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Chihayafuru Vol. 1

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Chihayafuru Volume 1 by Yuki Suetsugu

Around a month ago, there were a few things I knew about Chihayafuru. It was a josei title about a Japanese card game. It has had an anime adaptation. I was interested in reading this, but I was convinced it would never be licensed. I have also been living under a rock, or at least totally unaware of what Kodansha was doing because I didn’t realize until several days ago that Chihayafuru was being released in English albeit just in digital format. I clicked the preorder button so quickly!

Chihayafuru is a josei manga, but it also is a sports manga centered around karuta, a poetry matching game that requires literary knowledge, memorization, quick reflexes, and strategy. From the start, the reader gets a few panels of the middle of an exciting game. Then the manga catapults into the past, to six years earlier. The main character is Chihaya, a girl who has buried her ambitions in supporting her older sister’s dream of becoming a supermodel. While Chihaya doesn’t seem to have any goals for herself, it is clear that she’s kind and a bit of tomboy at school. When a new kid arrives in her classroom and is promptly bullied, Chihaya sticks up for him. Wataya might talk funny and be poor, but he is a master at the game karuta, which the class plays from time to time. Wataya’s first enemy is Taichi, a popular boy who is dedicated to his studies and comfortable always winning the school kuruta tournament.

Wataya is a genius level kuruta player, and when he gets put at a disadvantage in a challenge match because his glasses were stolen, Chihaya substitutes herself for him. She doesn’t have all the poems memorized, but she has an incredibly dynamic and aggressive playing style that when combined with her reflexes enables her to eke out a win. She becomes inspired to pursue kuruta as her own interest. Taichi, Wataya, and Chihaya end up forming an odd friend group centered around kuruta, even visiting a local club to play practice matches and learn from a local teacher. The personalities of the three main characters create an interesting dynamic and dramatic tension.

I’m assuming with the flashback opening to this volume, the characters will be shown at their current ages soon, but the reader is set up to being able to feel all nostalgic when the trio gets together again outside of middle school. Chihayafuru reminds me of Hikaru No Go in the best way, because it takes a topic that might seem overly cerebral and invests it with a great sense of pacing and action. Chihaya’s dynamic personality and habit of slapping down cards whenever she gets a sudden insight makes everything exciting. Suetsugu’s paneling using multiple perspectives as angles on the game action also creates plenty of visual interest. I also liked the way romanized Japanese was presented along with the translations for the poems, because it was easier to get a sense of the rythm of the game, and how the players greet matched poems as “old friends”. In a digital release I suppose one can’t expect too many extras, but if print volumes of this series ever come out, it would be fun to have some of the poems and cards featured in more depth in notes at the back of each volume.

Pick of the Week: Erased and Others

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SEAN: There’s quite a few titles I’m getting this week, but I’m not sure any of them really set themselves up above the rest as a Pick. As such, I think I’ll go with an old favorite and pick the 10th omnibus of Fruits Basket, which has Shigure’s nastiest speech to Tohru, and is therefore fascinating.

MICHELLE: I’m definitely all aboard for Fruits Basket, but after reading more about it, Erased sounds really interesting! Plus, it’s been nominated for all sorts of awards. I think I’ll be optimistic and pick it this week.

KATE: I’m torn between the latest volume of Dimension W and the first volume of Erased. I’m leaning ever-so-slightly towards Dimension W, if only because Yuji Iwahara draws manga like nobody’s business. Every detail on the page pops, and the characters are drawn with flair. And his world-building! You could read Dimension W just for the elaborate cityscapes. The story isn’t quite as engrossing as the art, but it’s fundamentally impossible to dislike an adventure in which Nikola Tesla’s research is frequently referenced.

ASH: I’m glad that Michelle picked Erased (which I will definitely be reading) because that means I can mention Magia the Ninth without feeling guilty. I can’t say it’s a great series–at times it’s barely coherent an I suspect that it was ended earlier than the creator originally intended–but I enjoyed the first volume immensely. I find it hard to resist the combination of music, magic, and historical references. The manga is absolutely ridiculous, but I’m getting a huge kick out of it and it makes me smile. Sometimes, that’s exactly what I need.

MJ: I have eternal love for Fruits Basket, of course, and I’m also interested in Dimension W. But I was absolutely thrilled to see Erased on the list, and that’s unambiguously my pick for the week. My husband and I watched the anime adaptation last year, when it was released for streaming in the U.S., and it was absolutely enthralling. This is a release I will not miss!

ANNA: I agree with many of my colleagues that Erased certainly sounds like the most interesting thing coming out this week. Looking forward to it!

My Week in Manga: February 13-February 19, 2017

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My News and Reviews

Hooray! I managed to write and post another in-depth review at Experiments in Manga. Even if I’m not writing as much as I once was, it still feels pretty good to get back into the (slow) swing of things. Anyway, last week I took a look at Jen Lee Quick’s dark fantasy Western Gatesmith, Volume 1. The comic is off to an intriguing start though it can also be a little frustrating. The series is currently on break, but I hope that there will be more soon.

As many people are probably aware, the prolific and versatile mangaka Jiro Taniguchi passed away earlier this month. Despite not being particularly well known in English, a fair number of his manga have been released in translation. Kate Dacey of The Manga Critic has a nice guide to Taniguchi’s work for those interested in what is currently available. At The Comics Journal, Taniguchi was the subject of a recent article by Joe McCulloch and an obituary written by Zack Davisson. Other comic sites like The Beat have recently honored Taniguchi as well. I’ve read most but not quite all of Taniguchi’s work in English, my personal favorites being A Distant Neighborhood and his collaboration with Baku Yumemakura The Summit of the Gods. Way back when there was a Manga Moveable Feast devoted to Taniguchi, too. Some of the links are no longer work, but many of the features can still be tracked down.

In happier news, SuBLime announced three new licenses last week: Akane Abe’s Am I In Love or Just Hungry? (digital-only), Scarlet Beriko’s Jackass!, and Tsuta Suzuki’s A Strange and Mystifying Story. (I’m very curious about Jackass! and I’m very happy about A Strange and Mystifying Story which is actually a license rescue. The first three of seven volumes were originally published in English by Digital Manga; I remember quite liking them.) The Toronto Comic Arts Festival has started announcing its featured guests for the year which will include Gengoroh Tagame among other fantastic creators. The OASG talked to Kodansha Comics about the licensing of Chihayafuru. While still probably unlikely, a print edition of the series isn’t completely off the table. As for Kickstarter campaigns for queer comics that have recently caught my attention, Megan Lavey-Heaton has launched a project to print the third volume of Namesake.

Quick Takes

Blood Blockade Battlefront, Volume 1Blood Blockade Battlefront, Volumes 1-7 by Yasuhiro Nightow. I wasn’t initially planning on reading Blood Blockade Battlefront–I wasn’t a huge fan Nightow’s Trigun–but I kept hearing great things about the anime adaptation and then I came across a “complete” set of the manga on super sale, so I picked it up. The series is actually ten volumes long; supposedly Dark Horse has plans to release the final three at some point. In general the manga tends to be fairly episodic, so even if the rest of the series isn’t translated at least readers aren’t left with an unresolved story. It wasn’t until partway through the second volume of Blood Blockade Battlefront that the series started to click with me, but once it did I found myself really enjoying the manga. Its mix of goofy everyday life and action-heavy sequences actually reminded me a bit of Cowboy Bebop. The manga is essentially about a semi-secret group of monster hunters working in what used to be New York before it was destroyed by the sudden appearance of an interdimensional portal. The character designs of the main cast are sadly simple and plain compared to the series’ fantastic setting and creatures, but their distinctive personalities mostly make up for that.

The Box ManThe Box Man by Imiri Sakabashira. The North American manga industry is primarily focused on publishing more popular, mainstream works, but occasionally an alternative or independent work is released as well. The Box Man was originally serialized in Ax, an alternative manga magazine in Japan which was the basis for the Ax: Alternative Manga English-language anthology. Examples of Sakabashira’s work can be found in that anthology and in the earlier collection Sake Jock, but The Box Man is his first long-form work to be translated. Granted, there’s very little dialogue that actually needs to be translated–for the most part the manga is an entirely visual experience. Even the story is fairly limited in scope. The narrative follows a kappa-like cat accompanying a man on a scooter who is transporting a box which turns out to contain something rather peculiar. The strangeness of The Box Man doesn’t end there, but the point of the manga seems to be less about telling a story and more about creating a visual spectacle. The artwork incorporates popular culture references (some of which I’m sure I completely missed) and at times can be rather bizarre, violent, or erotically-charged.

Giganto MaxiaGiganto Maxia by Kentaro Miura. Though it certainly has its problems, Miura’s Berserk is one of my favorite series. I have been significantly less enamored with the other manga by Miura that have been released in English–specifically his collaborations with Buronson Japan and King of Wolves–but I was still very curious about Giganto Maxia. Whether it’s intentional or not, the dark fantasy manga shares some similarities with Attack on Titan and Terra Formars and also appears to be heavily influenced by professional wrestling. Miura’s artwork in Giganto Maxia is tremendous but the story, while it isn’t awful, struggles to match the caliber of the illustrations. I almost wonder if Giganto Maxia was originally intended to be longer than a single volume since so much about the manga’s world and characters are left unexplained in the end. Giganto Maxia does more or less tell a complete story, but it feels like a single episode taken from the middle of a larger narrative. At one time a slave forced to battle to the death in a gladiatorial arena, Delos is now fighting against the empire itself. Joining forces with Prome, a powerful spirit who takes the form of a young girl (and who is constantly trying to get him to drink her “nectar” ), Delos can transform into the mythic titan Gohra in order to do battle.

Lake JehovahLake Jehovah by Jillian Fleck. Lake Jehovah, Fleck’s debut graphic novel, first came to my attention due to the fact that Jay, the comic’s protagonist, is genderqueer. While themes of identity, gender, and sexuality are integral to the comic’s story they aren’t the primary focus of Lake Jehovah. Instead, the comic is about the end of the world, both literally and figuratively. Human civilization has already succumbed to multiple apocalypses but Jay unexpectedly becomes the prophet for the next impending disaster while dealing with even more personal and existential crises. Jay struggles with intense depression and anxiety which slowly destroys xis relationship with xis fiance. Eventually she leaves, no longer able to cope with Jay’s instability, and Jay is left recover and come to terms with everything alone. Lake Jehovah actually handles the topic of mental illness better than many other comics I’ve read. It’s an emotionally tumultuous work, tempering despair with humor as the characters search for meaning in their lives even while everything is falling apart around them. Some turn to sex or drugs while others find comfort in poetry or art. Lake Jehovah is a somewhat strange but undeniably compelling comic.

Paying to Win in a VRMMO, Vol. 1

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By Blitz Kiva and Kuwashima rein. Released in Japan as “VRMMO wo Kane no Chikara de Musou suru” by Hobby Japan. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Elizabeth Ellis.

You would think after reading all of the light novels currently out in North America about games, either with people trapped in them, transported to them, or having worlds based on them, that I would be used to things by now, but Paying to Win in a VRMMO reminds me once again: I’m not really a gamer. I get the aggressiveness of microtransactions due to playing Candy Crush Saga, but that’s as far as it goes. And while it’s refreshing to actually see a book where people play a game they can actually log out of at the end of the day, it also means that more than the usual amount of prose was expended in regards to items, levels, attack names and types, and the like. Don’t get me wrong, the fights were exciting, especially the final one, it’s just hard for me to get into it as much when I’m seeing “he swiped his inventory to grab another sword”. But I suppose that’s VR for you.

Our hero is the man on the right, Ichiro, a young obscenely rich man who is also a genius, having graduated Harvard at age 13 (which is the usual requirement for fictional geniuses). Sadly, the fact that he can easily do anything has led him to be bored by almost everything. Then his second cousin Asuha asks for his help with a problem she has, one that needs to be solved by playing the popular VRMMO “Narrow Fantasy Online”. Ichiro has no reason to refuse, so agrees, pays an obscene amount of money to get an arcade version of the game put into his highrise penthouse, pays an obscene amount of money to get the cool character traits he wants, and pays an obscene amount of money to level up to obscene levels. He does all this rather coolly and stoicly, with the occasional bemused grin. Luckily, he finds something in the game that, for the first time perhaps ever, really challenges him. That someone… is Kirito.

Pardon me, my apologies. That someone… is Kirihito, one of many gamers who base their stats and appearance on “a certain famous light novel hero”. The main reason to get this book is probably for the almost-litigious-but-not-quite parodies of Sword Art Online, which keep coming fast and furious – the idea that most newbies play as Kirihito (this book’s version of WcDonald’s), the high-level Kirihitos who team up and become a sentai team, complete with pose (the illustration alone is worth the price of the book), all the way to “King Kirihito”, who may not like that nickname, but is the only other person in this game who can challenge Ichiro, and is also the source of the problem that Asuha would like to solve. (Also, if you’re going to be broadly satirizing SAO that much, perhaps choose a name other than “Asuha”, maybe?)

To be honest, while I enjoyed the book somewhat, I found the characters wanting. Kirihito’s real-life self was probably the most interesting, and I approve of the author leaving it up to the reader to choose their gender. Ichiro unfortunately grates a little too much with his “I earned this money myself, so can use it to solve all life’s problems and none can complain” ways, which get called out a bit in-book, but are mostly shrugged off. Asuha is very passive throughout the book, which is very frustrating given that one of the major cores of the book is getting her to stop being so passive – I didn’t really feel the satisfaction I was supposed to. And the otaku maid just wasn’t over the top enough for me to find amusing. The writing is good, and the jokes are excellent, but Paying to Win needs some better character development stat.

Captive Hearts of Oz, Vol. 1

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By Ryo Maruya and Mamenosuke Fujimaru, loosely based on the novel “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” by L. Frank Baum. Released in North America by Seven Seas. Translated by Angela Liu. Adapted by Lianne Sentar

One of the big sellers about 5-6 years ago on the late lamented New York Times Manga Bestseller charts was Alice in the Country of Hearts and its 87 billion spinoffs, based on a number of otome visual novels by creator QuinRose. In fact, one might argue that for a while the market was a bit glutted with Alice manga. Sadly, when QuinRose’s business went under, so did the rights to her series, and therefore we’re not seeing any more Alices over here. That said, they were a big hit for Seven Seas in particular, and they decided to reach out to the most popular artist for the series, Mamenosuke Fujimaru, and ask her if she could create a similar styled manga based on the Oz series by L. Frank Baum, which Seven Seas had recently done a version of with manga-style illustrations. And so we have this new manga, in which Dorothy finds herself in a mysterious new world and is soon surrounded by handsome men.

The strengths of this book are somewhat similar to Fujimaru’s Alice titles. Her art is excellent, and the pacing and action flows very well. The characters are mostly likeable if not all that fleshed out yet, as is typical for Volume Ones. We get the addition of a brother-sister team of Crows, who have a complicated tsundere-ish relationship with the scarecrow that I quite liked, and led to the best moment of the book, in which Dorothy pretends to be an evil villain in order to lure them out. Best of all is the hint that one of the witches, Locasta (you know, the one who no one remembers) is trying to change the way that the story goes, and we get the suggestion that the Land of Oz is something that runs on rules of storytelling rather than logic, in a very similar way to the Alice books.

The weaknesses of the book also crop up. It’s wearing its heart on its sleeve, frankly – we can’t do Wonderland, so here’s Oz with very similar attempts at dark themes and a harem of young guys. Unfortunately, the premise, at least so far, seems to lack the Alice series’ caustic and complicated heroine. While she has her moments, Dorothy is simply too nice and sweet, and you’re reminded that the best Alice books showed us the truth behind everything in the world – that the world was created as an escape to help her run away with a reality too tragic to deal with. I’m not entirely sure whether something similar is going on here, but if so, there need to be more hints that Dorothy is more than what she seems, rather than just Oz being more than what it seems.

That said, this is still the first volume, and I’m perfectly happy to get the next one to see how things developed. In the meantime, Alice fans will definitely enjoy this, I think, even if it feels a bit “lite” compared to its inspiration.

My Big Sister Lives in a Fantasy World: The Half-Baked Vampire vs. the Strongest Little Sister?!

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By Tsuyoshi Fujitaka and An2A. Released in Japan as “Neechan wa Chuunibyou” by Hobby Japan. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Elizabeth Ellis.

The second volume of a series like this one was always going to be tricky. The seeming big reveal of the first book was that Yuichi, the supposed “average high school student” protagonist you get in these sorts of harem stories, was not remotely average. In fact, given the oddballs we saw in the first book, I had mentioned that the closest we had to a normal person in the cast was Aiko, who happened to be a vampire but was otherwise the fairly typical “shy cute girl” stereotype. Of course, as we find in this second volume, Aiko is far from normal either, even if she towers over the other eccentrics in her family in that regard. “Half-Baked Vampire” is your first impression, and the book tries hard to make it stick at the end, but I’m not buying it.

I’d argue this book isn’t as good as the first. The character of Yuichi’s younger sister Yoriko seems to be added for the sole reason that series like these always have little sisters who love their big brother just a little too much, and she doesn’t play any role in the plot besides getting jealous of Aiko and being too clingy. (You’d think she was the “Little Sister” in the second part of the subtitle, but no, as we find out, that is not the case.) There’s a lot of rambling discussion of the nature of murder and various other thought experiments by Mutsuko, whose tendency to exposit whenever it’s needed is her worst character trait. Girl who likes isekai continues to get so little to do that I can’t even remember her name. And poor Natsuki, the villain of the first book, is now reduced to playing the straight man role that Aiko played in the first book, as Aiko is too busy being the heroine.

Where the book succeeds is in analyzing the plot and character tropes you find in “Middle School Syndrome” types and, if not exactly deconstructing them, at least making you think about them in a different way. Honestly, much of the time the book reads as if it was written by Mutsuko herself, being the sort of self-insert you get from first time fanfic writers in their teens. Mutsuko may be the most interesting character in the series, which is fitting given she’s in the main title. I loved her discussion with Natsuki of those downbeat endings that seek to be dark for the sake of gritty realism, and how much she hates them – I agree 100%. At the same time, as Natsuki gradually realizes just what training Mutsuko has given her little brother, and how little it occurs to her to wonder if this is actually abusive or insane, we begin to see a dark core to Mutsuko, which I’m not sure if the author intends or not. She gets the final scene to herself, taking out the “power behind the throne” villain with a literal railgun, as suits her personality. She’s horrible and fascinating, which is fitting given that she’s an expy of Haruhi Suzumiya, who was the same.

In the end, this is still a silly harem series, but I enjoy it best when it’s taking a look at the stereotypes of such series, or asking us to examine the characters further to see how seriously we’re supposed to take them.

Manga the Week of 2/22/17

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SEAN: Not only is next week a Yen Press week, but the other publishers have a bunch of stuff too. Get ready to be buried again.

J-Novel Club has three titles. Grimgar of Fantasy and Ash has a 2nd volume, and continues to be the “trapped in another world” title that is SERIOUS BUSINESS.

The debut this week is How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom, which could be good but whose title makes me very wary. Realist Hero sounds only a few story steps from a Dark!Grey!Independent!Harry fanfic.

And we get the 2nd and (so far) final volume of Occultic;Nine, from the creators of other badly punctuated works.

Kodansha is doing a mass re-release of the Ghost in the Shell manga, featuring Ghost in the Shell 1, 1.5, and 2. No, it doesn’t have the hardcore lesbian sex scene, as I know someone will ask. The creator requested it be removed. It’s still good. Get it if you don’t have it.

ASH: It’s been a long time since I first read the original Ghost in the Shell manga! Along with Message to Adolf and Blade of the Immortal, it was actually one of the first manga that I ever read.

SEAN: And they have a 6th Inuyashiki as well.

Seven Seas has a quartet of titles, beginning with a second volume of Magia the Ninth.

ASH: The first volume of Magia the Ninth was absolutely ridiculous but I couldn’t help enjoy myself. I’ll definitely be picking up the second and final volume.

SEAN: There’s also a 6th volume of Magica Swordsman and Summoner, one of those titles that I sort of stick my fingers in my ears and go ‘lalala’ when I see it.

The debut is Magical Girl Site, another in a genre I am so sick of it’s beyond belief. If you like the 8th iteration of cute young girls dying in violent ways, here it is. Again.

And in the complete opposite direction, we have the 2nd volume of Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid, which remains yuri-ish despite the best efforts of the English dubbers of the anime.

ASH: I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the first volume.

SEAN: Vertical has a 5th volume of Devil’s Line.

Viz gives us a 2nd Mobile Suit Gundam Thunderbolt, one of the newer Gundam iterations.

ANNA: I still need to read all the volumes of Gundam: The Origin that I hoarded.

ASH: I’m ashamed to say that there are a few volume of The Origin that I have left to read, too.

SEAN: And an 11th Tokyo Ghoul, which should outsell everything else on this list combined.

And there’s also a 7th Ultraman.

And then there’s Yen Press. As with previous months, we get most of their titles except one or two which are delayed a week (so don’t panic, Nozaki fans). Yen On has the 10th A Certain Magical Index. Will the entire world be forced to be Roman Catholic? Naruto never had cliffhangers like that.

Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? has the 2nd volume of its side story based on Aiz Wallenstein, Sword Oratoria.

Yen On’s debut is KonoSuba: God’s Blessings on This Wonderful World!, an abbreviation of Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku o! (which I am happy to never type again). It’s a “trapped in another world” novel, but as you can see by its first volume subtitle, Oh My Useless Goddess!, it’s a broad parody of such titles.

And a 3rd volume of Psycome, in which the protagonist’s somewhat obsessed little sister joins the cast.

Oh yes, and three more Spice & Wolf volumes digitally, as the catchup really takes off.

Yen’s manga releases begin with the third Aoharu x Machinegun. Will we finally get the gender reveal that is probably long overdue?

ASH: Another series that surprised me with how much I enjoyed the first volume; I should probably catch up and see if I continue to like it.

SEAN: Onward and Onward and Onward goes BTOOOM!, now up to Vol. 16.

Corpse Party: Blood Covered has a 4th omnibus, and must be running out of corpses for the party. Someone will have to run down to the store.

MICHELLE: Hee! And that is the most amused I’ve ever been by Corpse Party!

SEAN: And we get a 5th Volume of Dimension W.

ASH: I’m still not sure if Iwahara can tell a coherent, cohesive story, but I did enjoy the first couple of volumes of Dimension W.

SEAN: Erased makes its debut, and it’s a hardcover omnibus. Dark time-travel thriller, from what I understand.

ASH: Now this I am very interested in reading.

SEAN: Fruits Basket has a 10th omnibus. We are rocketing towards the climax!

MICHELLE: After ten months, you’d think I’d be accustomed to the speed of this release, but you’d be wrong.

ANNA: Nice!

SEAN: KonoSuba, mentioned above, also has its 2nd manga volume.

Believe it or not, there are still Madoka Magica spinoffs, though they’re slowing down. Puella Magi Oriko Magica: Sadness Prayer’s 2nd volume sounds like the rest of the genre the main series inspired: bleak.

Rose Guns Days Season 2 Volume 2 is still not as good as Higurashi or Umineko.

I know very little about Smokin’ Parade except it runs in Kadokawa’s Young Ace and looks grim.

Spirit & Cat Ears is from my old nemesis, Comic Alive, so expect fanservice and cuteness, in that order.

Lastly, we get an eighth volume of Trinity Seven.

With the Manga Bookshelf team breathing a sigh of relief that at least there’s a Fruits Basket they can use for Pick of the Week, what will you be getting?

ANNA: Apparently, all of Kodansha’s josei and shoujo digital releases from last week!

One Piece, Vol. 81

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By Eiichiro Oda. Released in Japan by Shueisha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Weekly Shonen Jump. Released in North America by Viz. Translated by Stephen Paul.

In almost all respects, this volume of One Piece is leagues better than the last one. It’s the start of a new arc, which means that the chaos that Oda now writes as a matter of course is a bit more tightly controlled. There’s amazing fights, mostly in flashback. There’s great humor, mostly involving the two leaders of Zou and their animal characteristics. Our heroes get to actually be heroes, and we are reminded once again that Luffy’s piracy is not about raping and pillaging. There’s also surprising drama, as we find out about the extent of Big Mom’s power (complete with a shout-out to the movie Se7en) and her reach. And, perhaps most important of all, Sanji gets a last name.

This is more important than it sounds. Of the original ‘main’ cast of One Piece, it was noteworthy that three of them were never given family names, which might imply there’s some lingering backstory to be had in the future. After all, we never met Nami’s birth parents, and Usopp’s father is still presumably bumming around with Shanks. And then there’s Sanji – or rather, Sanji Vinsmoke, who happens to be one of a family of famous assassins. We don’t actually get too many details here, and I’ve no doubt we’ll be meeting them soon, but I like that Oda is able to riff on details that he wrote literally over 70 volumes ago in an “I meant to do that” way – namely that Sanji was born in North Blue, and getting from North to East (where he met Luffy and the others) is not an easy thing, As for Sanji’s decision to leave the Straw Hats in order to forcibly be married off… well, that’s what this arc is about, no doubt, and I don’t doubt he’d sacrifice himself to save the crew. (Note Capone threatens Nami first – he knows Sanji well.)

We also see the Sanji side of the Strsaw Hats arriving at Zou in the aftermath of the battle with Kaido’s underlings (we’ve still not really dealt with Kaido much, but as is pointed out, no doubt they will need to face him soon – along with Big Mom), and right away they’re making a humanitarian effort to save lives and help people. I always enjoy it when the Straw Hat Pirates show off their innate goodness, and this isn’t even in a “we’re saving the kingdom” way – if that had been the case they’d have arrived earlier. There’s also a tremendous reveal right at the end of the volume, which I won’t spoil, but Usopp and Nami’s tears, as well as Luffy’s huge grin, pretty much spell out how I felt about it. It was amazing.

So all in all we’re back to excellent volumes of One Piece, and I couldn’t be happier. Next time we get more anthropomorphs, and try to decide which direction the plot will go next – there are many ways it could go.

Gatesmith, Vol. 1

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Gatesmith, Volume 1Creator: Jen Lee Quick
Publisher: Chromatic Press
ISBN: 9781987988079
Released: July 2016
Original run: 2014-2015

My introduction to the work of Jen Lee Quick was through her comic Off*Beat. The first two volumes of the series were originally published by Tokyopop after which the comic sadly languished unresolved until it was rescued by Chromatic Press, becoming one of the publisher’s flagship titles. After completing Off*Beat with Chromatic Press, Quick began working on a second comic series with the publisher called Gatesmith. The origins of Gatesmith actually date back to Quick’s Tokyopop days as well, but the ideas for comic have significantly changed since then. At least one thing has remained the same though–Gatesmith is a dark fantasy Western drastically different from Off*Beat. Gatesmith began serialization in Chromatic Press’ digital magazine Sparkler Monthly in 2014. The first volume concluded in 2015 and the serialized content was subsequently collected as an ebook along with an exclusive epilogue comic and the short prequel comic “Hungry.” A small print run of Gatesmith, Volume 1 was released in 2016. As a fan of Quick’s work, I was very happy to snag a copy.

Edgeward is a western frontier town undergoing a transformation as its residents slowly build it into a successful mining city. But Edgeward is also the home to numerous strange happenings, phenomena which some people attribute to the area’s large deposits of mythrilite, a promising but potentially dangerous new energy source which hasn’t yet been thoroughly studied. Modernization can carry along with it tremendous risks, but there seems to be something even more primal, ancient, and bizarre at work in Edgeward. On the outskirts of town, strange lights can be seen in the middle of the desert. Peculiar trees spontaneously emerge where no tree has any right growing. Rumors circulate about monsters and creatures of legend roaming about. Ranchers are losing livestock and are uncertain whether or not to blame humans or something much more diabolical. Whatever it is that is going on in Edgeward may very well have a greater meaning and far-reaching impact than anyone realizes.

Gatesmith, Volume 1, page 72The setting of Gatesmith, while beautiful, is also a harsh and frequently brutal one. Survival is certainly not guaranteed in such an unforgiving environment. The comic opens with an attack on a covered wagon that leaves everyone directly involved in the incident dead and the violence in the story doesn’t end there. At this point virtually everything is unknown in Gatesmith, and the unknown is very apt to get someone killed. Gatesmith, Volume 1 offers very few answers as Quick layers mystery upon mystery. In the series, myth, folklore, and the supernatural are closely intertwined with scientific, social, and technological progress. The anxieties surrounding the changing times are very real and sometimes manifest in unexpected ways. When humans are attempting to deal with things that they don’t completely comprehend or understand trouble naturally follows, but it’s not always the inhuman that people have to worry about–unintentionally or not, civilization can be just as destructive and isn’t necessarily always a positive force. Tremendous resilience and adaptability will be required of any of the characters who hope to reach the end of Gatesmith alive.

Gatesmith is off to an incredibly intriguing start with its first volume; I am intensely curious to see how the comic continues to develop from here. However, part of what makes Gatesmith so appealing and engrossing is also what makes the comic somewhat frustrating. Quick is working with several storylines and a marvelously diverse cast of characters, but this early on in the series the connections between them all are not immediately clear. With the many strange occurrences and often stranger characters involved in Gatesmith, the ultimate direction and drive of the story is somewhat obscured at the moment and the worldbuilding hasn’t yet been established in its entirety. What has been revealed so far is enticing and tantalizing, though. Gatesmith is an interesting blend of genres. Quick draws on traditions of Westerns, folklore, horror, and other speculative fiction without relying heavily on preexisting elements or well-worn tropes, combining them together in striking ways. Currently Gatesmith is on a break as Quick concentrates on a few other creative projects, but I hope to see more of the weirdly wonderful and wonderfully weird Western soon.

Chihayafuru, Vol. 1

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By Yuki Suetsugu. Released in Japan by Kodansha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Be Love. Released in North America digitally by Kodansha Comics. Translated by Ko Ransom.

It has become very difficult these days, as manga fandom expands and grows more varied, to state outright that a series will “never be licensed”. Sure, there’s still a few holdouts that can boast that – I’m looking at you, Hajime to Ippo – but for the last few years we have lived in a renaissance of “oh my God I never thought we would get this title!”. In particular, seeing josei series on a regular basis is something that is welcome and heartwarming. And, in fact, Chihayafuru pulls off a troika. It’s josei, running in Kodansha’s Be Love, which has almost never been mined for licenses; it’s a big comeback for the author, whose career was on ice after a plagiarism scandal – this is her magnificent return. And it’s also a sports manga, something which may not be obvious when you look at its cover, but really sinks in after reading the first couple of chapters.

Of course, you could argue we’re overlooking another big reason why this was an unlikely license, which is the subject matter. This is a manga about a group of kids and their love for Hyakunin Isshu Karuta, a Japanese game that combines memory with one hundred famous poems – you’re given the start of the poem, and need to find the card with the second half of it. It requires speed, smarts, and a certain amount of guile – there’s a lot of smacking of cards here that made me raise an eyebrow and wait for a foul to be called, but that never happened. Playing this game is our heroine, Chihaya, whose name is similar to the start of one of the poems. She’s a brash tomboy who tends to always say what she’s thinking, which gets her in trouble. She’s friends with Taichi, a smart young kid with an oppressive mother – he carries both a chip on his shoulder and a crush on Chihaya. And then there’s the new student Arata, made fun of for his heavy local dialect (which is nicely adapted here by Ko Ransom – I’m reminded somewhat of the way Sweden has been translated in Hetalia, only more coherent) but a whiz at karuta. He gets the other two kids involved, and Chihaya in particular discovers that her speed and acute hearing are a boon.

Fans of the anime may be surprised to see that this entire volume takes place in elementary school – the adaptation made this a flashback after introducing her in high school. It’s still a good start, introducing the strengths and weaknesses of our leads, and having a romantic triangle that pretty much isn’t yet because they’re kids, but you can see it bubbling anyway. Unfortunately, everything comes to an end with Taichi going to a different middle school, and Arata having to move again due to the health of his grandfather (a world-famous karuta player). Will they ever meet again? Signs point to yes. In the meantime, with its engaging characters, dynamic art, and the ability to explain a complex sport/game without getting bogged down in exposition, Chihayafuru is a must read. It’s digital only, but if enough people get it, print may be feasible. Go get it, it’s worth it.