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

A word of warning here: I love Nabiki Tendo. Love love love her. I don’t deny that if I were ever to meet her in real life I’d run away, but she’s fictional, so I am free to openly admire a confident confidence trickster who decides to mess with Ranma and Akane purely because it amuses her… and also to get some of Ranma’s cash, of course. This volume is the first one where she’s really had an arc focusing on her, and she’ll only have one more after this (about 7 omnibuses from now). So most of what folks consider ‘canon’ comes from the 6-chapter story in this volume, where, after a huge fight – again – Akane decides that Nabiki can be Ranma’s fiancee instead.

Of course, like every other story in the series, Nabiki’s presence here is to help show how Ranma and Akane are perfect for each other, while also demonstrating why it’s taking forever to get them to admit that. Akane’s hair-trigger temper is seen here several times, topped only by Ranma’s amazing tendency to say exactly the wrong thing and not understand why anyone would get angry. If you combine this with their mutual innocence and gullibility, it’s no wonder that Nabiki can play them both like fiddles. It helps that Nabiki is one of the few women in the series not attracted to Ranma – at one point she decides to wrap things up, thinking “wouldn’t want him to get TOO attached to me.” I also like that she’s not perfect – her plan to sell Ranma to the highest bidder is done in by Shampoo, Kodachi and Ukyou deciding that killing Nabiki would achieve the same end (yes, Ukyou is also there, just slightly less murderous), and she misreads Ranma as genuinely trying to hit her towards the end. She should know better. She also shows a bit of concern that her plan might genuinely break Ranma and Akane up, which is sweet.

Of course, there’s a lot more in this omnibus than Nabiki, but it’s not quite as interesting. Picolette Charin’s story is wrapped up in a fairly weak way, though the force-feeding was pretty clever. The entire second half of the volume, though, is taken up with a new minor villain, who has the unfortunate name of Pantyhose Taro. In fact, his name drives the plot – he got the name from Happosai, who happened to be at the springs where the young baby had drowned and christened him as if it was a baptism – and his tribe forbids name changes unless it’s the one who gave the name. So Pantyhose Taro has a grudge, and is also possessed of possibly the most ridiculous Jusenkyou curse of all, a yeti riding an ox carrying an eel and a crane spring. This translates to a hideous huge monster, but Pantyhose Taro is fine with that – it’s the name he hates.

Most of this volume is taken up, unfortunately, with a lot of fights and with Akane getting kidnapped and used as bait – again. Luckily, there’s also some sharp humor as well, mostly at Taro’s expense. Pantyhose Taro ends up being the inverse of the usual manga villains – usually they never appear again in the manga, but the anime has them return. Here it’s the anime that didn’t bother to bring Pantyhose Taro back, but we’ll see him again soon. We’re halfway through Ranma 1/2 now, and next time we’ll get a few more amusing one-shots, as well as the development of two new devastating attacks for Ranma and Ryouga.

By Akira Hiyoshimaru. Released in Japan as “Hatsukoi Monster” by Kodansha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Aria. Released in North America by Yen Press.

First off, this is another one of those titles where, no matter how good the execution is, recommending it to friends is just going to be problematic. “See, the twist is that the male lead is really 11 years old… STOP CALLING THE COPS, DAMMIT!” Manga and anime romance has skewed young pretty much since inception, but 13-14 used to be the low end, with most of it taking place in high school. Lately, though, we’re seeing more and more series with younger and younger characters, and even if they aren’t getting in relationships they’re sexualized in some way (hi, No Game No Life). And of course this is written for Aria, which has increasingly become Kodansha’s ‘eccentric’ shoujo magazine. Come into this knowing that the premise is questionable.

The good news is that the author and the cast also know the premise is questionable, and call it out throughout the entire volume. Our heroine is caught up in the flush of first love based both on looks and the fact that he saved her life in a cool manner, but is aware this is deeply wrong. Everything Kanade does emphasizes that he’s not ‘mature for his age’ in anything but appearance – he’s still playing in sandboxes. If this were a case where she were in college and he was in high school, it would be like any other shoujo romance out there, but the fact that he’s 11 adds a frisson of wrongness that just doesn’t go away. It drives the entire title.

Honestly, I kept expecting this to be creepy and make me stop reading, but it never did. It has so many elements that could have gone badly. If the 11-year-old hero had also been mentally/emotionally mature… if the heroine had not been sheltered and naive herself, as well as starved for affection… even the appearance of the characters, which the author says in a note her editor had her change, as the original was a normal-sized girl with a short guy (she liked the huge difference between then, so when told to make the girl tiny, made him huge to contrast), ends up massively improving the product.

There’s also lots of humor – this doesn’t take itself seriously, and I laughed out loud at the introduction of Kanade’s equally huge classmates, as well as their Detective Conan-eaque leader. The one thing I really disliked was Taga, the college age guy who attempts to sexually assault Kaho because… well, because that’s what happens in these sorts of titles to provide conflict, and I wish it didn’t. Naturally, he gets away with a busted lip and nothing else, and is free to emotionally abuse the heroine later. Luckily, the rest of her roommates are more supporting, but that guy needs to go away.

As with so many titles I’ve reviewed lately, if the premise squicks you, don’t get First Love Monster. But the author actually respects and treats the leads sympathetically, without setting up the heroine for comedic humiliation faces. That means I’m intrigued, and will get the next volume to see where it goes.

Pandora in the Crimson Shell: Ghost Urn by Shirow Masamune and Rikudou Koushi. Released in Japan as “Koukaku no Pandora – Ghost Urn” by Kadokawa Shoten, serialization ongoing in the magazine Newtype A. Magika: Swordsman and Summoner by Mitsuki Mihara and MonRin. Released in Japan as “Magika no Kenshi to Shoukan Maou” by Media Factory, serialization ongoing in the magazine Comic Alive. Released in North America by Seven Seas.

As I’ve said before, my tendency to give all Volume 1’s a shot even if I suspect they won’t be my thing at all gets me into a lot of difficulties, particularly with Seven Seas, which is very much an all or nothing company with me. They debuted two new titles this month, one of which not only has the amazing writer-artist team of Shirow Masamune and Rikudou Koushi (leaving Viz means he gets his u’s back), but managed to be on SDCC’s worst manga of the year list despite having been out a total of 5 days when the panel ran. The other one is a harem fantasy from my old nemesis, Comic Alive. Two otaku-pandering titles enter, only one can leave – which one did I like more?

Pandora gets off to a poor start with that cover, featuring our heroine bursting, semi-mude, from some sort of mosaiced plastic casing. We then get color pages of another heroine dressing up in tiny lingerie. This title definitely does not skimp on the fanservice, as we’ll see throughout the volume. The basic premise involves Nene, our heroine, getting involved with a confident young woman who may actually be a supervillain and her cyborg companion. Nene is also a cyborg and highly idealistic, saying that she wants to see world peace. Sadly, she arrives at her island destination to find a robot gone amok, and only she and Clarion (the other cyborg) can hope to stop it.

On pure skeeze factor, Pandora in the Crimson Shell wins hands down. The sequences where Nene has to finger Clarion in her vaginal ‘port’ are risible, though admittedly I wouldn’t put it past Shirow based on past titles. Speaking of which, the credits show quite a committee working on this title. Rikudou is the main artist in charge, but I had felt that I could only see his art style occasionally, and that may be why. His sense of humor, thankfully, is sometimes more apparent, particularly in the Excel-ish intrepid reporter and the dry tones of Uzal Delilah. The action sequences, which make up much of the second half, are… decent. Basically, if it weren’t for the horrible service and constant sexual assault hints, I may actually have enjoyed this. Sadly, the service and assault is all over the book.

Magika Swordsman and Summoner is our second title, and reads like a modern-day light novel checklist (appropriate, it’s based on a light novel). Our hero is the lowest of his class at magic school, not good for much yet but stirring water around. He’s also the only male in a class of females. He has an adopted sister (older than him, but acts younger as they only found that out recently), who harbors incestuous feelings for him. At the school, he meets a busty airheaded woman who turns out to be student council president, as well as an angry young blonde who seems very upset that he doesn’t recognize her, for some reason. Oh yes, you can also add in a quiet, stoic elf-girl and a shy girl who can’t deal with men. When he summons an amnesiac diva with no powers (which gets him in trouble, as she may be evil), he discovers he has to form a harem of 72 women in order to become the Harem King.

If you started throwing up halfway through that, you may get the feeling I had while reading this title. Everything about it is from Tropes 101, be it the Magic Academy stuff or the Harem stuff, though I admit 72 is aiming high – even Negima didn’t quite go for that many women. (Yes, it’s from reports of the houris that accompany Muslim martyrs after they die.) Seven Seas’ back cover notes that fans of Dragonar Academy and Zero’s Familiar will enjoy it, and I can’t argue with that – it’s certainly more of the same. The one redeeming feature is the hero, who seems a decent sort and is very uncomfortable with the whole harem concept. We’ll see how long that lasts. Or rather, other readers will.

In general, if you’re going to be a bad manga and keep me interested, it’s best to do it with style. Neither of these titles are things I’d recommend to anyone except SS’s core otaku audience. But honestly, Ghost Urn made me wonder how the cliffhanger might be resolved, whereas with S&S I just didn’t care. On balance, I have to give the edge to Shirow, Rikudou and company here.