Sean Gaffney

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

I hope you enjoyed the Black Bird-esque cover art, as that’s really the closest thing Skip Beat gets to romance. Oh yes, there’s Kyoko and Ren teasing each other briefly, but the point of that scene is the same as it’s been before – when pressed, Kyoko freaks out completely and shows, as Lory lampshades in this volume, that she’s not remotely ready for love or romance. Which is one reason why Skip Beat is at Vol. 29 and things are still up in the air. Not that we’ve any doubt that the final pairing will be Ren and Kyoko – if Sho somehow manages to win her heart I’ll be mind-boggled (and I think angry fans would storm Hakusensha’s offices). But there’s simply demons in Kyoko’s past that really haven’t resolved yet.

Honestly, I wish we’d see more of Kyoko’s mother. Yes, she’s horrible, and I certainly don’t want to see more of her interactions with Kyoko. Except I totally do, because her emotional abuse at her mother’s hands is what continues to drive her story. Every single time she twitches or reacts poorly to someone getting angry with her – even when it’s obviously meant to be comedic – it reminds me that she’s hypersensitive to everyone’s reactions. And one reason she may be so good at method acting is that she grew up trying to be the good child – or, as she increasingly got pawned off on Sho’s family, the dutiful wife/sister figure. Kyoko’s ability to immediately sense when Ren is upset with her, and her over the top reactions, are incredibly funny, but they’re also built on a foundation that screams ‘trigger warning’.

In a way, Kyoko’s emotional maturity when it comes to love and romance (and even simple things such as friendship) is trying to catch up to the personas that she’s put on her entire life. Which is why she’s still so incredibly naive about love. Her discussion with her Bo costume about Ren’s ‘playboy’ ways show that Lory isn’t kidding about her being completely unable to love. He may glibly tell Ren to avoid taking ‘that final step’ with her, but there’s a reason behind it – if Kyoko is freaking out to the point of bolting across the room when Ren even suggests seducing her, she’s not ready for anything else.

As for the rest of the manga, despite the fact that we’re twenty-nine volumes in, not much time has passed within the manga itself, as we can see given that Dark Moon is only just wrapping up. Meanwhile, Cain Heel’s drama finally starts filming, and we meet one of his fellow actors, Murasame, who seems to be a combination of rival and tsukkomi, as he points out to himself all the weird things Cain and Setsu are doing, but is also clearly attracted to Setsu. Of course, he shows this attraction via his own emotional immaturity – after pondering the best way to introduce himself to her, he starts by insulting her brother. Kyoko’s not the only one with issues.

I love the fact that this cute, funny shoujo manga can make me write about serious things. It doesn’t look to be ending anytime soon, so here’s to more volumes (and perhaps Kyoko conquering her love and affection demons).

By Ai Yazawa. Released in Japan by Shodensha, serialized in the magazine Zipper. Released in North America by Vertical, Inc.

I had already done a review/overview of this series for a Manga Movable Feast a while back, but now we have Vertical’s new re-release with larger trim and a new translation, so it’s time to give it another look. Which I honestly don’t mind, as this is such a terrific series. I won’t be talking too much about the technical details – the larger size makes the asides much easier to read, I do note. As for the translation, it’s definitely different, and there are pluses and minuses to both. I do prefer Arashi not sounding like Johnny Rotten, though.

The cover and chapter pictures, by the way, might give away a bit of the plot: Yukari becomes a model. But then, most of you probably guessed that as it’s the premise. Yazawa has an eye for fashion and posing, and it all comes to the fore here, with many long, lingering shots of outfits and fabric, and even the rudimentary drudgery of sewing beads is made to look glamorous. Paradise Kiss is a colorful, vibrant place. By contrast, Yukari’s life is as stark and black and white as the manga itself – we barely get to know anyone besides Hiroyuki at her school, and her attention is so quickly distracted by George and company that her diligence to study is in doubt. (Notably, the entire PK group urge her to keep studying, and constantly ask if she has to hit the books. They’re all good students, and don’t want to be seen as the reason she isn’t. It’s Yukari’s own fault that she winds up blowing everything off all the time.)

I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again – I really like Hiroyuki, and I’m glad to see how he interacts with Yukari and the others. The sequence where Yukari drags him to meet Miwako is painful but very well done – and Yukari, as many ‘well-intentioned’ folks seem to do, immediately realizes she’s made a mistake. That said, it worked out well in the end, even if what we mostly get from the story of Miwako. Arashi and Hiroyuki is of things left unfinished – by forcing a choice onto Miwako, Arashi has unwittingly left everything more open-ended than it should be. This will come back to haunt him in future volumes…

A word of warning to those who hate it – this manga is rife with metatextuality. The non-Yukari cast constantly talk about chapters, page placement, etc., reinforcing the fact that Yukari is not only entering the fashionista world of Paradise Kiss, but the manga ‘world’ as well. There are also several references to Yazawa’s shoujo manga Gokinjo Monogatari, which starred Miwako’s older sister, Mikako. Mikako makes a cameo, and a few other characters also show up. Don’t worry if you’ve never read the (unlicensed) prequel; the references actually serve to better flesh out the characters, and show that this isn’t just a story that began once Yukari entered the scene.

Did I forget to mention George? I did. Hi, George. I’ll have more to say about him in my next review. In the meantime, Paradise Kiss has attractive, vibrant characters, gorgeous and striking art, and a wonderfully wicked sense of humor. I’m incr3edibly happy that it’s back in print.

By Osamu Tezuka. Released in Japan by Shogakukan, serialized in the magazine Big Comic. Released in North America by Digital Manga Publishing.

This is one of those mature Tezuka titles that a lot of fans had been waiting to hear about. So much so that when DMP decided to start a Kickstarter project to get enough money to license it, it was an obvious choice. And I must admit, it does seem like the sort of manga you’d like to verify you have enough money to cover costs before you publish. Unpleasant, flighty, and just plain annoying at times, Barbara is fittingly very much like its main character, a muse who is various things to various people, and ends up being an alcoholic hipster when she’s inspiring our “hero”, the writer Yosuke Mikura.

You’ll note I put the word hero in quotes. Even using the term protagonist seems wrong for Mikura, who does not really inspire much sympathy throughout this book. Right off the bat we get two chapters which show him not only abusing Barbara (he beats the crap out of her the entire book) but also has serious psychological problems, leading to hallucinations. It requires a certain amount of sang-froid to trust that Tezuka will lead you through this and tell a satisfactory story, especially as the first half of Barbara seems to be composed of mostly disconnected life scenes with Mikura and his drunken companion.

Things pick up considerably when we are introduced to Russalka, an African writer and political activist who comes to Japan for a conference. It turns out he has a past with Barbara, and was not particularly happy to see her go. This is when Mikura gets the full explanation of what Barbara is, which he stubbornly doesn’t really understand at all – at least not consciously. But they don’t really have a relationship, just occasional inspiration – as muses are to writers most of the time. When he decides to marry Barbara at one point, most readers will be groaning and going “You idiot!”. If they weren’t already.

Mikura continues to spiral downward, committing murder multiple times (even if it’s sometimes only implied) and his marriage to another woman who is genuinely real seems to only make things worse for both of then. The last third of Barbara reads like an elegiac car crash, as you watch a man who was already deeply disturbed when the book began go off the deep end. In fact, that may be a fault with the book – Mikura was *so* creepy and deluded right from the start, there’s very little surprise or sympathy in seeing him get run off the rails like that. It’s less of a tragedy and more of a “well, that’s just life.” Which, given this is the early 1970s, may have been what Tezuka was going for anyway.

The artwork is excellent, with many striking scenes. He’s especially good at depicting Mikura’s hallucinations. At one point Mikura meets a woman who looks like Barbara but insists she’s a real woman named Dolmen, and Tezuka actually manages to have her look slightly different. Sometimes the art is a bit sexualized (there is much focus on Barbara’s rear end), but that’s what you’d expect from a book about a seductive muse. And the scenes in the end in the sewers and field are fantastic action sequences.

I wouldn’t say I enjoyed Barbara the way, say, I enjoy Ranma or Sailor Moon. It can be an unpleasant experience, and its lead is loathsome much of the time. If you can get past that, however, this is a striking tale well-told, and made me curious to find out more about the Japanese literary scene of the early 1970s. And hoping that if I ever get a muse like Barbara, I don’t end up the same way. But, that’s writing for you. So fickle…

By CLAMP. Released in Japan by Kadokawa Shoten, serialized in the magazine Shonen Ace. Released in North America by Dark Horse Comics.

Angelic Layer comes at a turning point for CLAMP, one where they had already shown how well they could succeed in the shoujo market and were trying to branch out and expand. And while they were still drawing X at the time they started this (and just wrapping up Card Captor Sakura), they clearly wanted a new challenge. Unfortunately, I’m not sure how well they succeeded – certainly this work is a decent enough diversion, and there’s never any desire to put it down or move on. But it doesn’t really grip you the way their best series do – and indeed, the way that their more successful series for a male audience, Tsubasa and xxxHOLIC, would later on. Angelic Layer is shonen, but it’s fluffy shonen.

If I want to be honest, there’s not even a whole lot about Angelic Layer that HAS to be shonen. Yes, the plot involves what basically amounts to a fighting tournament, but the fighters are mostly female, and they’re fighting using cute dolls, albeit technologically advanced fighter dolls controlled through willpower. But Magic Knight Rayearth was basically a series of ever-increasing battles as well. (Speaking of which, Rayearth apparently exists as an anime in this universe – Misaki’s Angel is clearly meant to be based off Hikaru from the series.) But the cute female lead who’s plucky but always optimistic, the vague romantic possibilities, the jealous rivals who want to take her out as soon as possible? This could easily have run in Asuka, except X already was taking its place.

The series has its heart in the right place, and clearly wants to be liked. Perhaps that’s why I’m not enjoying it as much as other CLAMP offerings – at times you feel it’s trying too hard. There are two wacky, comedy characters – Icchan, the mad scientist inventor of the Angels, and Misaki’s new female friend Tamayo – who are wacky! And funny! Oh so funny! Let us show you how wacky and funny and loud and funny they are! And it can be exhausting. The quieter, more sedate supporters of Misaki work much better.

That said, it also feels like I’m finding faults where I shouldn’t bother. As a light, fun comedy with lots of cool fights and amusing scenes, this fills its function perfectly. CLAMP are at the point in their careers here where they couldn’t really ruin a story if they tried. (That will change later – indeed, Angelic Layer gets made far more depressing retroactively if you read Chobits – but for now, it’s all smiles.) Misaki has enough things going wrong for her that we feel a need to see her win and be happy, but not so much that it verges into Pollyanna territory. And honestly, sometimes the wacky characters *are* funny, particularly Icchan and his sublime awareness that he gives the appearance of a creepy pedophile.

But there’s no depth to Angelic Layer at all, and depth is something that we’ve increasingly come to rely on CLAMP for (and get frustrated when it goes wrong). It’s a step forward into a new genre, but it’s still keeping too much of itself held back. If only it had an anime adaptation that took its good points and expanded on them? Hrm, that would be awesome…

Story by Ryukishi07; Art by Hinase Momoyama. Released in Japan as “Higurashi no Naku Koro ni: Minagoroshi-hen” by Square Enix, serialized in the magazine GFantasy. Released in North America by Yen Press.

This review has spoilers!

Ladies and gentlemen, after 18 volumes, meet our heroine.

The author talks in the notes for this volume about how he tried to keep Rika’s main character-ness a secret at first, with Keiichi, Rena and Shion getting all the attention. The Time Killing Arc was probably the one exception, and even that was 5 years before the main action. We’ve known Rika is much deeper than she seems, and that she can see/understand the constant resets in this world. But this is where the manga outright has her as the star. And while no one is going to pick up a new manga 19 volumes in, the first chapter does a decent job at setting up the ‘mysteries’ and ‘rules’ of the resetting worlds… even if it turns out to be wrong a lot.

By the way, the twin girl that Rika meets is Frederica Bernkastel, whose poetry we have been enjoying at the start of each arc. She is somewhat unimportant to the Higurashi series (we’ll only see her again at the very, very end), but is a far larger player in Umineko, which begins over here in two months… Also, Frederica, not Furude Rika. I don’t know how anyone could mix them up. :)

We do also meet another major character here – Hanyu, aka ‘Oyashiro-sama’. For a series that has combined moe and gore to such a large degree, it’s not as much of a surprise as one would think to find that their torture god is an adorable little girl who hates all the killing. Seeing her stomping her feet in rage at Takano’s insane ravings is quite funny. Possibly the only funny thing she gets to do in this arc – Hanyu is a drag, and ends up bringing Rika down with her. Downtrodden and depressed, she’s the one resetting the worlds, but it’s clear she has no confidence this one will be any different.

But oh, how wrong she is. This is what the previous 18 volumes have led to. Remember Higurashi is actually an adaptation of a game, where the player saw everyone make really, really horrible mistakes. And in this world, through the constant replays and reboots, they subconsciously learn from those mistakes, and make the right decisions. This is one of the more heartwarming parts of the volume. Seeing Keiichi give Mion the doll, seeing Shion treating Satoko like a little sister, Rena confessing that she got her dad help and a job… it’s great to see. And it has a wonderful capper, as who should show up in Hinamizawa but Akasasa. With his wife. Who is not dead. It’s pure happiness on a manga page.

And this is where hubris starts to hit Rika. After being so depressed for so long, seeing this is a world where everything is ‘perfect’ makes her a little too cocky. She goes to tell Tomitake and Takanao that they’re going to be killed… and they seem to believe her. She deliberately incites a gang to hit her… and it turns out she now has hidden bodyguards. So she gets the tiniest bit smug… and oh, does she ever pay for it. Because this is the Answer Arc for the MOST DEPRESSING ARC EVER, the Curse Killing Arc.

See, when Rena turned to Mion and confessed the difficulties she and her dad were having, Mion told her family. Who are yakuza. Who responded by simply quietly killing off Mamiya, the woman blackmailing Rena’s dad. And with Mamiya now dead… Satoko’s uncle has come back home. This leads to the most chilling image of the volume, Satoko with a huge bruise on her cheek and empty eyes. We only have one problem to solve in this world, but oh, it’s a doozy.

But remember, people are learning from their mistakes, mostly. So even though Shion backslides a little, murder for once ISN’T an option. Instead, they go to child services. Who suck. Horribly. So they go back, with their teacher and principal. And fail again. It’s like beating your head against a brick wall, mostly as Satoko refuses to admit that she is being abused. (Well, maybe murder isn’t an option as it’s being taken off the table… the first thing Rika does is go to Takano and ask that her hired goons take out Satoko’s uncle. She should know better.) And Ooishi, despite getting a nicer introduction than usual, is not helping at all with his usual elliptical warnings.

By the way, there’s still the matter of who is killing Rika. When this first started in GFantasy in 2009, the games were finished. As was the anime. 95% of the people reading this knew who the main villain was. So you see the author cheating a bit, with perhaps a few more creepy villainous smiles than might be warranted. More on this later. It isn’t called the Massacre Arc for nothing, after all.

As you can see, there’s a lot going on in these first two volumes. I am pleased that Yen omnibused them. The next two aren’t out till December, but luckily we have Umineko in November. We switch from cicadas to seagulls… and also switch from a series searching for its happy ending to one where that may not even be an option.

By Satoko Kiyuduki. Released in Japan by Houbunsha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Manga Time Kirara Carat. Released in North America by Yen Press.

It may seem like forever, but in reality we’re getting two new volumes by Kiyuduki-san this fall, with this and the 3rd Shoulder-A-Coffin Kuro. This series ended up being far more popular in Japan (much to the consternation of Western fans, who I think prefer the darker Kuro), probably due to its dynamic – let’s face it, if every series you do with cute high school girls living their ordinary lives sells well, you’re going to want more of that. The artist does use this fourth volume to provide a bit more depth and characterization than we’d seen previously, though.

This series has always been compared with Sunshine Sketch (and not just over here – Japanese fanartists cross the two series over a lot), but GA is far more serious about its art. Previous volumes have dealt with color choice, textures, and lettering. This one has the color pages dealing with fashion from early to modern, and the chapters cover topics like the best way to convey water, how to get your model to not pose stiffly, and (in the best sequence) Kisaragi losing her glasses and seeing the rest of the cast as indistinct, vegetable-like shapes. For a 4-koma cutie series, the artist is not afraid to experiment within its boundaries.

Speaking of which, one series starring Noda, the flakey and eccentric girl, shatters the fourth wall in what turns out to be a long dreams sequence (which surprised me, as usually it’s Kisaragi who gets those sorts of stories). Noda, by the way, enjoys teasing Namiko, the straight woman of the group, about her weight and her larger chest. It was entertaining seeing that Namiko is starting to fight back in a deadpan way, and seeing Noda getting all upset is quite amusing, given she’s normally so hyperactive and cheery. Speaking of Namiko, she may be the perfect oneesama character to keep everyone else in check, but apparently her home ec skills show she’s not ready to be a perfect Japanese housewife just yet.

As for the third-year group that’s our secondary cast of GA characters, they get some nice spotlight time as well. Awara ends up wandering into said home ec class, and gets corralled into helping Kisaragi and Namiko make pasta. We also learn her eyesight is exceptional, almost preternaturally so. This is a contrast to the bespectacled Uozumi, who not only needs glasses but turns out to be color-blind (which, this being GA, leads to a discussion of how color-blind people see art and what Van Gogh painted). And in the final chapter of the volume, we see the sickly Tomokane brother, having passes out in the sun (his being sickly has been a plot point throughout) musing on the relationship between him and his sister (also Tomokane – the artist has deliberately avoided giving them first names) and how they contrast perfectly with each other. Not to mention how his sister apparently has psychic powers to know when he needs her help…

As I noted above, there are a ton of cute girl 4-koma series out there, even in North America. Most need something beyond the initial gimmick to keep you reading. And besides the bond between the cast members, humor, and occasional bits of character development, this series simply makes you more interested in art, and how artists see things. It’s great fun, and I’m pleased that we finally have the 4th volume. It’s coming out very slowly in Japan, though, so it may be a while before we see it again.