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Sean Gaffney

Bookshelf Briefs 1/16/12

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This week, MJ, Michelle, Kate, and Sean take a look at recent releases from Yen Press, Viz Media, and Kodansha Comics.

13th Boy, Vol. 10 | By SangEun Lee | Yen Press – I swear, this series just keeps getting better and better. About the only thing keeping it from a perfect score in my book is the occasional obnoxious behavior from protagonist Hee-So, but the well-executed story and character growth more than make up for that. In this volume, Beatrice the erstwhile cactus strives to establish independence (and learns the price Whie-Young pays for using his power), Hee-So does her best to see Beatrice as an ordinary boy with legitimate feelings for her, Whie-Young is given the chance for a normal lifespan if he meets a specific condition, and one of the aspects of that condition falls in to place. This last is a great twist that leaves me honestly rather terrified about what’s in store for these characters in the final two volumes—which I need right now, please—but I wouldn’t have it any other way. – Michelle Smith

Afterschool Charisma, Vol. 5 | By Kumiko Suekane | Viz Media – For most of the series, Kai, St. Kleio’s only “ordinary” student, has remained an enigma. Volume five at last sheds light on Kai’s origins with a lengthy flashback in which he discovers that he, too, is a clone. These scenes bristle with tension; one can feel Kai’s frustration as he struggles to assert his unique identity, in spite of the fact his clone looks and acts just like him. Kai’s backstory serves another important purpose as well, offering several important clues about St. Kleio’s true purpose. Though volume five is one of the most information-dense installments of Afterschool Charisma to date, crack pacing, surprise twists, and a cliffhanger ending make it a swift and engaging read. – Katherine Dacey

Bamboo Blade, Vol. 11 | By Masahiro Totsuka and Aguri Igarashi | Yen Press – The start and end of this volume focuses on the self-doubts and backstory of Saya, the large tsukkomi of our little group of kendoists, and makes you think that this volume will be about the main cast. But just like Vol. 10 focused its attention on Ura and her backstory, here we get introduced to more participants in the television show that Kojiro’s team is going to be doing. There’s not much new here – the jealous actress who realizes that her co-star can outshine her in any athletic event has been seen in manga before this – but it’s still a good mine for humor, especially watching her flip moods and beat the hell out of her manager (and later yell at him for sexism, probably the manga’s best moment). Still, as enjoyable as this has been, and as much fun as Totsuka-san can make things, I’m really ready for the TV show to actually happen. I hope we see it in Vol. 12.-Sean Gaffney

Bleach, Vols. 36-37 | By Tite Kubo | Viz Media – Volume 36 is the best volume of Bleach since the conclusion of the Soul Society arc, as it takes us away from the interminable battle to rescue Orihime from Hueco Mundo and focuses instead on the history of enigmatic Kisuke Urahara and the first, secret betrayal by certain villainous Soul Reapers. Though it would’ve been cooler to have this information ten or fifteen volumes ago, it’s plenty engrossing as it is and even seems to reinvigorate the action when we return to present day. Volume 37 offers more awesome interaction between Orihime and her de-facto warden, and though I still don’t care much about Ichigo, I welcome the chance to see bishounen like Yumichika and Hisagi again, and actually find myself somewhat eager to continue the series. I haven’t felt that way about Bleach in a long time. – Michelle Smith

Dawn of the Arcana, Vol. 2 | By Rei Toma | Viz Media – The tension ramps up in this series’ second volume, as Princess Nakaba becomes more aware of her growing feelings for her new husband, as well as just how deeply those feelings conflict with her loyalty to long-time servant Loki. While this series is shaping up more and more to be another shoujo love triangle, it does have enough genuine intrigue to set it apart from the crowd. This volume also delves further into Nakaba’s preternatural abilities, which are perhaps more interesting than they first appeared. But what really makes this volume work is Nakaba’s inner conflict. Though there’s nothing really new going on there, it’s written from a place of real emotional truth, and that makes this series well worth reading. Toma’s expressive artwork is a highlight as well. Tentatively recommended. – MJ

Dengeki Daisy, Vol. 8 | By Kyousuke Motomi | Viz Media – Well, if you thought things would be easily resolved after last volume’s cliffhanger, think again. Kurosaki is quite aware that the message sent to Daisy was a fake – he says so on Page 21. But it doesn’t take much to make a broken soul shatter again, and Kurosaki is determined to remove himself from Teru’s life forever. Teru, after a brief chapter of self-pity and moping, isn’t having any of this, and asks everybody else to explain exactly what happened with Kurosaki and her brother. The explanation is the rest of the volume, and it’s by turns uplifting and crushing, as with most tragic backstories in shoujo. The drawback, of course, is that if you read this manga for the fun romance and humor between its two leads, there is precisely nothing here for you. Read it anyway, it’ll make the eventual reunion, presumably in Vol. 9 or 10, that much sweeter.-Sean Gaffney

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, Vol. 3 | By Kenji Kuroda and Kazuo Maekawa | Kodansha Comics – The main reason for Phoenix Wright fans to pick up this third volume is featured prominently on the front cover – Franziska Von Karma is the prosecutor this time around, and that means a lot of foolish fools and a lot of whip jokes – none better than at the start, where her side job is revealed. In fact, that seems to be a problem with most of these Ace Attorney mangas – the setup is invariably more interesting than the trial. Anyone reading this for the mystery will be disappointed – it’s obvious. Those who read it to see more Phoenix adventures should be pleased – there’s even a few shoutouts to the Apollo Justice game, as Phoenix gets an eerily accurate fortune given to him. There’s also some nice art here, showcasing the dramatic poses and plot revelations in ways the writing can’t quite match up to.-Sean Gaffney

Toriko, Vol. 8 | By Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro | Viz Media – The eighth volume of Toriko offers readers an entertaining respite from hand-to-hand combat, as Toriko and Komatsu visit Chef Setsuno, one of four “gourmet living legends” in the world. Setsuno is a hoot: she’s a demon in the kitchen, dispatching a chicken with ferocious precision, slicing vegetables mid-air, and preparing a broth of such purity that it’s invisible to the eye. Lest anyone confuse Toriko for Oishinbo, however, this pleasant interlude is swiftly followed by an action-packed trip to the Antarctic, where Toriko wrestles sharks, serpents, and evil gourmands for the chance to taste century soup, a dish that only materializes once every hundred years. Subtle it isn’t, but the characters’ goofy antics and goofy powers (“Flying fork!” and “Long-range bazooka breath!” were my personal favorites) mitigate against macho excess. – Katherine Dacey

Love Hina Omnibus, Vol. 2

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By Ken Akamatsu. Released in Japan by Kodansha, serialized in the magazine Weekly Shonen Magazine. Released in North America by Kodansha Comics.

At the end of the last Love Hina omnibus, we left our hero and heroine having just failed their entrance exams. We open this second volume with Keitaro depressed. This is his third straight failure, and the pressure is on him to find something else to do with his life besides apply to Todai. What’s more, a dashing (if eccentric) young man has arrived in town. This is Seta, Naru’s crush, and Keitaro completely fails to measure up to him. Seta also brings along a young girl, Sarah, who like many bratty young girls in manga proceeds to abuse and belittle our hero at every turn. Is it any wonder Keitaro decides to give up?

I’ll be honest, I still find Keitaro a weakness in this series. Searching for a purpose in life is all very well and good, and god knows we’ve all done it. The trouble is that we haven’t all had six different women all find they have feelings for us. Keitaro is still mostly defined by his failures and his bad luck, and occasionally being polite. He needs to have a better goal than ‘get into university so I can meet my mysterious promised girl’. We actually do start to see the first hint of that here, but I only know this because I’ve read the series before. For a new reader who is unaware that Keitaro’s gluing pots together is foreshadowing, it’s just 3 more volumes of him accidentally walking in on women naked.

Speaking of the women, aside from Naru and Mutsumi, they’re once again given short shrift here. It amazes me that Negima has a cast of 31 main girls, as Akamatsu has enough trouble handling the 6 he has here. Shinobu, Motoko and Su continue to get a focus about every 15 chapters, and Kitsune gets even less than that. That said, Kitsune’s focus chapter was actually a high point of the volume, as we see her love of alcohol and mischief is tempered by a genuine desire to see Naru and Keitaro get over themselves. We also see that one should not try to play mind games with her unless one is prepared to face the consequences – she’s quite cunning. As for the others, Shinobu continues to worry about immaturity (and first kisses), and Motoko about being a samurai yet having romantic feelings. Su gets a brief chapter where we see what she might be like as an adult, but this doesn’t really change her personality noticeably.

The exception is Mutsumi, who gets her largest role here (she sadly appears less often as the series goes on, the curse of not actually living at the Inn). Mutsumi is a lot of fun, and the revelation that she’s actually quite intelligent and only failed one entrance exam as she forgot to put her name down is unsurprising. There are bigger revelations, however, as it becomes increasingly apparent to Naru that Mutsumi is the girl Keitaro made him promise to. This leads to a situation where Naru has to make a decision to give up on Keitaro in order to let him find his destiny. His destiny, of course, has spent the entire manga showing that she already knows that Keitaro and Naru are destined to be together. And once again true feelings end up getting buried (at least on Naru’s side – Mutsumi honestly seems OK with letting Keitaro go).

Love Hina continues to show the strengths that Akamatsu had at this time. Lots of physical comedy, lots of fanservice, and the ability to develop a cliched yet likeable romantic plot. It also shows off many of his weaknesses, which he would improve on with Negima. In the end, though, the big drawback is that I’m not a 22-year-old guy anymore, and Love Hina is a title that’s very rewarding for 22-year-old guys but very frustrating for ones who are older and more mature. For pure nostalgia reasons, this is worth a buy, however. And I seem to recall the next volume should be more interesting.

Manga the Week of 1/18

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3rd week of the month from Midtown Comics/Diamond usually means Yen Press, and indeed, that’s what we see here, with several new January releases!

(Note to Sailor Moon fans: we’re going by Diamond lists, and Kodansha books are always late to Diamond. I’m hoping for next week.)

Bandai, still trickling out its last few releases, has the 4th of its Code Geass “Queen” doujinshi anthologies, devoted to the female cast of Geass having fun sexy times together. Though not *that* sexy, this isn’t that kind of doujinshi.

Vertical puts out the penultimate volume of their release of Twin Spica! This is a 400-page bumper crop of space academy goodness, featuring the Japanese Vol. 13 and 14, I believe. Definitely read it if you want to feel happy and sad at the same time (which is what this series specializes in).

Viz apparently has the 5th volume of Pokemon Black and White, which I admit I know little about. But it’s Pokemon, and that still sells after all these years. Must be doing something right.

And then there’s the big pile of Yen. The big debut this month is the manga adaptation of Durarara!! It’s not the light novel license fans wanted (likely as that would sell about 15 copies each); and it’s not the anime (which has the benefit of awesome voice acting), but I’m hoping this adaptation works well with its source material, as opposed to other anime/novel/manga franchises currently being released by Yen where the manga suffers in comparison (coughHaruhicough). I will admit the cover is a great start. Very stylish!

Also from Yen, we have Vol. 8 of the runaway bestseller Black Butler; the final volume of Yen’s Shonen Sunday title Darren Shan, known over here as Cirque Du Freak; the final volume of Zombie Loan, another Peach-Pit classic; Volume 5 of tits ‘n gore series High School Of The Dead; and Volume 8 of fantasy/mystery/Lewis Carroll pastiche Pandora Hearts. There’s also new volumes of 13th Boy and Black God, for you fans of Korean Manwha. Lastly, the 4th volume of one of my favorite novel series is coming out from Yen: Book Girl and the Corrupted Angel. I wonder if this will resolve the pseudo-cliffhanger from the last book, or leave us dangling some more? Can’t wait to find out…

Anything appealing to you this week?

Pick of the Week: Farewell, Bandai

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The pickin’s are somewhat slim this week at Midtown Comics, but the Battle Robot is able to find a few comics worth buying.

SEAN: … I’ll be honest, nothing thrills me from this week’s manga list. Instead, my vote goes to Vol. 3 of IDW’s Best of Dan DeCarlo, another in their line of Archie Comics series devoted to classic authors. Admittedly, it would have been nice to see the fine folks at Archie show love to these artists while they were still alive, but we can’t have everything. The first collection of Dan’s work focused almost entirely on his Betty and Veronica classics, and that makes sense: Dan is most famous for the way he drew the female form, and those comics best show that off. Now that we’re three volumes in, I’m wondering if we’ll see some more variety. Plus this collection likely means even more scripts by Frank Doyle, who was simply the best writer Archie ever had in its classic years.

BRIGID: I probably wouldn’t do this if there were a stronger selection to choose from, but my pick is vol. 3 of Kannagi, both because it’s a nice series and as a tribute to the publisher, Bandai Entertainment, which is closing up shop next month. That means there will be no new volumes of Kannagi. That might be a good thing. The first volume was a pleasant surprise, the second volume a bit weaker. Still, I enjoy Eri Takenashi’s elegantly simple art, and Bandai did a nice job with production on these books. I’ll miss Kannagi.

MJ: I’m going to follow Brigid’s example here, and throw my vote to Kannagi. I enjoyed the series’ first volume quite a bit, and was disappointed by the second, but I’ve held out hope that the third might steer the story back to its original trajectory. I’m sorry to see Kannagi and Bandai go. Manga was never the compay’s focus, but they worked hard to do well by it and learned from their mistakes. It’s a shame this series won’t be completed in English.

KATE: My choice is the final volume of Hyde & Closer. At seven volumes, the series never overstays its welcome, offering readers an enjoyable mixture of comedy and horror, with a sprinkling of life lessons. The crisp, imaginative artwork is another plus; Haro Aso had a talent for transforming seemingly benign toys — a kokeshi doll, a teddy bear — into lethal weapons. (Do I really need to say more than “teddy bears with chainsaws” to sell you on the concept?) It’s a pity the series was saddled with an Older Teen rating, as it’s a perfect choice for younger teens who’ve outgrown material like BakeGyamon: Backwards Game but aren’t quite ready for the more mature shonen titles in VIZ, Yen Press, and Kodansha’s catalogs.

MICHELLE: Ordinarily, I’d cast my vote for volume five of Bokurano: Ours, but as I’ve done so at least once already, I’ll focus instead on volume 41 of Case Closed, which I talked about in a recent Off the Shelf column. I realize it’s unlikely that anyone new to a series would decide to start with volume 41, but Case Closed is the rare example of a manga where one could legitimately do this, not be lost, and enjoy it. All it takes is being in the mood for a mystery that features gadget-assisted sleuthing and convoluted murder puzzles. If this were seinen, no doubt the series would be more grim and realistic. Because it’s shounen, though, readers are in for uncomplicated fun.

Readers, what looks good to you this week?

Bookshelf Briefs 1/9/12

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This week, MJ, Michelle, Kate, & Sean take a look at new releases from Vertical Inc., Viz Media, Kodansha Comics, and Dark Horse.

Chi’s Sweet Home, Vol. 7 | By Konami Kanata | Vertical, Inc. – One might imagine that a manga series about the life of a cute cat would eventually become… boring. Fortunately, the appeal of Chi’s Sweet Home endures, adding to the internet’s growing body of evidence suggesting that the human fascination with feline behavior is essentially endless. In volume seven, Chi spends some time out of the house with stray cat Cocchi, who introduces her to the neighborhood’s best food sources, for better or worse. This series remains as fresh and charming as ever, and also stands as one of the few currently-running manga that can be successfully picked up at pretty much any point. This volume works as well as a stand-alone set of cute cat comics as it does as part of a heart-warming series, so there’s no excuse for passing on it, even if you’ve missed what’s come before. Still recommended. -MJ

Chi’s Sweet Home, Vol. 7 | By Konami Kanata | Vertical, Inc. – As a cat owner, I read Chi with a certain amount of sympathy for all parties concerned. This is especially true in this volume, wherein Chi eats something strange while exploring outside and ends up being whisked to the vet for treatment by her frantic owners. (Barf is such a ubiquitous part of cat ownership I’m actually pretty amazed that it took until chapter 127 for Kanata to get around to depicting it!) True, sometimes her owners still do very unwise things (like bring a new goldfish into their home), but Yohei continues to be adorable, as do Chi’s outdoor pals. I’m especially fond of Cocchi, a kitten without a home who plays gruff but secretly enjoys cuddling with Chi. His sad story—and Chi’s brush with danger—also serve to show that this series doesn’t need to rely on cuteness to affect its audience. Perennially recommended. – Michelle Smith

No Longer Human, Vol. 2 | Based on the novel by Osamu Dazai, Adapted by Usamaru Furuya | Vertical, Inc. – I’m of two minds about No Longer Human. On the one hand, Usamaru Furuya’s sense of pacing and narrative has never been stronger; working from Osamu Dazai’s text, Furuya has crafted a grim but compelling story about a young man’s fall from grace. On the other hand, Furuya’s interpretation of the lead character, Yozo, is less nuanced than Dazai’s; Yozo has been transformed a young man paralyzed by his own self awareness to a garden-variety narcissist who thinks only of himself. That small but important change gives the material a bitter aftertaste, making No Longer Human a difficult manga to read — not because bad things happen, but because the hero’s apathy makes him seem like more of a jerk than a wounded soul. An uneven but worthy introduction to Dazai’s work. -Katherine Dacey

Negima! Magister Negi Magi Omnibus, Vol. 3 | By Ken Akamatsu | Kodansha Comics. – This third omnibus, containing Vols. 7-9 of Negima, sees Akamatsu shuffle plot points into position, dot i’s and cross t’s, and generally prepare for the next big arc, the fighting tournament. Most of Vol. 7 is taken up with a fight between Negi and Asuna, who is at her most Naru-esque here, a trait she’ll lose as the series goes on. Vol. 8 reintroduces Kotaro, but on Negi’s side and becoming a much needed “male friend”. The translation by the Nibleys had less to alter here – Trish Ledoux was not as free as Peter David was – so it’s not as absolutely necessary a buy as 1 and 2 were. Still, those re-reading will enjoy the foreshadowing of things that happened years later Akamatsu throws in here, as well as casually dropping in his first big villain – one of Negi’s own students! There’s also less service here (though still quite a bit), leading me to think this is where Akamatsu gained control over Kodansha’s editors.-Sean Gaffney

Oh My Goddess, Vol. 40 | By Kosuke Fujishima | Dark Horse Comics. – If you skip to the Letters column of this very short volume, you’ll see Carl apologizing – it was only 112 pages in Japan as well, for unknown reasons. It’s supposed to be a one-time thing. Still, we do get some action in these 5 chapters, as Keiichi and the three goddesses begin their journey into Hell to battle Hild’s usurpers. Keiichi’s place in the group is brought up a few times, and we get a few good reasons why he’s there – he’s genuinely good at strategy and thinking on his feet, something we’ve seen before but tend to forget because it’s balanced with so much of him waffling and not shtupping Belldandy. Speaking of whom, Bell’s jealousy is really starting to get lampshaded in these chapters – Hild’s farewell kiss causes Bell to lose control of her powers, and when a demon threatens Keiichi, she’s quick to break in with a pointed threat. Those who have read the series all along will still enjoy this volume, small though it may be.-Sean Gaffney

Psyren, Vol. 2 | By Toshiaki Iwashiro | Viz Media – The second volume of Psyren is a minor improvement on the first, thanks in large part to the introduction of a second memorable female character, Matsuri Yagumo, a motorcycle-riding concert pianist who also wields a mean kitana. Though we’re treated to a few moments of Matsuri strutting her stuff, her primary role — in this volume, at least — is to explain the rules of Psyren to newcomers Ageha and Hiryu. Those exposition-dense passages dominate the volume, slowing the narrative to a crawl while Matsuri lectures the boys on how to use their psionic powers and what they can expect to see within the game. With the basic groundwork for the story laid, one can only hope that the talk-to-action ratio in volume three will cant more strongly towards the latter. -Katherine Dacey

Oresama Teacher, Vol. 6

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By Izumi Tsubaki. Released in Japan by Hakusensha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Hana to Yume. Released in North America by Viz.

It’s the rare manga that can make me laugh when I open the front cover and look at the title page, but that’s what Oresama Teacher does here. Shinobu not only lampshades one of the more obvious faults of this series (a lack of other female characters), he also suggests Mafuyu is trying to create a “reverse harem”. Though there are a few guys here that are falling for her, I’d argue that he’s incorrect. This isn’t a reverse harem as this series is simply not focused on romance – mostly as the leads are too dense to understand what they’re feeling. How can you recognize love if simple friendship is beyond you?

Likewise, the first chapter of this volume is simply top comedy, as we meet yet another cast member with no common sense. Shinobu is simply a flake, albeit a skilled one, and therefore matches up well with “Super Bun”, who gets trotted out here again to my delight. It’s interesting to note that Shinobu flat out worships the series’ main villain, Miyabi. In fact, it almost borders on BL, without ever quite going there (just in case both are needed later to have feelings for Mafuyu). The fight itself, meanwhile, shows how clever Mafouyu can be when she’s strategic – thinking on her feet about how best to defeat a ninja and even using some pseudo-ninja techniques.

The rest of the volume is not nearly as funny, but that’s not a bad thing – we’re finally getting a pile of plot and backstory that has been hidden from us. Shinobu ends up joining the Public Morals Squad (as the world’s most obvious mole), and the three club members start to analyze exactly why the bet the school principal has with Saeki is so weird – why does the administration WANT delinquency in the school? Mafuyu thinks that she now has enough that she can get Saeki to tell her the rest, but he proves surprisingly cold, pushing her away by pushing on one of her biggest buttons – the “I want to stop being a delinquent” button. But is that really what she wants?

Having also been abandoned by Hayasaka (whose reasons are far more teenage boy-oriented than Saeki’s), we then get a wonderful scene of her opening up to the other girls in the class, and trying to be friends with them. It’s wonderful not only because her desperation and tomboyishness is amusing, but also because the other girls in class genuinely seem to like her, even if they find her incredibly strange. You could argue this is because they’ve never seen her fighting, but it’s rather nice, and makes me hope that one day we will see more female presence in this manga. It’s not going to be today, though – after defending Hayasaka, who still has his horrible reputation, Mafuyu runs off, realizing that hanging out with the other guys is where she wants to be.

Then there’s Saeki. If you recall, he’s the title character (though France actually changed the title to “Girl Fight”, putting the emphasis more on Mafuyu). His reasons for pushing Mafuyu away are entirely predictable, but this doesn’t make them poorly written, and the scenes with his grandfather are both touching and intriguing. A telling point comes towards the start of the book, when Mafuyu is running off to fight Shinobu, and Saeki asks her why she fights. Note that she doesn’t give a typical manga reason like “to defend the weak” or “to battle injustice”. She fights because she was challenged, and that’s it. She is Saeki’s reminder of what he once was, and that’s why he tries to get rid of her. Of course, she’s made of sterner stuff, which he knows but would rather not admit.

We end on a cliffhanger, with Saeki starting to tell Mafuyu the real reason for the bet, and what the bet actually involves. It’s going to be a long wait till the next volume, but when it comes I’m willing to bet there will be lots of fights, stupidity, and shoujo cliches. Just the way I like it.

Going Digital: January 2012

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Welcome to Going Digital, Manga Bookshelf’s monthly feature focusing on manga available for digital viewing or download. Each month, the Manga Bookshelf bloggers review a selection of comics we’ve read on our computers, phones, or tablet devices, to give readers a taste of what’s out there, old and new, and how well it works in digital form.

This month, we’ll take a look at Digital Manga Publishing’s new iPad app, as well as a couple of manga published for viewing in your web browser. Device, OS, and browser information is included with each review as appropriate, to let you know exactly how we accessed what we read.


Apps

Digital Manga Publishing | iPad app | iPad 2, iOS 5.0.1 – Though most manga publishers have been playing catch-up when it comes to digital manga, Digital Manga Publishing has been in the game all along. While other publishers have struggled with user-unfriendly systems and disappointing selection, DMP’s eManga store made it all look easy, with its slick, robust viewer and large collection of titles.

Given DMP’s forward-thinking business model, it’s a bit surprising to note that they are one of the last English-language manga publishers to embrace iOS as a platform for digital comics. Fortunately, they’re well on their way to getting it right.

(click images to enlarge)

DMP’s storefront is extremely promising, at least at first glance. Buttons across the top indicate a wealth of available genres pulled from each of their BL imprints, as well as standard shoujo and other “mainstream” manga, though clicking on any of these quickly reveals the weaknesses of their iOS catalogue. Several of these tabs lead to pretty much the same small mix of instructional manga and other random titles, with nearly the entire current catalogue coming from their Juné, 801 Media, and Digital Manga Guild imprints. Price point is a weakness here, too. As with eManga, DMP counts on the willingness of BL fans to pay premium for their content, but with most titles going for nearly double the price of single volumes from publishers like Viz and Kodansha, these purchases do feel a bit painful.

I rather reluctantly plunked down $8.99 for the second volume of the two-volume BL series Seven Days, the first of which I’d enjoyed quite a bit, and while the value of a volume downloaded to my iPad definitely feels weightier than an indefinite rental at eManga, it’s disheartening to note that I could have picked it up for less in print from the publisher’s own online store.

Fortunately for DMP, I’ve discovered that I rather like reading on my iPad, perhaps even better than print (thanks largely to inadequate lighting in my small downtown apartment), and the reading experience is something they decidedly get right.

Like all the best apps for manga on the iPad, DMP’s runs smoothly and intuitively, flipping from page to page with no visual delay, and adjusting nicely between single and dual page views, with no reduction in readability.

(click images to enlarge)

The one initial oddity is the arrow tab that appears in the bottom left corner of every page. Though it does obscure a tiny portion of the page in view, the payoff is more than worth it. When touched, the tab reveals a smooth-scrolling view of each page in the volume, allowing for quick, easy access to earlier pages at a glance.

As a reviewer, especially, one of the downsides of digital is the lack of physical memory provided by a print volume. Our minds retain the sense of where something was in a volume based on sight and feel, so it’s always easy to find something, usually even after significant time has passed since the first reading. While it’s not possible to recreate this feeling entirely on a digital platform, the inclusion of thumbnail images to the simple scroll bar used by other manga apps goes a long way towards providing a real sense of flipping through a physical book.

Though minimal selection in non-BL genres combined with substantial sticker shock may make keep DMP’s app from performing as well as others, its top-notch manga reader makes it a winner, at least from a usability standpoint. Good going, DMP. – MJ


Web Browser

Nao Go Straight – Guide Dog Trainer Vol. 1 | By Yasuto Tamamoto | Futabasha, Manga Action | JManga.com | Windows XP, Firefox 8.0
There is a certain sort of manga seen over in Japan that doesn’t always make it to North America, and this series is an excellent example of it. You have the bright young protagonist, who is naive and perhaps tends to fail at a lot of things, but has a talent that is just itching to be taken advantage of. They find themselves at a new job, filled with energy and vigor. Then they begin to have second thoughts, as the job is much harder than they’d expected. Do they really have what it takes to keep up with this grueling regimen? And there’s that one guy, who’s their boss or manager or someone with authority over them, who *hates* the protagonist, and finds fault in everything they do. Of course, as the manga goes on the protagonist learns to find the joy in the job, and finds that guy was being extra harsh on them because they showed the most promise. All is well.

The job and the protagonist differ from manga to manga, of course, and here we have the word of dog training – specifically, training guide dogs for the blind. Our heroine is Nao, who keeps leaving or getting fired from jobs. Her problem is that she’s too empathic – which in a setting like Japan can be hideously detrimental. How creepy, she knows how I’m feeling! Then one day she runs into a brash young blind man, Yamazaki. He realizes that the traits she exhibits are a natural for working with guide dogs, and suggests that she check out a school he has a mysterious affiliation with. Of course, there are other, more experienced candidates there as well. This is just the beginning for poor Nao…

I’ll be honest – this first volume can feel really dull. It’s a slow starter, and that can be hard in a series you’re not reading from week to week. Nao is nice and plucky, but ’empathy’ is not exactly a quirk that reaches out and catches your interest. Likewise, the art is OK, but not great – the mangaka was able to put his bland style to better use in Ninja Papa (yes, it’s the same author), but here it’s merely bland. That said, if you’re at all interested in the actual subject of the manga – training guide dogs – the manga will interest you. There’s about 60 Labrador Retrievers here, all seemingly alike, yet as Nao grows to recognize their quirks they gain more personality – particularly Choko, the dog who no doubt will become Nao’s pet project (so to speak). So, to sum up: decent manga, but mostly for dog lovers.-Sean Gaffney

Sherlock Holmes, Vol. 1 | By Toya Ataka | Asahi Shimbun Publications Inc. | JManga.com | Mac OS 10.7.2, Chrome 16.0.912.63 – In this supernaturally-charged version of London, some have attained the power of “Shadow Masters,” people who are able to use their shadows to perform super-human deeds on their behalf. One of these is teen sleuth Sherlock Holmes who enlists the power of his shadow to invisibly probe his surroundings, a talent that keeps him (and his cocky grown-up partner, Watson) in business.

Though I’m pleased to report that this is a mildly fun supernatural detective series in a not-quite-as-good-as-Tokyo-Bablyon sort of way, the question you may be asking is, “What on earth does it have to do with Sherlock Holmes?” The answer is, “Nothing. Nothing at all.”

Though it has borrowed some names from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s legendary tales (including Holmes’ landlady, Mrs. Hudson) and its leads make their living as detectives, that is the full extent of this manga’s similarity to any previous incarnation of Sherlock Holmes. This is unfortunate, for though this series does have some qualities to recommend it (crisp, detailed artwork and genuinely creepy villains, for instance), it suffers badly in comparison to its namesake, and even to most of the original series’ popular adaptations.

The series’ supernatural premise certainly shows promise, though its origins are so little explained in the first volume, it’s difficult to know now whether that promise will be fulfilled. And, unfortunately, a sloppy English adaptation makes for some unintentionally humorous moments, such as in this piece of dialogue, “He is Sara, the actress’ sponsor,” which makes it appear as if the man being spoken of goes by the name of “Sara” (he doesn’t).

Overall, this is not a bad little title, but it might have done better to avoid comparison with far superior works. Though the name “Sherlock Holmes” may certainly draw readers, it’s unlikely to keep them based on such unfulfilled expectations. Buyer beware. – MJ

Ouran High School Host Club, Vol. 17

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By Bisco Hatori. Released in Japan as “Ouran Koukou Host Club” by Hakusensha, serialized in the magazine LaLa. Released in North America by Viz.

It’s the second to last volume of Ouran, and things really aren’t getting any funnier. Not that there isn’t humor in this, especially towards the end, but the main thrust of this volume remains the family drama surrounding Tamaki and how it gets resolved. We’re in full soap opera mode here, and the tension is so high that even Kyoya loses it and starts screaming.

I was rather surprised at how well all of this holds together considering that so much of it is a giant infodump that’s hurled at us. The huge, convoluted plan that Tamaki’s father has would seem completely ridiculous until you remember that it’s Tamaki’s father, who has proven before to be as overdramatic as his son. Of *course* he would use the convoluted, overcomplicated plan! Actually, the family dynamics here are one of the best parts of the volume. Haruhi remarks how Tamaki, his father and his grandmother all share a bullheaded stubbornness, and we certainly see that here. I was quite p;leased with the depth that the grandmother got in particular, and I hope the final volume gives us some more resolution.

We also get some more of Tamaki’s mother. Given how she’s been presented as this beautiful-yet-weak fragile woman, it makes complete sense that she seems to suffer from the Ouran version of Love Story Disease, where one grows more beautiful the sicker one gets. That said, what little we see of her shows she’s not merely a potted plant – I loved her casual beating up of Tamaki’s father over what he did – it’s meant to remind us of Haruhi, I think. I suspect that Haruhi and Tamaki’s mother will get along swimmingly after the series ends.

Haruhi mostly has it easy here, getting to see Tamaki’s serious, stubborn yet noble side. It’s the side that’s easiest to fall in love with, and she has far fewer issues with it. Of course, she’s fallen in love with *all* of Tamaki, which also means you get his goofy, over the top side as well. And she *does* love that side, and not merely tolerate it. There is a wonderful inner monologue right towards the end of the volume where Haruhi reflects on joining the Host Club. Just as Haruhi keeps Tamaki grounded and attempts to tone down the worst of his excesses, so Tamaki shows Haruhi a world that she would never have otherwise experienced. I know this is a reverse harem manga, and there are many Ouran fans who would have preferred that Haruhi end up with Hikaru or Kyoya. But I think Hatori-san did an excellent job of showing why Tamaki is the real winner here.

And at the end of the volume those feelings are finally admitted in the open. After the catharsis of seeing Tamaki and his mother reunite, even if only for three minutes, Haruhi finally takes all the emotions that she’s felt over the past 17 volumes and tells Tamaki that she loves him. We don’t hear his response, of course – there’s still one volume to go. Somehow I’m going to guess he’ll overreact. Now that almost all the drama of Ouran has been resolved, I’m expecting a return to high comedy for the final one. Sadly, it’s another six-month wait. The curse of being caught up in Japan!

Manga the Week of 1/11

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A nice, reasonable 2nd week this month, with many interesting things coming out. Also, I’ll be getting Wandering Son 2 finally. Why I’m getting it after the rest of you already have, I don’t know.

Bandai emits a last gasp with its release of Volume 3 of the shrine maiden harem comedy Kannagi. If you want to know how it ends, I advise watching the anime, I suppose.

Dark Horse reminds us it’s not all just Gantz and Oh My Goddess there these days. They also have their various Evangelion spinoffs! This is Volume 10 of the AU story Shinji Ikari Raising Project, which seems to mostly be a kinder, gentler Evangelion. A reminder that it’s edited by Carl Horn as well. I wonder if it has extensive endnotes…

Seven Seas has a new volume of the big bestseller Dance in the Vampire Bund, which I’m sure they’re very happy remains an ongoing series in Japan. How long it remains ongoing is an interesting question, as Media Factory was just bought by Kadokawa. I’m not sure what they’ll be doing with Comic Flapper. Could this series move to Young Ace? At least, unlike Hayate x Blade, Seven Seas doesn’t have to worry about the series moving to a company that it’s near impossible to license from.

Manga Ends On Sunday as we see the final volume of Hyde & Closer from Viz. They’ve also got a much longer running Sunday series with Case Closed Vol. 41. And for older readers who perhaps want a bit more violence and death, there’s new volumes of Jormungand from Sunday GX and Bokurano: Ours from Ikki.

Anything appealing to you this week?

Higurashi: When They Cry, Vol. 16

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Story by Ryukishi07; Art by Karin Suzuragi. Released in Japan as “Higurashi no Naku Koro ni: Tsumihoroboshi-hen” by Square Enix, serialized in the magazine Gangan Powered. Released in North America by Yen Press.

As the Higurashi series has gone on, the descent into murder and gore has seemingly come faster and faster, with far less build-up. This is, of course, because the audience is well aware of what’s going to happen and needs less setup. Of course, just because the first volume ended with Rena committing bloody murder doesn’t mean things get to wrap up quickly. What’s going to happen in Volume 2?

Well, another murder. Right away. The first images we see are of Rena luring Satoko’s uncle out to the trash heap and killing him brutally with an axe. Of course, this leaves her with two corpses she has to get rid of. And it doesn’t help that she killed them in the one place that everyone who knows her well would go if they wanted to find her. So it does not take long for her to be discovered. This is where much of the horror comes in this volume – Keiichi and the others are determined to cheer Rena up, and the discovery of her hacking the corpses to pieces with her billhook… it’s chilling. As is Rena’s desperate response, asking why they had to show up *now* when she was almost finished covering everything up?

And so the next half of the manga deals with Rena’s confrontation with the rest of her friends. It’s an interesting examination of guilt, with Keiichi and company all feeling the exact same way – “why didn’t we notice how badly Rena was hurting before?” This is not helped by Rena slowly sinking back into paranoia and madness, and accusing them of the same thing. Here, though, is where Keiichi really steps up. In my previous reviews, I tended to call him an idiot a lot, and indeed he was. But in this arc, where he’s not the main character, he shows amazing insight and strength – I particularly liked him noting that Rena was crying “in her heart” this whole time, which helps lead to Rena finally shedding actual tears.

There’s an examination of “inaction” as a whole here, and in fact all of the others – Keiichi, Mion, Satoko and Rika – all apologize to Rena for various things they could have noticed and taken action about, but didn’t. And then they all choose to forgive each other – including Rena, the murderer here – and help her take care of her problems. Which, yes, means helping her chop up and hide the bodies. It’s amazing how heartwarming this is given what’s actually going on. But that’s Higurashi for you.

Of course, things have only just begun. Just as Rena is getting back to her regular school life, along comes the school nurse, Miyo Takano, with her notebook filled with Hinamizawa analysis. I’m really getting to dislike her – yes, she keeps getting killed off, but she manages to be quite creepy regardless, in a skin-crawling way. What’s more, she gets Rena reading about Hinamizawa’s past, including the three families. Is everything that’s gone on before a giant conspiracy? And why is Rena being followed all the time now? She does try to confide in Keiichi, but can she even trust him?

This book starts out very gore-laden, but quickly becomes an examination of what trust is – and what people can be forgiven for. The cast are very quick to blame themselves for what Rena did, and forgive her for the murders – but was that really the right thing to do? Moreover, if everyone is involved in a townwide conspiracy, is there anyway to trust someone without overanalyzing everything until you draw the inevitable conclusions? For all that the cast descends into paranoia in this series, it’s not as if they don’t have help. And oh look, there’s Oishii as well, the police officer who means well, but tends to make everything worse. So we’re now halfway through, and not any closer to Atonement. Will this all end as badly as Shion’s arc did?

Pick of the Week: Manga & More

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It’s a new year, and Midtown Comics gets things started with a hefty shipment of new manga. See what Michelle, Sean, Kate, and MJare looking forward to this week!

MICHELLE: It’s the first pick of the new year! There are actually several likely candidates on the list of manga due to arrive this week, including Kimi ni Todoke, One Piece, and Oresama Teacher. But I am going to have to award my pick to a shoujo manga that I continue to love even as it approaches its 30th volume: Skip Beat!. In practically any other series, the fact that the heroine, Kyoko, is still oblivious to the hero’s feelings for her would be series-droppingly annoying by this point, but somehow, Skip Beat! makes it work. It helps that Kyoko is spirited, determined, and focused on her career, and the funny moments (pretty much any time Kyoko wears a chicken costume) are also worth the price of admission.

KATE: I’m just getting up to speed with Skip Beat!, so my vote goes to Government Issue: Comics for the People, 1940s – 2000s. This anthology has actually been available for a couple of months, so it’s a little surprising to see it appear on the Midtown Comics list this week. But if you missed it when it was originally released in November, now’s your chance to see how the American government has harnessed the comics medium to educate its constituents about a range of topics, from nuclear war to AIDS. The book is divided into four sections: comics about the military; comics about employment and economics; comics about civil defense, safety, and health; and comics about landscapes and lifestyles. Though the contextual essays are a little too brief to be truly revelatory, the comics speak for themselves, offering readers a fascinating window into twentieth-century history.

SEAN: It’s getting so that every new volume of Oresama Teacher is making me even happier than the last. The author has a flair for writing very dumb characters in such a way that you not only like them but root for them, and yet at the same time your jaw drops every time they miss the blatantly obvious. It also manages to ride a very fine line, not quite being supportive of young teenagers being in gangs, but at the same time showing the deep bonds of friendship that exist within such structures. As for Mafuyu’s various relationships with the various males in the series, I can honestly say I have absolutely no idea who she’ll end up with, if anyone. Which is a rarity for most manga both shonen and shoujo, where the end pairing always seems set in stone from the very beginning. And she kicks everyone’s ass as well. Fantastic series.

MJ: Though this week is chock full of (mostly Viz) goodness, I find myself drifting to a book I picked up from last week’s list, volume two of Takako Shimura’s Wandering Son from Fantagraphics. I absolutely loved the first volume of this series, and I was thrilled to see this pop up a couple of weeks ahead of what I’d thought was its official release date. This is one of those highly-anticipated series that turned out to be even better than I expected, which is a pretty rare treat. Though its beautiful hardcover presentation puts it in a higher price bracket than most manga, it’s required reading as far as I’m concerned, deserving of a nice, long shelf life. Definitely worth saving up for.

Readers, what looks good to you this week?

Bookshelf Briefs 1/2/12

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This week, Sean, Michelle, & MJtake a look at recent releases from Viz Media, Yen Press, and Del Rey Manga.

Blue Exorcist, Vol. 5 | By Kazue Kato | Viz Media – The revelation from Volume 4 continues to reverberate in this volume, as now that Rin is known to be the son of Satan most of the class is treating him differently – even Shiemi, much to his dismay. To her credit, she at least realizes that what she’s doing is wrong. Still, it was nice to see Izumo step up and show she doesn’t think anything has changed. A lot of this volume deals with what Rin is supposed to be because of his heritage versus what he actually is in real life – as Rin notes, he did not personally destroy entire families, so why is he being blamed for it? Meanwhile, we meet Ryuji, Renzo and Konoekomaru’s families, and get into the next big plot point, involving the theft of demonic artifacts. As always with Jump titles, a lot of the time the resolution comes down to shouting at other people. But that’s OK, it’s still a lot of fun.-Sean Gaffney

Kamisama Kiss, Vol. 6 | By Julietta Suzuki | Viz Media – Much of tis volume has another old, tried-and-true trop from shoujo manga. We meet a girl, Kayako Hiragi, who would appear to be a new rival as well as a horrible person who sneers at Nanami and has no idea how she could possibly get anyone to follow her… then spend the next few chapters showing how this attitude is a facade and she’s really broken and terrified deep down. It works here because Suzuki is a good writer and because Nanami does not let lack of raw power interfere with her basic niceness. Of course, she also DOES show some awesome new power here. One thing to note: the scene with the black tar spider demon attempting to possess/eat Nanami was bad enough, but Nanami’s cry of “don’t come inside me” gave it an even creepier feeling I wasn’t expecting from a cutesy Hana to Yume manga.-Sean Gaffney

Kobato., Vol. 5 | By CLAMP | Yen Press – The fifth volume of Kobato. provides some long-awaited details concerning how supernatural being Iorogi found himself chaperoning human Kobato on her heart-healing journey while stuck in the body of a stuffed animal. Unfortunately, despite this information and some truly gorgeous illustrations, I still just cannot connect with this series. I just don’t care that Kobato has fallen in love with Fujimoto, the hardworking part-time employee of Yomogi Kindergarten, and I just don’t care that her failure to complete her mission and have her wish granted has some sort of unfortunate consequence for Iorogi and his former underlings, who spend most of this volume standing around telling each other things they already know in order to fill in background for the reader. The most intriguing aspect of the series continues to be the yakuza, Okiura, but he’s only around for a few pages. Still, I’ll read the final volume to see how it wraps up. – Michelle Smith

My Girlfriend’s a Geek, Vol. 5 | By Rize Shinba and Pentabu | Yen Press – There’s nothing too exciting about the conclusion to My Girlfriend’s a Geek, but I think it’s probably better that way. Instead of manufactured drama, there are chapters about Taiga allowing the BL story he wrote for Yuiko’s eyes only to be posted to a website, the continuing effort to figure out whether Taiga’s friend Kouji has picked up on his sister’s otaku interests or is just really dense, and the final story, in which Taiga concludes that, though Yuiko is kind of bizarre and manipulative, being her boyfriend is “not such a bad life really.” It’s a pretty satisfying ending, though I could’ve done without the side story, in which a BL fanboy coerces his roommate to partake in his hobby with lines like, “You will do as I say, or I will sell your soiled underwear to dirty old men!!” What a charmer! – Michelle Smith

My Girlfriend’s A Geek, Vol. 5 | By Rize Shinba and Pentabu | Yen Press – I really enjoyed Volume 4, feeling that it finally managed to give Yuiko enough depth so that we could accept why Taiga would continue to be with her despite simply liking her looks. I was hoping for more from this, the final volume, but instead it seems a bit more like “we’ve run out of plot, do a few more chapters then wrap it up.” Not to say there’s not interesting material here – I was highly amused at finding that Kouji sees his sister in such a set way that he doesn’t realize that in reality she’s MUCH WORSE – but the chapter focusing on two roommates who are a BL version of Yuiko and Taiga felt very tacked on and pointless. Luckily, the last chapter was rather sweet – it stems from Yuiko’s fujoshi tendencies, and intimacy is still some ways away, but I’m happy we got to know this couple, and pleased we got to read this amusing if cynical look at BL fans and the men who put up with them.-Sean Gaffney

Natsume’s Book of Friends, Vol. 10 | By Yuki Midorikawa | Viz Media – This volume was a more slice-of-life turn from Natsume, as we see his attempts to help an old classmate who has fallen for a spirit, and impersonating a harvest god so that a local festival can go on. The latter is the far more dangerous task, and we get to see several action sequences that I’m not really used to seeing in this manga that’s usually more mellow about its yokai. This story also involves Natori and Hiragi as well, and I enjoy the way that Midorikawa-san draws their relationship. I also like the fact that the yokai are still not used to Natsume’s basic kindness and concern. Everyone continues to try to see an ulterior motive. Luckily, we have other characters to be the flawed types in this manga. Natsume’s just the upright noble lad – and we’re glad to see that.-Sean Gaffney

Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan, Vol. 6 | By Hiroshi Shiibashi | Viz Media – I generally try to avoid letting my shipping biases affect my reviews of any manga, so I will limit my discussion of the first chapter of Nura 6 to a brief SQUEE! and a note that Yuki-Onna really gets to be utterly badass. That said, the rest of the volume is not without its pleasures as well. The Tamazuki arc finally comes to an end, but not before he gets to show off exactly why he’s never going to beat Rikuo – the scene where he starts sacrificing his own Night Parade is chilling. The second half of the manga shows off Rikuo and his classmates investigating a rumored yokai at a coastal village, and features some chilling art – Shiibashi is particularly good at drawing good guys revealed to be bad guys in a creepy way. Nura is nice, solid Shonen Jump, and will appeal to those who enjoy Jump-type relationships and a more active yokai series than Natsume’s Book of Friends.-Sean Gaffney

Toriko, Vol. 7 | By Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro | Viz Media – After wrapping up their search for jewel meat (and saving Rin, who was not quite dead, as I suspected when I read Vol. 6), the majority of this volume shows Toriko on his own, accompanied only by his battle wolf Terry. Though it’s odd seeing him separated from pint-size best friend Komatsu, we do get a few character moments here and there – most notably Toriko’s hard love towards Terry, who has a tendency to try to protect Toriko from lethal creatures that Toriko doesn’t necessarily need protecting from. As always, though, the main reason to read this is to see what ludicrous food the author will come up with. BB Corn may look normal, but proves to be anything but – and we hear for the first time about what Toriko plans to make his entree. God. That is to say a food named God, before people start to panic. Still dumb fun.-Sean Gaffney

xxxHolic, Vol. 18 | By CLAMP | Del Rey Manga – One of several metaphysical themes that runs through the entirety of xxxHolic is the idea that time and place for are not things to be taken for granted. The series is filled with searching and waiting for that right time or place, and it tirelessly urges its characters to be patient as they endure. And though the series proper ended a couple of volumes ago, I find I’m grateful that it did not quite end, because watching someone like Watanuki actually learn how to wait has been a very special joy for me. To hear some factions of fandom tell it, I shouldn’t be enjoying this series anymore, but if anything, I’m enjoying it more than ever. Readers should not expect the kind of dramatic tension one usually finds in a series’ penultimate volume—that moment passed several volumes ago—but this postscript is well worth reading. Still recommended. -MJ

Sailor Moon MMF: Final Day Links

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It’s the end! Thank you all so much for your participation!

Just one link today: Jason Yadao examines his history with the series, and reminds us of that half-dubbed Mixx translation once more. :)

Again, special thanks to everyone who participated and promoted this MMF! It was a blast hosting it. And don’t forget the next MMF, hosted by Experiments in Manga, focusing on Usamaru Furuya. Details are here. I’ll be writing about Short Cuts!

Sailor Moon MMF: Day 6 Links

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We are getting near the end of the Feast! What will today bring?

Animemiz gives us two more articles on Sailor Moon, the first talking about the gorgeous Sailor Moon artbooks, and the second discussing her dislike of Chibi-Usa, and how she compares with the final arc’s Chibi-Chibi.

Zoe Alexander reviews the first Sailor V manga, and also gives us a look at her Top 10 favorite manga moments from Sailor Moon.

Lastly, I also did a list of my favorite moments.

Tomorrow will be the final post! Will there be more amazing stuff?

MMF: Top Five Sailor Moon Moments

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(There are obviously spoilers here for the anime and manga.)

These are my own personal top five, of course; if you asked ten different Sailor Moon fans you’d get ten lists. But these five are good examples of why I keep coming back to this manga/anime again and again. Three manga moments, and two from the anime.

5) Sailor Moon Super S manga – Dream 6: New Guardian Dream. I chose this chapter for many reasons. First of all, it’s fantastic to see the Outer senshi at rest, as it were. For all that they tend to be seen as the driven and pragmatic counterparts to the more emotional and caring senshi, they’re still meant to be high school girls, after all. (Well, mostly. Setsuna is debatable, see my previous post.) Here we see them all living as a family, celebrating their six month anniversary of having done so, since the end of S when Hotaru became an infant. They’ve also been unable to transform, so it’s been a bit of an idyllic rest for the three of them. However, Hotaru (who has gone from baby to 4-year-old in 6 months, and ages here to approximately 13 or so) is also there to remind them of their duties as senshi, and notes it’s time to get involved. This chapter, showing a different side of Haruka, Michiru and Setsuna, was so much fun that the anime, which had removed the Outers from the Super S story, went back and redid it as a prelude to Stars, just so they could show off how cool it was. I love the Outers, and this chapter is basically just seeing them all relax, then seeing them all kick ass. It’s great.

4) Sailor Moon Super S manga side-story – Rei and Minako’s Girl School Battle. Sailor Moon is a very funny series. However, I’ve noticed that a lot of the people talking about how funny it is tend to focus only on the anime. Now, it’s true that the anime has some side-splittingly funny episodes – I could easily have picked Nurse Minako from R or Minako’s Heart Crystal from S here as well, and debated it. But I went instead with this small chapter as I think it showed that Takeuchi’s characters are still her characters, and that they don’t need the expansion/exaggeration the anime sometimes gives them in order to be funny. The Rei we see here is definitely the manga version – the cool beauty and queen of her school – but we see how she gets driven to be just as angry as her anime counterpart. And Minako is simply fantastic – her drive to find out about Rei’s private school, completely being unable to fit in, and accidentally releasing the monster of the chapter through her own foolishness. And, of course, there’s the part that *everyone* remembers, which is Minako asking Rei if she has ever farted. Leaving aside that it’s Minako’s own way of trying to get Rei to admit that she’s just another girl like the rest of them, it is gloriously in character. What’s more, the punchline to the chapter – where Rei angrily says she has never farted, and that she’s nothing like Minako at all, makes me laugh hysterically – because of Takeuchi’s little side comment of an arrow pointing to a blushing Minako saying “has farted before”. Glorious.

3) Sailor Moon R – The Movie (climax). Sailor Moon had 3 movies made for the theater while it was running. But in general, when people talk about Sailor Moon movies, they mean *this* one – the first, and the best. Towards the end of the movie we see the other inner senshi watching Sailor Moon get throttled by the villain of the piece, and they all have little flashbacks to their lives before Usagi. And they’re all *incredibly depressing* – each one shows the girls being ostracized for being different or strange. Ami the intellectual, Rei the shrine maiden, Makoto the supposed “thug”, and Minako “always leaving” but unable to say she’s Sailor V. It’s beautifully done, and heartbreaking. Then later on Sailor Moon has defeated the villain, but there’s still the small matter of an asteroid headed for the Earth. Everyone teams up to stop it, and we see the Inner Senshi having another set of flashbacks – these showing Usagi coming into their lives, and her honest kindness and friendship being more than anyone could ask for. It shows how closely linked these five girls are, and it’s simply brilliant.

2) Sailor Moon R manga – Never Ending. This is the first of two to deal with the deaths of a sailor senshi. It’s a credit to both Takeuchi and the anime that even after we know about the senshi’s tendency to be resurrected and reincarnated, death is still a horrible, tear-jerking thing. This is the final chapter of the second arc, and all seems completely lost. Chibi-Usa is possessed as “Black Lady”, and Prince Diamond is about to cause a time paradox that will destroy not only Crystal Tokyo but causality. This leads Sailor Pluto to do the unthinkable – she stops time, allowing Sailor Moon to resolve things. As this happens, though, we see a much younger Pluto talking with Queen Serenity in a flashback, and she is told point blank that stopping time is forbidden, and that if she ever does it she will die. And that’s what happens, with Pluto barely getting time to say farewell before passing away. That’s not, however, why this is here. This is #2 because of Black Lady, who is startled to find tears streaming down her cheeks, becoming unpossessed and reverting to Chibi-Usa again. What’s more, Chibi-Usa has finally become able to unlock her powers – she transforms, and is now Sailor Chibi-Moon! Delighted, she turns to Pluto (who previous chapters have shown is essentially her only friend) and remarks on her transformation – only to become hysterical as she sees Pluto’s corpse, and begs her to open her eyes. I don’t think anyone can read this chapter and not be affected – it’s been over ten years since I read it, and I’m still tearing up just typing this.

1) Sailor Moon anime, episode 45. Yeah, there really wasn’t any question what number one would be. If the climax of R is, in my opinion, the manga’s finest hour, the climax of the first arc is where the anime surpassed it, both in dramatic tension and in heartbreaking loss. It should be noted that the anime does not exactly make this a big secret – the episode is TITLED “The Sailor Senshi Die!”. And sure enough, that’s what happens, as the senshi travel to the North Pole to take on Beryl. Now, there is a manga equivalent here – the senshi die there as well, though in a completely different situation – but the tension and agony are just incredible in the anime, where first Jupiter, then Mercury, then Venus and finally Mars sacrifice themselves so that the others can continue, each showing off just how powerful and badass they are even as they are killed. And Sailor Moon, her despair growing with each death, is left alone at the end – except that the spirits of the four fallen girls appear once more, telling her that they will always be with her and giving her the strength to go on. The anime came close to hitting these highs later on (Episode 125 comes closest), but never quite topped it – an episode that shows that even a magical girl may need to pay the ultimate price in order to save the world.

So those are my five favorites. If you think I missed something, let me know in a comment!