication (and indeed to an extent today) the government was not comfortable with admitting. As a result, it can be a bit didactic. Mizuki is not entirely condemning Japan – he discusses the Bataan death march, and notes what little choice the Japanese military had there given the climate. But certainly this is more critical than we’re used to seeing, and the facts are so riveting that you’ll find you can’t stop turning the page. Add to this the art style, which continues to shift between photorealism and goofy sketches, and you’ve got a second volume that’s just as essential as the first.

By Takashi Ikeda. Released in Japan in three separate volumes as “Sasameki Koto” by Media Factory, serialized in the magazine Comic Alive. Released in North America by One Peace Books.

This was one of those licenses I’d been waiting for for quite some time. Along with Aoi Hana, Sasameki Koto (released here as Whispered Words) was one of the big yuri manga of the last few years or so. It will seem quite familiar to those who read the genre. The tall, strong, dark-haired girl who does karate and her smaller, more feminine and gorgeous friend. Unrequited love out the wazoo. A cast of eccentric side characters there to help the main couple grow and change. And piles and piles of angst. Does it read well as an omnibus?

Actually, I’d argue that the omnibus format was the best way for this series to succeed, as there are a lot of issues with it as it starts off. It’s clearly meant to be more comedic, with Sumika’s crush being portrayed as genuine but subordinate to getting her into awkward situations. More to the point, Ushio can be very hard to like in the first part of this series. And then there’s Akemiya, who’s nice enough, but whose plotline feels like it belongs in another manga, and whose sister is easily the most aggravating character in the series. Were this not an omnibus, I can see a lot of folks giving up after Vol. 2 (which is also where the anime ended, as it didn’t want to overtake the manga).

About halfway through the third section, though, you sense the manga starting to take a more serious and character driven turn. I suspect the writer might have ended things with the folk dance, but was told the series was popular enough to continue, and so started to think about how to take things in a deeper, more fulfilling direction. This starts off oddly, with the addition of Lotte, a tiny German foreign exchange student who idolizes Sumika. But it really points out Sumika’s issues with who she is, and how Ushio has been unthinkingly making those issues harder and harder to overcome. The emotional high point to this volume is really high – Ushio getting upset at Sumika for allowing Lotte to push herself too hard in karate training, and Sumika just losing it and screaming how Lotte likes her for being big and strong – unlike Ushio, the subtext says.

And Ushio gets this, to be fair. A lot of the setup of Whispered Words is of a somewhat shallow, ditzy girl who gloms onto anything cute. A flashback at the end shows that this is pretty much a mask, and Ushio, caring for Sumika after running outside in the rain makes her get a cold (never let it be said this manga doesn’t use manga cliches 100%), starts to wonder what her feelings for her best friend are really like. Is this going to be the moment when the two of them finally get together?

Highly unlikely, we’ve got 6 more volumes (2 more omnibuses) to go. In the meantime, this is a decently translated volume with good reproduction. Sadly, the publisher is tiny, and apparently their budget could not stretch to a copy editor, as there are some bad, BAD typos. They will make you cringe. But I hope that doesn’t stop you from getting this series. The tone is changing to a more serious work by the end of this first omnibus, and I hope that it continues along those lines and we continue to see Sumika and Ushio suffer for their love (in a good way, of course.)

Also, this manga has Kyori, who is perfect. That is all.