Features & Reviews

Dengeki Daisy, Vol. 12

May 14, 2013 by Anna N

Dengeki Daisy Volume 12 by Kyousuke Motomi

It occurred to me as I was reading volume 12 of Dengeki Daisy that more shoujo titles should feature yacht kidnappings as standard plot points. Think about it! Instead of evil male models, frenemies, and surprise fiances, there would be random kidnappings taking place on luxurious ships! Wouldn’t it lend a bit of excitement and suspense to most manga?

I enjoy Dengeki Daisy so much because it portrays a slightly unconventional romance with some elements of techno thriller action. As you might guess, volume 12 features a yacht kidnapping, as Teru and her hacker/school janitor/almost boyfriend Kurosaki team up with the rest of the Scooby Gang to rescue Rena from her evil fiance Morizono. They storm the party in a variety of disguises. Kurosaki pretends to be a clueless foreigner. Teru gets all dolled up and stages an elaborate and hilarious distraction by pretending to be Morizono’s spurned lover. Hasegawa disguises himself as a waiter. As the group secures Rena, Kurosaki stumbles across yet another hacking conspiracy. Akira’s presence is almost negligible, as Kurosaki works to foil the plan to sell the Jack Frost virus and encounters someone else from his past – a person who started the tragic actions that lead to the creation of the Jack Frost virus in the first place and the death of Teru’s brother.

Dengeki Daisy always manages to cover a wide variety of emotional scenes in an effortless way. There’s the fun caper of the team storming the yacht where Rena is held captive, followed by a celebration afterwards where Rena and Hasegawa start inching towards the development of a new relationship. Nothing is ever simply happy in Dengeki Daisy for long though, as Kurosaki is horribly affected with his encounter with the mysterious new hacker. Kurosaki is in many ways the exact opposite of the cool shoujo hero, and the level of vulnerability he displays to Teru shows the reader just how traumatized he is as well as how much he trusts her. They’re one of my favorite shoujo manga couples of all time, and each volume of the series tends to show a new aspect of their relationship. Even though each conspiracy tends to lead to yet another conspiracy and I am wondering why every hacker that shows up in this manga has long bangs, after twelve volumes of Dengeki Daisy I’m still looking forward to seeing what happens next.

Weekly Shonen Jump Recap: May 13, 2013

May 14, 2013 by Derek Bown 1 Comment

These past two weeks have been a bit strange for me. A few years ago Golden Week was like some kind of massive torture perpetrated against me by the Japanese people. How dare they take an entire week off and deprive me of my new manga chapters!?

Please keep in mind this is a comedically exaggerated representation of a much more immature me.

Jump forward to this year, and I found myself mostly unconcerned about there being no new manga chapters last week. I attribute it to being a lot busier than when I first started reading manga on a weekly basis. It almost felt like a bit of a relief not to have new chapters, though that I attribute mostly to the fact that I didn’t have to write up a recap. As much as I enjoy this, a break is nice every now and then. But, now we’re back and we won’t be off for the next several months. I’m pretty sure there’s a week or two during the summer that we don’t get new chapters, but the only extended break in Japan I’m aware of is closer towards Christmas and New Years.

Blue Exorcist Ch. 046
There was once a time when I would have raged at a chapter like this. I hated romantic drama, and to an extent I still do. In a way, I remind myself of a certain fictional manga artist, “But I don’t want to make it hard for my main character.” Thank goodness for perspective. There are certainly plenty of reasons to rage about this chapter, depending on one’s varying levels of shipping aptitude. But the main thing I took from this is that Shura is my perfect woman. Not because of her fashion sense, but because she just doesn’t give a crap. All this teenage romantic drama and the only thing she cares about is giving Yukio a hard time. Were she real I would ask her to marry me. Sadly, she is not, so I’ll just sit back and keep enjoying chapters like these.

Naruto Ch. 629
There are a few things I could go off on in this chapter. The first thing that really stuck out was the giant hole Obito now has in him. But I was able to remember that part of his body is actually made up of a Zetsu clone. So chances are, he can survive with a giant hole through his chest because that’s not actually part of his body.

What really got me going was the reveal of how Rin actually died. I’m going to go off on a slight tangent here, but one of the reasons I really like the series Fairy Tail is because it’s one of the only manga series that addresses the fact that “one can die for their loved ones and have said loved ones be okay with it” is a pretty arrogant conceit. The sacrifice is no less noble, but one should not approach it without the understanding that while your loved ones’ lives will be saved by your sacrifice, they will still be severely hurt by your death. Because they love you so much that they would rather they die and you live, and vice versa.

That being said, I don’t know what exactly was going through Rin’s mind when she decided to jump in front of Kakashi’s attack. Certainly she was sacrificing herself to prevent the Three Tails from going on a rampage in Konoha, but besides Obito’s word we have no proof that the higher ups in Konoha couldn’t have controlled the Three Tails somehow. In fact, the majority of this series is about how Jinchuriki can control their tailed beasts. Does Kirigakure have some special way of forcing her to go on a rampage? We don’t know, we’re never told that information. Perhaps she couldn’t control it because she wasn’t a Jinchuriki from birth? We don’t know. That crucial bit of information, upon which the validity of her sacrifice hinges, is never actually explained.

We’re given the most bare bones explanation, and are expected to feel sad just because someone died for someone else. (Semi)Pro Tip for aspiring writers, if you’re considering a plot twist that will just make readers pause and ask, “Say wha?” and you don’t intend to explain it later, then perhaps you need to rethink what you are writing!

And if it wasn’t bad enough that the entire sacrifice is dubious at best—why in the world are we supposed to think that there is some kind of deep significance in Rin using Kakashi to commit suicide? “She decided to die at the hands of someone she loved in order to protect Konoha.” From that sentence alone her actions are portrayed as something meaningful. But instead all I can see is a poorly written character deciding that it was a good idea to force the person she loved to kill her!

Now we get to the relevance of my Fairy Tail tangent. If dying for others without understanding the pain the survivors go through is a bad enough sin, then forcing them to be the one to kill you—forcing them to live with that guilt—is the most selfish thing I can imagine. We barely know what Rin’s personality was like, besides her being a proto-Sakura, but already she’s probably the worst character in this entire series! I make no effort to hide that I think Naruto has some poorly written women. But it’s a testament to Kishimoto’s skill that he could take a character we’ve barely even met and make her the most despicable character in the entire series. And what’s worse, we’re supposed to like her for what she did. It doesn’t work like that! We’ve got an entire series worth of Kakashi feeling guilt over his comrades dying. This isn’t making Rin’s death seem noble or anything, rather it’s just compounding how awful she is.

And what gets me is that we’re supposed to think this is anything other than the most awful thing anyone could do to someone they love.That’s the impression I’m getting. Why can’t we have characters in this series that don’t make the worst decisions ever? Or at least don’t ask us to accept that their decisions are not the worst decisions ever. I still haven’t forgotten that Naruto told Sasuke they would die together! Why is nobody pointing out how stupid that plan is!?!

Mario One-Shot
Fortunately Mario was a lot more tolerable than Naruto was this week. It’s a fair shake at a more serious story, though it still has those little flaws in Kishimoto’s writing that always get to me. For one, why exactly does Mario apparently die at the end? I know he says he’s sick of the world or something, but that’s not exactly a good reason. And once again we’re supposed to accept the events of the manga without questioning it. The ending practically screams, “This is meaningful and touching, don’t you dare question it!” To which my only response is, “Now wait just one darn minute!”

I think, if nothing else, that is my biggest problem with Kishimoto’s writing—that he does things not supported by any kind of logic, and expects me to buy in unquestioningly. That may work for some authors but it doesn’t here, because I have far too many questions every time I read one of his pieces. He focuses far too much on the emotional aspect of the story without backing it up with logic. Considering I’m a fan of Doctor Who I can’t exactly complain about relying on emotion more than logic. However, there is a certain level of logic required for the emotion not to crumble under the weight of questions. Consider the logic the cake and the emotion the sweet, sweet frosting. Frosting tastes good on its own, but if you try and form it in the shape of a cake you better have a crap ton of frosting or it’s either going to collapse or be a much smaller cake. And ultimately it won’t be nearly as satisfying. A sweet little nothing, without the backing of more solid food.

One Piece Ch. 708
All this talk about cake has made me hungry, but sadly the next series is not Toriko, so that segue has been wasted this week. Still, One Piece was excellent again. By this chapter, Luffy’s attempts to hide his identity are pointless, though I will give him credit for not being the instigator of his unmasking. I expected him to be dumb enough to once again tell someone that he’s Luffy. But rather than pulling that joke for a second time, Oda gave him the benefit of the doubt and let him slip up only after someone else called him on his identity. I look forward to seeing how the C block fights turn out. By that point I imagine his identity will become general knowledge and everyone will be ganging up on him.

This chapter also featured the best segue from Luffy’s scene to the B block fight. It’s a simple thing, but it’s so well done in its simplicity that I can’t help but take a moment to appreciate it. The fight itself is moving into the final phase with some of the prominent fighters from last week being taken down, allowing us to focus on the true powerhouses for this fight. I imagine that we’ll have one more chapter before we’re down to the final two, which I’ll predict to be Bellamy and Bartolomeo.

Toriko Ch. 232
Toriko continues to prove that we really can’t know what will happen week to week. It defies my attempts to predict exactly what will happen. Characters dying that I didn’t expect, others turning out to be members of this mysterious third party… The fight seems pretty equal between the IGO and Gourmet Corp, but the only safe prediction I feel I can make is that both sides will be pretty much devastated after this war. And unless Toriko pulls himself together fast he’s going to lose this fight. And then Komatsu will become one of the rare male damsels in distress.

Nisekoi Ch. 073
I really need to stop falling in love with manga characters. Rakku’s teacher is possibly the master troll, and supreme not-give-a-crap master. Once again I find that the only way I can review Nisekoi is by giving a detailed summary about what was funny in this chapter. Which would result in me recapping the entire chapter and just butchering the jokes. So instead, go read it if you haven’t. You’ll need to read the chapter from two weeks ago, since this is a direct continuation of that. In fact, Viz has the first three volumes as digital editions. Go pick those up.

World Trigger Ch. 013
By this point my interest in World Trigger is null. I feel unfair writing a series off like that, but there really isn’t anything left for me to say. This is not a very engaging manga, and I can’t quite pinpoint why I’m not engaged by it. As a critic it’s been driving me mad. I should be able to point out why exactly something isn’t very good, but in this case I really can’t say anything but that this series is just dull. The premise was interesting at first, but the pacing has been atrocious (oh hey, that’s a specific right there!). It’s taken this long to come close to something even resembling a main focus, but by now it’s pointless. I’m already annoyed by this manga’s general lack of anything interesting to say. The fact that a missing piece has finally been inserted into the story doesn’t take away the fact that I’ve all ready seen how dull this story is.

Bleach Ch. 536
Well then, this chapter has an interesting panel in it. I won’t dwell on it, though it’s kind of hard not to, but am I the only one who noticed way more detail put into Masaki’s chest than I thought Shonen Jump allowed? Anyone else? Fine then, I guess I’m just a pervert, but I swear that’s way more detail in the nudity than I thought was allowed.

By now I think it’s pretty clear that Katagiri is Uryu’s mother, or if she isn’t then we’ve been pointlessly mislead. The rest of the chapter prefers to show rather than tell, but since the important part has been shown already I can let it pass. Now all we need to do is sit back and wait to see how much Masaki’s death will be retconned. My prediction, given the general tone of this arc, is that Masaki’s death will actually be because of the militant Quincy faction.

Cross Manage Ch. 032
This week was not quite as strong as the chapter two weeks ago, but it was still very strong. Sakurai and the rest of the team’s despair over how outmatched they are by Chihara is very well portrayed. Personally I would have loved if we’d gotten another twist at the end of the chapter with Komatsu stopping Chihara’s ball, but what we did get was still very solid. By this point I’m pretty certain the Fujioka team will be defeated. It’ll be another loss to mirror their first loss against Chouran. Except this time we actually get to see the game, and the loss comes after many chapters of training and character development. It’s actually a really clever move. Show the standard loss that every sports story needs early on, and then move forward as if still following the formula. By this point the tropes had been matched and I imagine more than a few were thinking Fujioka had a chance against Chouran. By having them actually lose this match, the first loss was a decoy to give the actual important loss that much more of an impact. I imagine next chapter Misora will rally her team together and they’ll fight back, but ultimately I expect them to lose.

Really it all depends on whether the series will continue or not. If it’s being cancelled this would be a good time to have them pull themselves together and win the game. It would be satisfying, after what we’ve gotten so far, but not nearly as good as what they could do if they lose this match and the series keeps going. Considering how good Cross Mangage has been the past few months I would be surprised if it was cancelled. There are worse series in Jump that need to go away well before this one disappears. So I hope we get the more satisfying, long term story, but either way what we’ve gotten so far has been amazing.

One-Punch Man Ch. 016
One-Punch Man is always good, but sometimes it’s just a little less good than others. The past few weeks have been a bit iffy as far as this manga is concerned. Still good, but not amazing. This week was back to amazing. We go back to the same old joke, but at the same time we get an absolutely awesome color page at the end of the chapter. I had to zoom in real close to determine if the background was just a picture of a sunset, or if it was an actual painting. I’m pretty sure it was a painting, but I could be wrong.

The fact that Saitama barely passed the Hero exam was amusing, especially considering how his full score on the physical test barely represents his actual abilities. He could easily beat Genos, who got a full score on both the physical and the written portion of the exams. It really begs the question, what is more important to a hero? Strength? Or brains? Well, in this case I’d definitely say strength is the most important aspect. Since Saitama can take down any hero, he just needs to study a bit more for the written portion.

Dragon Ball Z Ch. 014
Has it really been fourteen chapters? And here I was thinking not much had happened at all. I used to defend the Dragon Ball Z manga as being much faster paced than the anime, which it is, but I apparently gave it a tad more credit than it deserved. And still, somehow this manga manages to hit the butter zone for what I like in manga pacing. I can’t stand it when it’s too fast, I can’t stand it when it’s too slow, it has to be just right. And while Dragon Ball Z errs on the side of too slow, it’s still much better paced than a good chunk of the manga we’ve seen come and go since Weekly Shonen Jump Alpha started.

The one thing that always bugged me about Dragon Ball in general was how nonchalant the characters were about cutting off Saiyan tails. Sometimes they just popped right off, with no sharp implements needed. I can’t exactly speak for the characters, but I’m pretty sure that if I grew up with a tail I would be more than a little peeved when it got cut off. I probably wouldn’t even know how to properly balance. Because, as I’m sure we all know, animals with tails use them to help maintain their balance. We humans, and most apes, don’t need them thanks to our vestibular system. Though, when it comes to upright balance we’ve got the rest of the apes beaten. Any animal that has a tail generally has it in order to maintain their balance. And without said tail balance would become much more difficult. Unless of course the Saiyans have the same kind of internal balancing system we have, in which case them having tails would be an evolutionary goof.

Why, it’s almost like Toriyama was some kind of comic book artist, and not an expert in biology at all.

Still, I think the characters are cooler with their tails and I don’t get why Toriyama kept cutting them off. It would have been awesome to see them learn how to control their monkey forms. Probably would have taken the series in a completely different direction. Spiky blonde haired, blue eyed martial artists beating each other up, or giant monkeys doing the same thing? Hmmm…

Bit of a long one this week, sorry about that. But, considering we didn’t have anything to discuss last week I think I can get away with a double length review this week. So, anyone getting sick of my Naruto bashing? Or perhaps do you agree? Leave your feedback in the comment section.

If you want to hear more, check out the Manga^3 Podcast Archives. Or go directly to last two episodes, Episode 046 – April 29, 2013 – Manga Endings | Medaka Box, and, Special 002 – May 6, 2013 – Where the $%#! Is My Manga!? – A Discussion of Golden Week | Toriko Vol. 4

It Came from the Sinosphere: The Wushe Incident

May 14, 2013 by Sara K. 3 Comments

Practically everybody in Taiwan knows about Seediq Bale, the most expensive Taiwanese movie ever made. During my entire time in Taiwan, not a single other movie, Taiwanese or not, has made as much of a stir as that one. What few people know is that it was adapted from a manhua, The Wushe Incident (台灣第一部霧社事件歷史漫畫), which is gratefully back in print thanks to the success of the movie.

The Story

Deep in the central mountains of Taiwan, 1930, the Japanese relentlessly inflict suffering on the Seediq people. Many young Seediq men are anxious to strike back at the Japanese, but their leader, Mona Rudao, stops them, and always placates the Japanese whenever a young Seediq man loses his temper. Of course, Mona Rudao himself hates the Japanese, as they killed his father, ruined his sister’s life, and continue to exploit his people. However, Mona Rudao has also travelled to Japan, and personally witnessed just how powerful the Japanese military is, so he dares not provoke the Japanese … before there is a good opportunity.

Background

If I had to sum up Taiwan in two words, those two words would be “mountain island.” Those two words alone explain a great deal about Taiwanese culture, history, politics, geography, agriculture, economy, weather, etc.

For example, Taiwan is difficult to conquer/unify because it’s a mountain island. That’s why the indigenous peoples speak over 20 different languages – travel was so difficult that most people would never went far from their birthplace.

During my various trips to Taiwan’s mountains, when I didn’t have to deal with road closures, landslides, fog so thick that the driver can’t see more than a meter or two ahead, buses that got cancelled because the road collapsed, etc., I was lucky. To read about the condition of what until recently was one of Taiwan’s most important mountain roads, click here. Right now, I reckon at least half of the major mountain roads in Taiwan are closed or have major obstruction, and there hasn’t even been a typhoon recently. This is why Taiwan has been politically united for less than a hundred years.

Conifers and high-mountain grasses are cloaked in lots of fog.

I took this photo near Wushe, where the story takes place.

Astonishingly, some of the “Japanese” mountain trails are still intact. I’ve been on a couple sections of the former Japanese Hehuanshan trail, which is one of the trails used by the Japanese to send reinforcements to Wushe. Along the trail there are the remains of Japanese police stations, schools to teach the indigenous children how to be more Japanese, and the graves of Japanese police/soldiers who died along the trail (most of them were killed by Mother Nature). Here is a description of an epic Japanese mountain trail running through Taiwan.

The manhua starts with a set of detailed color drawings showing various scenes of Seediq life.

The creator of the manhua, Qiu Ruolong, got stranded in Wushe (which is near Wuling pass, Taiwan’s highest mountain pass which is car-accessible – though I personally wouldn’t want to drive through it) when his vehicle broke down. While he was stuck in Wushe, he stayed with the local Seediq people, who gradually shared their history with him. This is how he first learned of the Wushe incident, and it fascinated him so much that he did more and more research – for example, he spent six months sewing traditional Seediq clothing. Eventually, he made this manhua.

The Wushe incident is historically significant as the last act of armed resistance to Japanese rule in Taiwan.

The Artwork

I love it.

First of all, Qiu Ruolong manages to capture a bit of the majesty of Taiwan’s high mountains. Just flipping through the pages brings up memories of my trips to the mountains.

It’s not just that he draws spectacular scenery – he populates it with the characters, making both the people and the scenery look solemn and magnificent.

Sometimes, I just have stop and let my eyes rest on a page for a while.

I love that halo of light around Mona Ludao as he walks through the dark forest, as the diagonal rays of sunlight frame him from above.

Which brings me to another point – Qiu Ruolong is great a compostion.

Take this page, for example. Here, Qiu Ruolong explains the way the Japanese treated Seediq women. These two pages can be split into about four parts – in the top-right, we see the Seediq women in their native village before any Japanese men bother them, in the bottom-right, we see the Seediq woman marrying the Japanese man and adopting a Japanese hairstyle (she does not look overjoyed), in the top-left we see the Japanese husband beating her, and in the bottom-left we see the Seediq woman weeping, isolated in the midst of Japanese architecture. Notice that the last section is the biggest, and the image of the weeping woman is the single biggest thing on these two pages. That makes that the center of this scene, and all of the other, smaller drawings are supports which explain the existence of this central image.

In the picture below, notice how all of the Seediq warriors with their backs facing the reader circle around Mona Rudao, whose front faces the reader.

And in this picture (below), notice how the simple image of the stare, surrounding by black, contrasts with the detailed drawings around it.

Qiu Rulong is a master of drawing violence. The way the Seediq warriors chop off Japanese heads is both silent and chilling.

However, possibly the best part of the artwork is he really brings the Seediq people (and to a lesser extent the Japanese people) to life. This is partially because the drawings are so detailed, but it’s mainly because he puts a human in every figure.

This is How You Make a Historical Graphic Novel

One of my biggest criticisms of In the Fires of 2/28 is that it didn’t focus on any specific characters, so it didn’t make the historical events feel personal. Qiu Ruolong does not make this mistake. While he often goes into digressions about Seediq life, historical background, etc., he centers the story around Mona Rudao and his family. Watching their personal journeys makes the story that much more powerful.

That said, I would have liked to have seen a bit more about the Seediq characters who adopted a Japanese lifestyle. The graphic novel shows just enough about them to intrigue me.

Exploited Resource vs. Sovereign Agent

While the Japanese did various bad things to the Seediq people, all of the awful behavior stems from a single root – the Japanese regarded the Seediq people as a resource to be exploited, not as agents with which one should establish mutually beneficial relationships. Some people would phrase this as “the Japanese did not see the Seediq as fully human.” which would be accurate … but I’d like to emphasize that the Japanese had the exact same attitude towards the Seediq people as they did to the other “resources” in the mountains. For example, the Japanese saw the mountain forests as a way to make money quickly (that was one of the main reasons the Japanese wanted to control the mountains), rather than as an ecosystem to steward and preserve.

The Seediq people knew that the Japanese were treating them as objects, not as agents. They could feel it. The Japanese were constantly rubbing it in. And passively accepting it was destroying their psyche.

The graphic novel does an excellent job of getting the readers to understand why the Seediq act as they do. First, the manhua patiently describes humiliation and humiliation suffered by the Seediq at the hands of the Japanese, making the reader angry. The worst is when the Seediq have to bow their heads and plead for forgiveness from the Japanese, even when it was the Japanese whose behavior was wrong. It’s like a rubber band slowly being stretched until it … snaps.

The Seediq knew that they were not strong enough to drive out the Japanese and restore their independence. But they felt they had to attack anyway. They had to prove to the Japanese, and to themselves, that they have some agency, and that they could not be oppressed without consequences. Suicidal action which proved they still had some power was better than powerlessly submitting to the Japanese.

Availability in English

This manhua is totally unavailable in English. And that’s a shame. This is a downright excellent graphic novel, and it’s only about 300 pages long – would somebody please publish it in English?

Conclusion

This manhua definitely exceeded my expectations. It brings out so many feelings … from relatively benign nostalgia of my trips to the mountains, to the horror of the humiliation and violence, to passionate desire of the Seediq people to assert power over their lives.

Though the Seediq did not drive out the Japanese, they did shatter the Japanese perception that they were just passive objects to be used however the Japanese pleased. And today, the Japanese are long gone, while the Seediq are still there.

This manhua would not have been possible, or at least not as good, without Qiu Ruolong’s passion for the subject. I know the film Seediq Bale has been criticized for historical and cultural inaccuracies, and I cannot judge to what extent this manhua is or is not accurate. Accurate or not, it is clearly something that Qiu Ruolong cares about deeply.

Next Time: Khóohái Lúsînliông (TV show)

Sara K. has had far more fantasies about living in the mountains that living by the beach. She is upholding the San Francisco tradition of disliking beaches (the beaches in San Francisco are at best unpleasant, and at worst life-threateningly dangerous). She is no doubt also influenced by her family – her father, who was born and raised in southern Florida, also has a distaste for beaches, as does her mother, who grew up on the coast of the Mediterranean. That said, it is still good for her to go to beach instead of the mountain once in a while. Heck, last week she went *swimming* for the first time in over five years.

Bookshelf Briefs 5/13/13

May 13, 2013 by Anna N, MJ and Sean Gaffney 3 Comments

It’s all Viz, all the time this week, as Anna, MJ, and Sean look at recent releases from Viz’s various imprints, including Shonen Jump, Shojo Beat, and SuBLime Manga.

07-Ghost, Vol. 4 | By Yuki Amemiya and Yukino Ichihara | Viz Media – A ton of stuff happens in this volume. Confrontations with the Barsburg Empire! Teito loses the source of his mystical power and gets back his memories! There’s a crazy final exam as everybody tries to become a Bishop! Teito cements his bonds with new friend Hakuren and the mysterious priest Frau as he begins to progress on his journey to fully understand his power and what it means to be a long-lost prince of the Raggs kingdom. Truthfully, I wasn’t following all the action all that closely because I was so distracted by all the billowing robes and mystical bolts of energy. After the first four volumes of the series, it seems like Teito is set up for the next phase of his adventure, and I’m curious to find out what will happen next. – Anna N

Bakuman, Vol. 19 | By Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata | Viz Media – As this series finally reaches its penultimate volume, I’m stunned to reveal that it’s finally hooked me on its ridiculous primary romance and I’ve officially been reduced to a blubbering pile of goo. Now that something is truly threatening Mashiro and Azuki’s happiness, it seems that I’m suddenly, hugely invested in seeing their dreams come true. As a jaded reader, this kind of pisses me off, but I can’t deny that it’s also significantly enhanced my enjoyment of the series’ building climax. It helps, of course, that the romantic subplot has become overtly entwined with the characters’ professional success, which I’ve been invested in from the start. Who knew that such an over-the-top romantic setup could provide this kind of emotional payoff? Well done, Ohba and Obata. Still recommended. – MJ

Blue Morning, Vol. 1 | by Shoko Hidaka | SuBLime Manga – Sean described this series’ premise as “Black Butler with the fantasy removed and the BL actually consummated,” which isn’t entirely wrong, in that it’s a BL story involving a butler with no supernatural elements. Fortunately, that’s where the comparison ends. This story about a young viscount left in the care of his late father’s mysteriously devoted butler is an angst-heavy, emotionally dense study of 19th century classism, with a dark, romantic undercurrent that’s more Les Liaisons dangereuses than Black Butler. Teen viscount Akihito’s unrequited feelings for his butler/mentor Katsuragi make way for the series’ obligatory sex scenes, but it’s their ongoing power struggle over Akihito’s political future that really pushes the story forward. A new multi-volume BL drama is always worth a look, and Blue Morning makes a strong showing from the start. Recommended. – MJ

Dengeki Daisy, Vol. 12 | By Kyousuke Motomi | Viz Media – One of the many things that impresses me about Dengeki Daisy is that it hasn’t abandoned its comedy roots even as the plot gets more serious. The first chapter in particular has a marvelous Titanic parody that’s only topped by Teru’s performance as a ‘scorned woman’. That said, the plot is getting darker and more serious. We knew that the guy who kidnapped Rena last time was a small-time villain, but he does lead us to a man who may be the ‘final boss’… one who not only manages to give Kurosaki a major freak out, but almost drives a wedge between our heroes with just a few well-placed words. All that plus we get romance (in a shoujo manga? Gasp!), as Teru and Kurosaki edge ever closer together without actually getting there. One of the most addicting manga currently on the market. – Sean Gaffney

Otomen, Vol. 15 | By Aya Kanno | Viz Media – This probably has the least Asuka of any of the volumes we’ve seen to date – indeed, Ryo appears more than he does! The first half of this volume wraps up Tonomine’s storyline, and once again emphasizes the core message of ‘be true to yourself even if it makes you ‘girly’ that every volume of this manga has had. (I note the moment those dresses came out, I thought “And Ryo will get a tux.” And I was right.) The second half has a summer festival, and features Yamato, who’s still self-conscious about his cute face and personality, which is not helped by spending most of the festival with Ryo, who is pure coolness in a female package. I’m not certain the cliffhanger ending of the volume will amount to anything, but that’s mainly as Otomen is still light froth. There’s tons of things wrong with it, but I still enjoy it immensely. – Sean Gaffney

Otomen, Vol. 15 | By Aya Kanno | Viz Media – I stopped buying this series regularly because I kept feeling frustrated that it never really explored the interesting aspect of people subverting gender roles in a more in-depth way. Still, it is fun to check in on Otomen now and then. Make-up artist Tonominie confronts his father’s political legacy and gets some resolution about finally being able to live for his own dream instead of fulfilling his family’s expectations. Ryo is one of my favorite characters in the series, so I was happy to see the last half of the book focused on her unique blend of oblivious coolness as she decimates every single (manly) challenge at a festival in an attempt to help Yamato with his own image issues. – Anna N

Zero’s Familiar, Vols. 1-3

May 12, 2013 by Sean Gaffney

By Noboru Yamaguchi and Nana Mochizuki. Released in Japan as “Zero no Tsukaima” by Media Factory, serialized in the magazine Comic Alive. Released in North America by Seven Seas.

I must admit to disappointment. Again. Not with the manga itself. Zero’s Familiar actually turned out to be much better than I’d given it credit for. No, I’m disappointed with anime and manga fans, who once again have labeled a young tsundere love interest as “the worst person ever, and deserving of all the epithets thrown at her!”. I found that she’s just a normal teenager with far too much going on in her life, a spoiled background, an entire class of students calling her a failure, and her familiar is not only a disrespectful commoner, but he also tries to molest her in her sleep at one point after thinking they’d grown close enough. Honestly, I felt the most sympathy with Louise through most of this omnibus. I’m sure I will hear, as I have with Ranma 1/2 and Love Hina and other harems featuring love interests men hate, “BUT IN THE ANIME” and “SHE NEEDS TO BE NICER TO HIM” and the usual chatter. And indeed, she may be worse in the anime and in the light novels, neither of which I know. But for now, my experiment to find a harem tsundere who’s genuinely loathsome and not hyper-exaggerated by fandom continues.

I suppose I should actually get around to reviewing the manga. The basic premise cries out for crossover fanfiction – indeed, I understand there’s more Zero’s Familiar crossovers in fanfiction than there are stories with the hero. The aforementioned Louise (who *is* a spoiled brat who tends to hit Saito in frustration whenever she’s upset or embarrassed, in case people thought I read the wrong manga) is at a magic school somewhere in Fantasy Europe, trying to summon her familiar – a lifelong spell that can only be done once. To everyone’s surprise, she summons Saito, a young Japanese high school student. this is not the usual frog or owl. This is unfortunate, as Louise is well-known for being a failure as a witch, and this only expands her reputation. Now Saito has to get used to living as a familiar in a magical world, and gradually accumulate girls who fall in love with him, as this is a standard harem series. No worries, though, he’ll end up with Louise. This is not a GROUNDBREAKING harem series, after all.

Indeed, the lack of originality is the series’ main failing. Louise and Saito are straight out of the stock cliche factory, though Saito is a bit more of a smartmouth than I’m used to, and also more of a lech – that scene where he said “you smiled at me, so I assumed you loved me and we could cuddle” made my jaw drop. We get the shy young maid, the busty rival, the stoic Ayanami clone. The villains especially disappoint by being lampshaded – I think the story would have had more suspense had the two bad guys not been signposted as “SECRET BAD GUY HERE”. Particularly the mustachio’d guy. Guys with mustaches in harem manga are evil, ESPECIALLY if they’re also fiancees.

But there’s stuff here to like. The series has a good feel for humor, knowing when to be funny and when to be serious, and the comedic violence that so offends young male anime fans is actually fairly mild compared to what I had been expecting. I like the backstory and world building going on, showing it’s not just a magic school divorced from the outside world. I also liked Henrietta, who shows us that it’s not everyone vs. Louise after all, and provides a good female friend for her. And the entire action scene with the Staff of Destruction’ was fantastic, and added intrigue as you wondered how the heck it got there.

I’d still only read this if you happen to like harem series with tsunderes, but if you do enjoy that genre, this should be right up your alley, and I find myself surprisingly wanting more. Also, that cover reminds me that every Japanese fanart we got of “Hermione Granger” back in the day seems to have been Louise instead – and that this story deserves the title “Harem Potter” more than Negima ever did.

It Came from the Sinosphere: Hear Me

May 10, 2013 by Sara K. 1 Comment

The Story

Tiankuo, who works for his parents’ eatery, delivers some lunch boxes to a training session for a deaf swimming team. There, he meets a pretty young woman called Yangyang. Yangyang is there for her sister, Xiaopeng, who hopes to participate in the Deaflympics (note: the Deaflympics 2009 happened in Taipei, the same year the film came out). Tiankuo happens to be proficient in Taiwanese Sign Language (henceforth referred to as TSL for brevity), so he can chat with Yangyang … but will their relationship go in the direction that Tiankuo hopes for?

Some Background

This was the most popular Taiwanese film of 2009. That same year, the Deaflympics happened in Taipei.

Ivy Chen, who plays Yangyang, also starred in Black and White, and Michelle Chen, who plays Xiaopeng, starred in You Are the Apple of My Eye.

TSL is the dominant sign language in Taiwan, and is closely related to Japanese Sign Language and Korean Sign Language (this is because the Japanese established formal Deaf education in Taiwan). TSL has also been influenced by Chinese Sign Language.

I have encountered a lot more users of sign language in Taiwan than I did in the United States. I can think of three explanations for this:

1) Sheer coincidence
2) Deafness may be more prevalent in Taiwan
3) Deaf people may be more integrated into general Taiwanese society

I don’t know which of the above explanations is correct.

Why Didn’t They Cast a Deaf Actress?

I really think they should have cast a deaf actress in this film. Okay, maybe, just maybe, there aren’t any pretty young deaf women in Taiwan with good acting skills … but I would have preferred casting a deaf actress from Korea or Japan over casting a hearing Taiwanese actress to play a deaf Taiwanese woman (actually, Xiaopeng doesn’t even have to be played by a pretty actress, but I’ll give the producers a pass on that one). And don’t tell me there isn’t a single competent pretty young deaf actress in Taiwan/South Korea/Japan combined – the population is too big for there not to be one.

Now, I myself know almost nothing about TSL, so I can’t tell whether the actors worked so hard that in the film they pass for natives in TSL, whether they actually are natives in TSL, or whether people fluent in TSL find the actors’ TSL laughably bad. If the actors did not master TSL well enough to pass for native (well, I suppose Eddie Peng doesn’t need to pass as native since his character, Tiankuo, isn’t native in TSL), then that’s simply disrespectful to deaf people. But even if they do pass for native in the film, I think that casting a hearing actress to play Xiaopeng was wrong.

Why?

Fairness.

I bet that there there are deaf women in East Asia who love acting. This was a rare chance for one to get cast in a major East Asian film … and that chance was handed to a hearing actress who has a lot of other opportunities.

In the United States – and I suspect this is true in Taiwan too – deaf people are much poorer than their hearing counterparts, and one reason for this is employment discrimination. Casting a hearing actress to play a deaf woman is employment discrimination.

A Quiet Film

I’m not referring to the lack of spoken dialogue – though of course much of the dialogue is in TSL – but to the lack of melodrama in the film.

Nice boy meets nice girl, boy is nice to girl, girl is nice to her sister. Nice boy of course does get worked up and nervous about how nice girl feels about him, and nice boy and nice girl even get into a petty conflict at one point in the film, but it’s pretty mellow.

The most melodramatic event is when there is a fire which causes Xiaopeng to lose consciousness, go to the hospital, and messes up her breathing, which affects her swimming ability.

And that brings me to another point – the most intense relationship in the film is not the relationship between Tiankuo and Yangyang, but between Yangyang and Xiaopeng.

Tiankuo is insecure because he doesn’t really know Yangyang that well, and it’s implied that he has little experience with romance. Yangyang and Xiaopeng, however, have spent their lives as sisters, and the love and bitterness in their relationship comes from knowing each other too well.

But while intense, it’s a quiet thing.

Or maybe it seems quiet to me because of the sign language after all. After all, now that I’m trying to describe the events of the film, they seem more dramatic than I remembered. Since I don’t know TSL, I had to read the subtitles, which meant I was not paying the fullest attention to the actors’ bodies, and I didn’t hear any voices supplying aural emotional cues.

Then again, it could be the acting. The acting does not seem as vivid and animated as the work I’ve seen by American Deaf actors when using ASL. That might be because the actors in this film aren’t native in TSL … or maybe Taiwanese deaf culture does not encourage emotional expressiveness as American Deaf culture..

But whatever it is which makes the film seem ‘quiet’ to me, I like the quietness. Maybe I simply read/watch too many operas of various sorts (soap operas, sword operas, etc.) but letting the character feel as they feel rather than milking the pathos feels very genuine to me right now.

And of course, I love the sense of play throughout the film, such as when we discover what Yangyang’s job is.

Respect

There are two words in Mandarin, kàndeqǐ (respect / think well of) and kànbuqǐ (not have respect for / look down on), which are so useful that I find it frustrating that English does not have any direct equivalent for these words.

The current running under this film is that many people kànbuqǐ deaf people, a fact that Yangyang, Tiankuo, and especially Xiaopeng is very sensitive to. They are always concerned about people whether or not others will kànbuqǐ them. For example, Tiankuo is worried about his parents accepting Yangyang.

[Spoiler warning for this paragraph] The core of Xiaopeng’s resentment for her sister Yangyang is that she suspects, deep down, Yangyang, who is actually a hearing person, kànbuqǐs her. When Yangyang insists that she respects Xiaopeng, Xiaopeng responds that she wants to be independent, she doesn’t want Yangyang to constantly sacrifice herself to care for her ‘pitiful’ deaf sister. And finally, if Yangyang really has respect for deaf people, why won’t she go out and become Tiankuo’s girlfriend (at the time, they both thought Tiankuo was deaf).

I am not deaf, but I understand how Xiaopeng feels.

As a non-Asian, the default assumption is that I can’t understand written or spoken Chinese. I can’t blame Taiwanese people for assuming this, since most of them don’t encounter enough foreigners to figure out that foreigners who live outside of Taipei/Kaohsiung probably know some Chinese. Even I have had to train myself, when I see another non-Asian, to not immediately assume that they need language help.

However, even after I have demonstrated my degree of Chinese ability, some people still continue to act like I don’t understand Chinese, or that I don’t know what I’m doing, even in situations when it turns out I was better informed than most of the other people present. They sometimes make things harder for me, and I would have been better off if they had completely ignored me, but usually, it just feels like they kànbuqǐ me. Getting away from this is one of the things I look forward to on that future day when I leave Taiwan.

And what I’m describing is extremely minor compared to what Xiaopeng faces. I am merely irritated by various strangers. Xiaopeng is dealing with her own sister. Most importantly, my Chinese ability is not as deep into the core of my identity as being deaf is for many deaf people. Therefore, the cut goes in that much deeper.

And the irony is that Yangyang gets into a quarrel with Tiankuo when she assumes that he kànbuqǐs her.

For some people, the cute love story between Tiankuo and Yangyang may be the main point of the film. But to me, the relationship between Xiaopeng and Yangyang is what stands out.

Alas, the film undermines its own point by failing to cast a deaf actress. If the film-makers really believed that deaf people are competent, capable people, wouldn’t they have cast one to play a deaf character?

Availability in English

This movie is available on DVD with English subtitles.

Conclusion

I have mixed feelings about this film. I would love to learn something about Taiwanese deaf culture – heck, I’d like to learn more about American Deaf culture (I would like to learn some ASL if I ever get a good opportunity to do so). And it’s clear that there was some input from the deaf community, since many of the ideas presented in the film are similar to ideas expressed by deaf people. It’s also a good movie from an entertainment point of view. But ultimately … it’s a film made by hearing people, about hearing people, and for hearing people.

I obviously don’t have a problem with movies made by, about, and for hearing people, since that describes about 100% of the movies I watch. But most movies are not supposed to represent deaf people. This movie could have been a great cultural bridge between deaf and hearing people, but to me, it feels like a lop-sided conversation with the hearing people mostly talking to each other while occasionally bothering to listen to what the deaf people say.

That includes me by the way – I did not find any opinion of the movie by any Taiwanese deaf person (if you know of one online, in Chinese or English, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE share the link), so this entire post has zero input from the Taiwanese deaf community. And I feel bad about not getting any input from Taiwanese deaf people in the writing of this post, since that means I’m doing the exact thing that I am criticizing this movie for doing – not having more deaf people directly involved.

Next Time: TBD (though I know it will be a manhua)

To learn what some people with various different disabilities think, last week was Blogging Against Disablism Day, which in previous years has included contributions from Taiwanese people (though not, IIRC, deaf Taiwanese people). On a completely different note, Sara visited the fort depicted in Cheerful Wind, which is related to why this post is so late. She met a Korean who was travelling all over the Penghu Archipelago by public ferry. She wishes she had enough spare time to do that, because she suspects that would be more fun than island-hopping by tour boat.

Manga the Week of 5/15

May 9, 2013 by Sean Gaffney, Michelle Smith, MJ and Anna N 5 Comments

SEAN: This will be a shorter post than last week, partly as there’s less manga coming out, and partly as I’m out of my brain on the 5/15.

MICHELLE: (smack)

SEAN: Ow.

First of all, last week I forgot all about Dance in the Vampire Bund, which had Vol. 14 come out. I can only put that down to the fact that I just don’t read it. Does it have a Young Miss Holmes crossover yet?

A new series from SubLime, Viz’s BL imprint, Blue Morning features viscounts and butlers, and the summary sounds oddly like Black Butler with the fantasy removed and the BL actually consummated. Certainly the cover indicates this won’t be a laff riot.

MJ: I’m usually open to trying new BL. I guess we’ll see? Hm.

SEAN: As for the cover for Bond of Dreams, Bond of Love 4, I regret to say it’s not quite as laughable as Vol. 3’s cover, though we do see a return of the ever popular GIANT SEME HANDS. Now there’s a post that needs to be done for BL Bookrack: Yaoi Misproportions I Have Known.

MJ: IT SHALL BE DONE.

MICHELLE: I think there’s a tumblr dedicated to yaoi misproportions, actually.

SEAN: Reminding me they don’t just do artbooks these days, Udon has the first volume of Disgaea 3: School of Devils. I believe it’s based on a game of some sort.

The rest of our week is Viz. 07-GHOST reaches Vol. 4, and is looking angstier and bishier than ever.

MICHELLE: I’m looking forward to catching up with this series!

ANNA: I think most people should have one angsty bishie series in rotation. 07-Ghost is more than sufficient to fill out that category, and I’m happy to overlook the occasional lapses of coherence for the pretty art.

MJ: Ditto on all counts!

SEAN: We’re still not done re-releasing Takahashi’s Inu Yasha into big omnibuses, though the fact that this is Vol. 15 means we’re well over halfway there.

MICHELLE: Yep! Entering the home stretch.

SEAN: Another seinen series bites the dust, as we have come to the 11th and final volume of Jormungand. Action-filled gun-running has never been so exhilarating, well, if you haven’t already read Black Lagoon. Now that the series is over, I should go back and catch up on it.

Lastly, Neon Genesis Evangelion releases its third omnibus, containing Vols. 7-9. Asuka’s on the cover, but if I recall correctly, it’s the arrival of someone else a little earlier than in the anime that causes the most fuss.

What manga makes you care more than you should?

Tess Monaghan, Books 1-4 by Laura Lippman

May 9, 2013 by Michelle Smith

In the mood for a new mystery series, I decided to check out the Tess Monaghan books by Laura Lippman. They’re compulsively readable, inspiring me to proceed to the next in the series practically immediately, but I found I hadn’t much to say about each. Therefore, a column of brief reviews was clearly called for!

Baltimore Blues introduces us to 29-year-old Baltimore native Tess Monaghan, underemployed former newspaper reporter and fitness buff, who undertakes a surveillance job for a rowing buddy whose fiancée has been acting weird. There wouldn’t be much of a book if this assignment didn’t turn out to be more than she bargained for, and in due course, a famous local lawyer is dead and the rowing buddy the chief suspect.

Now retained by the buddy’s lawyer, Tess continues to snoop about. She’s just supposed to be finding enough information to achieve reasonable doubt, but is instead driven to solve the mystery. And, ultimately, she does. It was an outcome that I didn’t expect, and the various plot threads and loose ends are wrapped up reasonably tidily, though the suggestion that a second killer is still roaming free was relegated to one blink-and-you-miss-it sort of line.

Tess herself is a little bit generic at this point, but she’s likeable enough. It’s interesting that she’s an investigator who isn’t technically tied to law enforcement, so she’s not obliged to divulge full details about crimes, with the flip side that because she lacks status she probably couldn’t divulge anything anyway without irrefutable proof. Baltimore emerges as a character of its own, too, and I loved that there was a Homicide: Life on the Street shoutout. Actually, there was a Mystery Science Theatre 3000 reference, too. Does Lippman know how to woo me, or what?

Charm City is the second in the Tess Monaghan series, set about five months after the first book. Tess has both a full-time job and a full-time boyfriend for the first time in two years, but her boss encourages her to accept an offer to investigate how an inflammatory story, originally not on the printing schedule, wound up on the front page of the local newspaper. Eventually, deaths ensue. Meanwhile, some shady guys hospitalize her uncle Spike and stalk Tess and her family members.

The good things about this sophomore outing revolve around Tess and her personal relationships. She comes into sharper focus as a character, first of all, but also makes some serious changes and/or mistakes in her personal life. And yet, this doesn’t read like one of those chick lit mystery series—my mind goes immediately to Meg Cabot’s dreadful Size 12 Is Not Fat—where the protagonist seems too easily distracted by the male characters. Tess just seems… normal.

On the negative side, the subplot (involving the aforementioned shady guys) was a real yawner and there were a couple of instances where twists were really obvious to the reader, making Tess appear incredibly slow on the uptake. And though the final big reveal did surprise me, in retrospect it shouldn’t have, because it was essentially the same gimmick used in the first book! Is a pattern forming? As I head into book three, I will definitely be looking for a certain type of character and setting my suspicious sights on them from the start.

Overall, Charm City was a little disappointing, but certainly not bad. Onward ho!

In Butchers Hill, Tess has set up shop as a private investigator in a not-so-great part of town. Her first two clients are looking for children—one wants to make amends to the witnesses of a crime he committed five years ago, while another wants to know that the daughter she put up for adoption is doing alright. Neither client has been completely honest with Tess, however.

This was a really interesting installment of the series. I appreciate that Lippman was able to create multiple African-American characters who feel like full-fledged, sympathetic individuals (though I do wonder what an African-American reader would make of them). There’s commentary here on race relations in Baltimore, among other things, but it doesn’t feel too heavy-handed. I also like that Tess is not strictly a homicide investigator, though her cases have all involved murder eventually.

Speaking of murder, after Charm City, I was a little worried that it would be easy to predict the perpetrators in subsequent books, but actually, I didn’t see this one coming. And that’s a good thing, though the reason why I didn’t was that it was a rather implausible twist. Despite that (and the one aspect of the ending that I predicted), the conclusion to this one is surprisingly affecting. I hope some of these new characters stick around.

In Big Trouble takes Tess away from her hometown of Baltimore and into the unfamiliar environment of San Antonio, Texas. When she receives an anonymous letter that Crow, her former boyfriend, is in big trouble in Texas, Tess ends up contracted by his parents to track him down. She finds Crow in fairly short order, but he is greatly changed and is also involved with a crazy young woman whose influential local family is tied to a notorious murder 21 years ago.

This was a bit of a weird one. I can’t say I disliked it, or that I predicted anything about it, but Tess is so off-balance personally for the duration that it sort of feels like the story never really gets… grounded, or something. Unlike the others in the series, I was able to set this one aside for a long time—like, weeks—and didn’t feel any particular urge to get back to it. That said, I did think the San Antonio setting was portrayed well, and Lippman successfully instilled a serious hankering for some authentic Mexican food.

In the end, I’m enjoying the Tess Monaghan series quite a lot! I’m going to take a break here for a bit, but I do intend to return to the series in the near future.

Negiho: Mahora Little Girls

May 8, 2013 by Sean Gaffney

Created by Ken Akamatsu, manga by YUI. Released in Japan as “Negiho (Ito) Bun” by Kodansha, serialized in the magazine Bessatsu Shonen Magazine. Released in North America by Kodansha Comics.

Some of you may recall that this is actually the 2nd Negima spinoff. Negima Neo came out in seven volumes, and was essentially a cuter, more comedic Negima with most of the action and threats to our heroes removed. Somewhere down the road, though, some editor at Kodansha must have decided that this was simply not adorable enough, and came up with this. I assume they asked Akamatsu, and he looked up from where he was creating the actual Negima manga and nodded vaguely. And so we have Negiho, which takes place in a universe where Negi and Kotaro are young adult men teaching a class of 31 five-year-old girls.

I will be fair, this series was not nearly as creepy as it sounded. There are no panty shots of pre-pubescents throughout, which I was kind of expecting. And no one gets their clothes sneezed off, mostly as magic doesn’t seem to exist here. Asuna has a giant crush on Negi, who hits her ‘older man’ buttons this time around, but it’s clearly the crush of a 5-year-old girl on a teacher, and is never meant to be serious except in a ‘look at how freaked out she’s getting’ sort of way. There’s even stickers in the front of the book! Of course, the book is still rated OT, probably because of the chapter where Asuna and Ayaka try to make their non-existent breasts grow so they can seduce their teacher… Have I mentioned it’s hard giving Japan the benefit of the doubt sometimes?

The main reason this manga exists is for the comedy. Characterization attempts to happen, and a lot of the characters are sort of like their canon selves (Setsuna still crushes on Kanoka, Kaede is a ninja, Chao invents things) but are basically slaves to the gags. Heck, gag humor is actually the point of Chachamaru this time around, who has decided that the best way to become closer to the rest of her class is to be a manzai comedian. I will give credit to the Nibleys, who as translators had to deal with this and try to work out Chachamaru’s terrible Japanese jokes and turn them into terrible English jokes. The endnotes are also helpful here, mostly as even translated it still feels that we’re missing something.

Then there are the characters who don’t translate to ‘adorable preschoolers’ so well, and that’s Evangeline. Which is ironic, given she’s an undead vampire with the body of a 10-year-old in the original. But here, in the body of a 5-year-old, she doesn’t have the ability to be evil or malicious in any successful way, and instead merely becomes the buttmonkey of the entire series. Which, in a series with Asuna in it, is impressive. That said, I suspect the number of Negima fans who thought “I like Evangeline, but wish she wasn’t as awesome and terrifying and did more anteater impressions” numbers in the single digits.

There were one of two other things I sort of smiled at – it’s nice to see Rakan and Theodora get married in some continuity, even if it isn’t the main one, and Konoka and Setsuna’s attempts at death metal are possibly the funniest thing in the book. But at the end of the day, I came away wondering who this was written for? I can’t imagine fans of the original, especially in the West, being enthralled by preschool comedy adventures. And the romance and occasional sexual gags means it’s not for kids either. Even the artist, in his afterword, notes that this series had a lot of flaws. If you love everything Negima, give it a shot. It didn’t actively offend me most of the time, but it’s pretty inconsequential.

Also, how are a 5-year-old Chao and Hakase building Chachamaru anyway? Did anyone think this through at all?

Strobe Edge, Vol. 4

May 7, 2013 by Anna N

Strobe Edge, Vol. 4 by Io Sakisaka

One nice thing about new series with several volumes waiting in the wings to be translated is being able to read the English volumes with only a few months between releases. It is easier to appreciate the changes in plotting and art that appear over time as the creator gets more and more comfortable with a series. I wouldn’t have predicted after I put down the first volume of Strobe Edge that I would be enjoying it as much as I am now. There’s much more subtly shown in the relationships between the characters and even when stereotypical shoujo plot devices pop up, I find myself not minding them at all just because of the great work Sakisaka has done with her character development.

Heroine Ninako was bordering on being annoyingly naive in the first volume, and while she’s still relentlessly innocent she is in tune with her own emotions and is able to sense when a situation might be wrong for her. When reformed womanizer Ando starts pressuring her to date him, saying she can use him to forget her feelings for Ren, Ninako replies “Your idea of love and my idea of love aren’t the same at all. And I could never use you to forget him! You know how much it hurts to love someone…who loves someone else.” Ando tells Ninako that she doesn’t have to answer right away and goes back to his usual light-hearted personality but she can tell that he’s putting on an act to make her feel at ease.

Ninako and Ren keep getting pushed together in various situations, and while he tends to keep a tight reign on his expressions it is easy for the reader to tell that he’s filled with turmoil. Ren’s determination to be a “nice guy” is resulting in his continuing a relationship with his high-strung girlfriend, even though he and Ninako seem to share a unique bond of understanding. Ninako and Ren’s non-relationship is contrasted with the more established supporting couple of Daiki and Sayuri, who deal with their problems and end up becoming stronger together. There’s a slowly building tension in this series, as Ren keeps struggling to do what he thinks of as the right thing even while it becomes more and more intolerable.

Sakisaka does a good job showing her characters’ reactions to the emotional scenes, as she contrasts facial expressions or shows Ren turning away in order not to display his emotions. I’m looking forward to the next few volumes, as I can sense some dramatic crying scenes and confrontations coming up when Mayuka starts to realize that Ren is only showing her one carefully crafted side of his personality.

What’s Your Favorite Weekly Shonen Jump Title?

May 7, 2013 by Justin Stroman 17 Comments

So what do you know? It’s been over a year since Viz’s Weekly Shonen Jump has been around. With it out of the “Alpha” phase and now moving forward with simultaneous releases, it’s doing what I don’t think many would have thought years ago—and it’s pretty impressive. And while maybe the content is not like Japan’s Weekly Shonen Jump, the lineup that’s appeared since the magazine began is nothing to sneeze at. So I’ll ask you all to share what’s been your favorite Weekly Shonen Jump title serialized since January 30, 2012. Here’s a reminder of the works that have appeared in WSJ so far:

	Bakuman Created By: Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata Publisher’s summary: “Average student Moritaka Mashiro enjoys drawing for fun. When his classmate and aspiring writer Akito Takagi discovers his talent, he begs Moritaka to team up with him as a manga-creating duo. Can these two boys turn their dreams into reality with all the challenges they must face in the manga-publishing world?” Run: January 30 to May 7, 2012 Serialized: Weekly
	Barrage Created By: Kouhei Horikoshi Publisher’s summary: “Spunky slum kid Astro gets the chance of a lifetime to end the chaos ripping apart his alien-invaded home planet when the playboy prince switches places with him. Now Astro has become Prince Barrage, a boy charged with the duty of restoring peace to the planet…and given an all-powerful magical spear to do it!” Run: June 4 to September 2012 Serialized: Weekly
	Bleach Created By: Tite Kubo Publisher’s summary: “Ichigo Kurosaki never asked for the ability to see ghosts — he was born with the gift. When his family is attacked by a Hollow — a malevolent lost soul — Ichigo becomes a Soul Reaper, dedicating his life to protecting the innocent and helping the tortured spirits themselves find peace.” Run: January 30, 2012 Serialized: Weekly
	Blue Exorcist Created By: Kazue Kato Publisher’s summary: “Raised by Father Fujimoto, a famous exorcist, Rin Okumura never knew his real father. One day a fateful argument with Father Fujimoto forces Rin to face a terrible truth — the blood of the demon lord Satan runs in Rin’s veins! Rin swears to defeat Satan, but doing that means entering the mysterious True Cross Academy and becoming an exorcist himself. Can Rin fight demons and keep his infernal bloodline a secret? It won’t be easy, especially when drawing his father’s sword releases the demonic power within him!” Run: July 30, 2012 Serialized: Monthly
	Cross Manage Created By: KAITO Publisher’s summary: “Talented but aimless Sakurai just can’t find a place to belong. After trying (and failing at) one extracurricular activity after another, his life changes thanks to a chance encounter with lacrosse fanatic Toyoguchi, who thinks Sakurai has just what it takes to propel her girls’ lacrosse team to victory!” Run: October 1, 2012 Serialized: Weekly
	Dragon Ball (full color) Created By: Akira Toriyama Publisher’s summary: “The legendary classic manga series Dragon Ball is back…in full color! Relive the incredible Saiyan Saga with this special re-release.” Run: February 4, 2013 Serialized: Weekly
	Hunter X Hunter Kurapika’s Memories Created By: Yoshihiro Togashi Publisher’s summary: “Hunters are a select group of people who track down rare and priceless items. Many people have tried to become one, but most give up or are killed during the exam. This special one-shot is the story of one such Hunter, named Kurapika. His people were wiped out because their eyes turn a fiery red color and are sought by collectors. This is the story of Kurapika before he lost his clan…” Run: December 17 to Decemeber 24, 2012
	Kintoki Created By: Akira Toriyama Publisher’s summary: “Once upon a time, the Kinme Clan were an extraordinary tribe best known for their incredible physical strength and golden eyes. Because of that they were revered as gods of war, but now the clan is slowly dying out due to a short lifespan. And just when most everyone has forgotten about the clan, a mysterious golden-eyed boy enters the scene…” Run: January 28, 2013 (one-shot)
	Naruto Created By: Masashi Kishimoto Publisher’s summary: “Naruto is a young shinobi with an incorrigible knack for mischief. He’s got a wild sense of humor, but Naruto is completely serious about his mission to be the world’s greatest ninja!” Run: January 30, 2013 Serialized: Weekly
	Nisekoi Created By: Naoshi Komi Publisher’s summary: “It’s hate at first sight…rather a knee-to-the-head at first sight when Raku meets Chitoge! Unfortunately, his gangster father arranges a false love match with their rival gang leader’s daughter, Chitoge! However, Raku’s searching for his childhood sweetheart, with a pendant around his neck as a memento, and is surprised to discover three candidates with keys: Chitoge, Onodera (his current crush) and Tachibana (the police chief’s daughter)!” Run: November 26, 2012 Serialized: Weekly
	Nura: Rise of The Yokai Clan Created By: Hiroshi Shiibashi Publisher’s summary: “At first, no one thought that Rikuo, who is only one-quarter yokai and three-quarters human, could handle following in his grandfather Nurarihyon’s footsteps as the leader of the most powerful yokai clan. But now Rikuo has proven he can unite both humans and demons. He’s building the ultimate Night Parade of a Hundred Demons to ward off the legendary onmyoji, Abe no Seimei, and his descendants, the Gokadoin clan, who plan to take over the world with a master strike called The Purification.” Run: January 30, 2012 to January 14, 2013 Serialized: Weekly
	Nura: Aoi Spiral Castle Specials Created By: Hiroshi Shiibashi Publisher’s summary: “While the day belongs to humans, the night belongs to Yokai, supernatural creatures that thrive on human fear. Caught between these worlds is Rikuo Nura. He’s three-quarters human, but his grandfather is none other than Nurarihyon, the supreme commander of the Nura clan, a powerful yokai consortium. Now Rikuo’s on his way to taking over that command!” Run: August 27, 2012 (Part 1), October 29, 2012 (Part 2)
	One Piece Created By: Eichiro Oda Publisher’s summary: “When Monkey D. Luffy accidentally ate the cursed Gum-Gum Fruit, he gained the power to stretch like rubber…at the cost of never being able to swim again! Despite this, he’s vowed to someday become King of the Pirates and find the legendary treasure known as “One Piece” With his large crew of powerful and unique characters and his advanced pirate ship, the Thousand Sunny, Luff’s out to become the greatest pirate that’s ever lived!” Run: January 30, 2012 Serialized: Weekly
	One Piece X Toriko: Taste of the Devil Fruit Created By: Eiichiro Oda and Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro Summary: Crossover one-shot between One Piece and Toriko. Run: Available to subscribers who signed up before April 30, 2012
	One-Punch Man Created By: ONE and Yusuke Murata Publisher’s summary: “From illustrious illustrator Yusuke Murata of Eyeshield 21 fame and the maniacal mind of up-and-coming mangaka ONE comes a manga series that packs quite the punch! Follow our hero Saitama through his hilarious romps as he searches for the baddest guys to challenge. Let’s get ready to rumble!” Run: January 21, 2013 Serialized: Weekly
	Otter #11 Created by: Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata Summary: A gag manga series created by Kazuya Hiramaru in Bakuman. Run: Published in the SJ Alpha Yearbook 2013
	Road To Naruto The Movie Created By: Masashi Kishimoto Publisher’s summary: “To commemorate the latest Naruto Shippuden movie hitting Japanese thaters, Shonen Jump Alpha presents a special chapter that chronicles the events right before Road to Ninja: Naruto the Movie. See the Naruto characters in an all-new light as they deal with Tobi’s dark trap!” Run: August 6, 2012 (One-shot)
	Rurouni Kenshin: Restoration Created By: Nohiburo Watsuki Publisher’s summary: “Action, romance, and historical intrigue help make Nobuhiro Watsuki’s Rurouni Kenshin, the tale of a wandering swordsman set against the backdrop of the Meiji Restoration, one of the most popular Shonen Jump titles among fans to date. Himura Kenshin, once an assassin (or hitokiri) of ferocious power, now fights to protect the honor of those in need.” Run: May 21, 2012 Serialized: Monthly
	Sachie-Chan Good!! Created By: Akira Toriyama and Masakazu Katsura Summary: A collaboration between Akira Toriyama and Masakazu Katsura. Run: Published in the SJ Alpha Yearbook 2013
	Sakuran Created By: Toshiaki Iwashiro Publisher’s summary: “A special one-shot from the creator of Psyren.” Run: April 1, 2013 (One-shot)
	Takama-ga-hara Created By: Jyuuzouu Kawai Publisher’s summary: “Yamato Yamada’s family is famous for their physical strength, but Yamato doesn’t want to follow in his four brothers’ footsteps — all he wants to do is draw manga and win the Tezuka Award! Life for Yamato taks an unexpected turn, however, when his right hand becomes even stronger than usual…Does Yamato actually have godlike powers?!” Run: July 23, 2012 to November 19, 2012 Serialized: Weekly
	Toriko Created By: Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro Publisher’s summary: “In a savage world ruled by the pursuit of the most delicious foods, it’s either eat or be eaten! While searching for the tastiest foods imaginable, Gourmet Hunter Toriko and his bottomless stomach travel around the world facing every beast in his way.” Run: January 30, 2012 Serialized: Weekly
	World Trigger Created By: Daisuke Ashihara Publisher’s summary: “A gate to another dimension has burst open, and invincible monsters called Neighbors invade Earth. Only a group of elite warriors who co-opt other-dimensional technology can defend life on Earth as we know it.” Run: February 11, 2013 Serialized: Weekly
	Yu-Gi-Oh! Zexal Created By: Shin Yoshida and Naoto Miyashi Publisher’s summary: “In a futuristic city, augmented reality Duels are all the rage. Duelists, using devices called D-Gazers, can interact with the environment and their opponents as never before. With more awesome monsters and unbelievable cards, the future of Yu-Gi-Oh! starts right here!” Run: July 9, 2012 Serialized: Monthly

Justin Stroman is the founder of Organization Anti-Social Geniuses, a Japanese Pop Culture Blog that covers anime, manga, games, and more. You can follow him on Twitter and like the Facebook page to get updates and links to Japanese Pop Culture Related content.

Bookshelf Briefs 5/5/13

May 6, 2013 by MJ, Sean Gaffney, Michelle Smith and Anna N Leave a Comment

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

Alice in the Country of Hearts: My Fanatic Rabbit, Vol. 2 | By QuinRose, Delico Psyche, and Owl Shinotsuki | Yen Press – As I suspected, this volume was a lot more focused on romance and not so much on the psychology and psychotics. That said, there are points of interest here. It’s odd that Elliot, who was once imprisoned for destroying the clock of his best friend, is cavalier about killing Alice’s sister. And it’s good to give him a reason to be angry at Alice being close to Julius that isn’t jealousy. That said, in the end it mostly does turn out to be jealousy, and when the book details romance it gets far more generic. There’s also some nasty dream manipulation to stop Alice from returning home – which one can argue, given what we’ve inferred about her real life, is justified, but still comes across as harsh. An ambiguously good volume, but hey, the series is short.-Sean Gaffney

A Devil and Her Love Song, Vol. 8 | By Miyoshi Tomori | Viz Media – At no point has A Devil and Her Love Song actually been bad, but the “Anna arc” of recent volumes—in which Maria attempts to achieve some level of understanding with her former best friend—just retread the same ground over and over and felt like it would never end. And so I am profoundly relieved that we’re moving on to something different, even if it’s taking the form of Shintaro Kurosu, a brash new first-year who’s interested in Maria and takes every opportunity to get close to her. We’ve seen this sort of character in shoujo manga many times before, but any catalyst that causes Shin to confront his feelings for Maria is fine by me, and because Shintaro shares some qualities with our insightful heroine, he’s quite adept at getting under others’ skin. I still recommend this series, but if we never see Anna again it’ll be too soon for me. – Michelle Smith

Fairy Tail, Vol. 25 | By Hiro Mashima | Kodansha Comics – Fairy Tail will probably never get away from One Piece comparisons, but one big difference it has is that Mashima does tease romance between his characters quite a bit. In this volume we not only get Elfman and Evergreen getting past Mirajane with a shocking revelation – theoretically false, but I sense a setup – but we also have Levy’s giant crush on Gajeel, which is quite cute provided you forget him crucifying her a while back. Literally. Meanwhile, the S-class exams are interrupted not only by the arrival of a dark guild, led by Ultear, but also a young sobbing man who would seem to be Zeref, the evil wizard who has been mentioned before, and definitely doesn’t seem to be possessing anyone this time. It would seem that the exam arc is going to get a lot longer and more serious before anyone wins their S-class.-Sean Gaffney

La Corda d’Oro, Vol. 17 | By Yuki Kure | Viz Media – This final volume reads like a series of closing doors—at least for Kahoko’s suitors, who take turns examining their feelings, though it’s clear most don’t have a shot. Ryotaro’s epiphany is most significant, and his heartfelt confession throws oblivious Kahoko for a loop. Everyone knows that Kahoko will end up with Len, but when it gets right down to it, their final scene is oddly anticlimactic. Kahoko is predictably breathless and embarrassed, and Len is awkward and brusque, but as a romantic climax it’s surprisingly non-committal. We don’t even get a good kiss out of it. As a jaded fan of romance, I should be grateful for anything unexpected, but in a story that’s always been so conventional, it’s honestly a letdown. Though perhaps the most disheartening truth is that they’re still hung up on “Ave Maria.” What can you do? Farewell, La Corda d’Oro, I’ll miss you. – MJ

Rurouni Kenshin: Restoration, Vol. 1 | By Nobuhiro Watsuki | Viz Media – Watsuki says in the afterward that the genesis for this reworking of Rurouni Kenshin was the production of the recent live action movie. This shows in the first story of the volume which puts familiar characters into a battle arena situation with no real plot or character development. There’s a back-up prequel story that has more interest as Kenshin encounters a unique western doctor struggling to provide care for low-income patients. While it was nice to revisit the characters for a little bit, this parallel story reminded me of how much more I liked the original series. This is only for die-hard Kenshin fans, most people will be better served reading the very good first series. – Anna N.

Strobe Edge, Vol. 4 | By Io Sakisaka | Viz Media – What’s interesting about Strobe Edge, is the way that Io Sakisaka has managed to take the most trite characteristic of her series early on—namely, her heroine’s unbelievable innocence—and turned it into a real asset. That Ninako wouldn’t realize that there are unavoidably negative consequences to unrequited love seems ridiculously naive, but it also allows Sakisaka to explore those consequences more honestly than is typical, even for romance manga. The way both Ninako and Ren begin to recognize and forced to deal with the ramifications of their ongoing friendship in the face of Ninako’s (and now, Ren’s) feelings is surprisingly fresh. I’m reminded immediately of the personal agony I suffered while watching Shoji developing feelings for someone other than his girlfriend, Nana Komatsu (NANA), but this time I’m experiencing it with “other woman” Sachiko as my heroine. It’s an emotional punch in the gut, and very well-executed. Recommended. – MJ

We Were There, Vol. 16 | By Yuuki Obata | Viz Media – This is the second concluding Shojo Beat series for me this week, but what a contrast! Though this series’ romantic conclusion was no less predictable than La Corda d’Oro‘s, the execution could not be more different—much like the two series themselves. There was a time when I’d given up on Nanami and Yano’s torturous romance as simply too destructive to bear, so it’s a real testament to Obata-sensei’s gifts as a writer that she’s managed to bring me back around to loving them together once more. Everyone’s story ends with dignity, even that of long-suffering Takeuchi (my personal hero of the story) but the real centerpiece is our primary couple, with whom Obata completely sweeps me off my feet. Their ending is so poignant and so well-earned, it’s a genuine pleasure to read. Thanks for everything, We Were There. You’ve been quite a ride. Highly recommended. – MJ

Pepita by Takehiko Inoue

May 6, 2013 by Anna N

Pepita: Takehiko Inoue Meets Gaudi

This has been a very good year for fancy hardcover editions of manga materials. There’s Gundam: The Origin, Wandering Son is still coming out, Heart of Thomas, and the Nausicaa box set was great. This book, about Takehiko Inoue’s architectural tour of Spain and specifically Gaudi works isn’t filled with enough drawings to be an art book, and it doesn’t have enough biographical or written content about Gaudi to be a true study of the man. Instead, we get an interesting travel sketchbook that reveals as much about Inoue’s artistic process as it does about the subject he’s exploring.

I started reading this without much knowledge of Gaudi other than the fact that he was an architect who explored form in an innovative manner. Inoue travels to Spain to get a sense of the man and his approach to designing with nature. Inoue’s reflections come in the form of written thoughts and some exuberant drawings, as he comes up with his own interpretations of Gaudi’s trademark mosaic salamander. Throughout the book we get impressions of Gaudi’s life and some of his most significant work. Inoue’s illustrations are sometimes superimposed on photos, which creates an interesting effect. Inoue’s questions and struggle to understand Gaudi show the reader a great deal about Inoue’s artistic process and artistic approach. There’s enough information about Gaudi in the book that I felt I came away from it slightly better informed, but I thought I’d have to do even more study to really grasp the topic.

In the end, this hybrid art book gives the reader a feeling as if they’ve just spent a little bit of time on an architectural tour of Spain with Takehiko Inoue as their tour guide. This is a pretty good feeling to have! Serious students of architecture might not find the book very informative, but to a casual reader with an interest in Gaudi, this book is worth checking out. I always think that any book by Inoue is worth reading, and I did enjoy this very much.

Off the Shelf: Black Butler, Pepita, Gundam

May 4, 2013 by MJ and Michelle Smith 2 Comments

MJ: Good morning, Michelle! It’s a gorgeous morning here on Free Comic Book Day. Perfect for reading comics in the park. Do you have any comics-related plans for the day?

MICHELLE: Not in regards to Western comics, no, but I am looking forward to reading some Psyren later today!

MJ: I’ve got a nice stack of manga waiting for me as well. So I guess this is our cue to start talking about our comics-related activities earlier this week! What have you been reading?

MICHELLE: Well, one thing I’ve been doing lately is revisiting some of the series that I first talked about in the early days of Off the Shelf. Of course, there aren’t many that are still running—they’ve either finished or the publisher has disappeared—but there are a few, and one of them is Black Butler. Here’s my initial summary from back in January 2011:

In this series, a thirteen-year-old named Ciel Phantomhive is the head of his family after a fire claimed the lives of his parents. To assist him in his plans for revenge he has entered into a contract with a devil who is serving him in the guise of his butler, Sebastian. The Earls of Phantomhive have always served as a “watch dog” for the crown, a duty Ciel is now expected to perform for Queen Victoria.

At the time, I said that the emphasis on solving mysteries was pretty fun, but does that still hold true in volume thirteen? Well, sort of. Up until the previous arc, which involved a series of murders at Phantomhive Manor and the inspiration they provided a young Arthur Conan Doyle, the answer was yes. This current arc, though—which can pretty much be summarized as “zombies on the Titanic“—seems to be more about mass carnage than detection, even though Ciel got involved in the first place because he thought the Queen would want to know what was behind news reports of the dead being reanimated. The one bright spot is that Elizabeth, Ciel’s betrothed, turns out to be a secret badass with swords.

I was actually planning to talk about Black Butler even before you posted your 3 Things Thursday column about how you just couldn’t like it, and now your post has made me wonder why I’m still reading it. I like Sebastian, and sometimes there are amusing bits, but overall, I don’t feel connected to any of these characters or invested in their fate. Ciel could get devoured by a zombie at this point and I would not be affected in the least. So why am I reading? Unfortunately, I think the answer is… because Yen Press is still sending this to me. It’s an easy and uncomplicated read for me, and I don’t hate it, and so I read it. If I had to fork over $12 for each volume, though, I suspect I would’ve dropped it some time ago. It’s just not a satisfying enough read to justify that kind of price tag.

MJ: Discussion of Black Butler seems especially timely for me right now, not only because of that 3 Things Thursday post, but because my recent obsession with Yun Kouga’s Loveless has forced me to confront the question of why I can tolerate certain problematic fanservice in that series when I’m unwilling to stick with Black Butler. And by “forced to confront” I mean that I’ve been asked the question directly, and justifiably so! And the only answer I really have is that, well… Black Butler bored me—at least as far in as I was willing to go—well, and that I have pretty specific reasons for liking the relationships in Loveless that don’t really apply to Black Butler. But in any case, I’ve been asking myself a lot of questions about it, and pondering yet again whether I should give Black Butler another go. Given your reaction here, though, I’m thinking… no, not really.

MICHELLE: There really isn’t much fanservice of that kind in Black Butler, anyway. I mean, very occasionally there are pages where I think Toboso-sensei is throwing fans a juicy little tidbit, but on a straightforward reading, I am personally not seeing the overt, emotional subtext there like one gets in Loveless. Although… can something be simultaneously “overt” and “subtext”? Perhaps I need a better word…

MJ: I think subtext can be incredibly overt. Perhaps you could go for “generous.” Though I think there’s an argument to be made that part of the difference is that Loveless moves the subtext pretty well into the text, which means that Kouga actually forces us to deal with it instead of just giving us a nod & a wink.

MICHELLE: I think you’re right. I never take the “nod and a wink” stuff seriously.

Anyway, what have you been reading this week?

MJ: Well, on a very different note, my main solo read this week is not actually manga, though it’s of great interest to both of us (and, I expect, many of our readers). That read would be Pepita: Inoue Meets Gaudí , a sort of art book/travelogue released last month by Viz. The book combines prose, drawings, and photographs to chronicle the travels of Takahiko Inoue (Slam Dunk, Real, Vagabond) as he traces the life and work of Spanish architect Antoni Gaudí.

The book opens with a heartfelt introduction in which Inoue describes his first encounter with Gaudí’s work and how his detached view of Gaudí as a tourist in Barcelona differed from what he experienced in his quest to really know the man behind the work. It’s a passionate little piece that perfectly sets the tone for the book itself, which is informational and (of course) beautiful, but above all, personal.

Through Inoue’s quest to understand Gaudí, I felt that I was also given an opportunity to understand Inoue—and in a very different way than what I’ve learned about him through his own work. There’s a sense of wisdom and confidence in a series like Real, for instance, that makes me, the reader, feel that I’m the student; I’m learning about humanity through the eyes of a master. Here, Inoue is the one seeking wisdom from a master, and that alone gives us a very different glimpse of him as an artist and a person than what we’d ever see otherwise.

Though I don’t know that Inoue gets the answers he was looking for on his quest (he gets answers, but it’s complicated, I think), the journey itself is glorious to behold. The book is filled with Inoue’s detailed, inspired scribblings alongside (and sometimes inserted into) breathtaking photographs of both Gaudí’s work and the Spanish region he grew up in. It’s a visual treat of the very best kind. It also offers a wealth of information about the life and work of Gaudí through bits of researched history, interviews with artisans and Gaudí scholars, and Inoue’s personal observations.

I’m sure very little of the information offered will be new for serious students of Gaudí, but I am kind of thrilled at the thought that it might serve as an introduction to Inoue (and perhaps manga artists in general) for lovers of architecture, just as it might open up a new world of architectural beauty for fans of Inoue. It certainly did for me.

MICHELLE: That sounds glorious. Now, I have to ask… how detailed were the pictures of Gaudí’s work? Did Inoue attempt to draw any of them? Building geek that I am, I would love that most ardently.

MJ: The pictures are plentiful, though there isn’t a particular focus on the detail, if that makes sense. And though Inoue does sketch them occasionally, I’ll admit that he spends the bulk of his time drawing Gaudí’s surroundings—the streets, people, countryside, mountains—the things that he felt must have most deeply influenced Gaudí’s work, rather than the work itself. He ponders for quite a while Gaudí’s relationship with nature and how some of his buildings were designed to become part of the natural landscape—it’s fascinating, really. I think you’d enjoy it quite a lot.

So, to take a fairly drastic turn once again, would you like to introduce our mutual read for the week?

MICHELLE: Sure! This week, MJand I decided to venture out of our comfort zone and into the realm of… mecha.

Back in late March, Vertical, Inc. released a deluxe hardcover edition of the first volume of Mobile Suit Gundam: The Origin. Vertical has licensed the aizouban edition of the series, rather than the 23-volume tankouban version, so this first release (subtitled “Activation”) is quite substantial and contains some bonus essays. Mobile Suit Gundam is a relatively recent manga adaptation of the first Gundam anime, and was originally serialized in a magazine called Gundam A, which sounds like it’s for hardcore Gundam enthusiasts. I’d never actually read or seen anything Gundam-related before, so I wasn’t sure how I’d make out, but it turned out to be newcomer-friendly.

In Earth’s distant future, a large chunk of the population is living in gigantic, orbiting colonies. War breaks out when some of the colonies declare themselves the independent Republic of Zeon. A nicely ominous color introduction informs us that the resulting battles wiped out half of the population. “All men grew to fear their own deeds. The war entered a stalemate, and eight months went by…” Fighting resumes when a Zeon mecha force infiltrates a Federation colony where a new mobile suit is being developed.

Long story short… the civilian colonists end up escaping on a rather unwieldy ship, fleeing from their enemy who fight with red-eyed metallic soldier things, and… anyone else here getting some serious Battlestar Galactica flashbacks?

MJ: Heh, well I’d say yes and no. I mean, yes, of course I see where you’re going with that. And I’d say that the plight of the civilians on the ship is the thing that interests me most in Gundam so far. Several of the civilians find themselves sort of spontaneously becoming part of the military operation—in particular Amuro, a civilian teen who accidentally finds himself the pilot of a new mechanical suit prototype, Gundam, and Sayla, who begins as part of the volunteer medical team. The conflict among the military command over the assimilation of the civilians is compelling, but as I struggle to describe any of it here, I think I’m actually hitting upon the thing that least reminds me of something like BSG and is also the source of my own difficulties with the book as a reader. The thing is, unlike BSG or even most of the other Japanese mecha-based series I’ve been able to get into (Evangelion, of course, or more recently, Knights of Sidonia), Gundam is for me, at least so far, a bit too much about the mecha.

As I say this, I’m aware that I’ll probably be criticized for it—and perhaps justly. As one of the two or three manga fans left in the world who has never seen even a second of this very famous anime series, I’m a total novice. I think my nervousness in approaching a series as iconic as this one is pretty similar to Phillip’s trepidation when he decided to read and talk publicly about Sailor Moon. I’m out of my depth and I know it. But as I read through this volume, gorgeous as it is (and it really, really is—seriously, it’s visually epic), I found that I had difficulty remembering characters’ names or really identifying with their story. And I felt pretty detached from the suit itself, which really seemed like the thing I was supposed to be appreciating the most. Is it just me?

MICHELLE: It is not just you at all. As you say, the manga is visually epic, and the overall atmosphere carries the story along even more than the plot does. (There were things about the plot that confused me, for example. Like why is civilian teen Amuro suddenly the pilot of the mecha, when there was an officer slated for that role? Did I miss his demise or something?) But the characterization is where things really fall flat. I don’t feel like we know Amuro even a little teensy bit, other than he seems to have some natural aptitude for piloting a big fighting suit. And where this might put him in direct comparison to Nagate of Knights of Sidonia, at least I have a sense with the latter that it’s Tsutomu Nihei’s intent that his lead be inscrutable. That’s just his style. With Mobile Suit Gundam it feels more like characterization was deemed unimportant in the grand scheme of things.

MJ: I’m grateful to hear you say this, because I really feared that my reaction was a case of reader failure more than anything else, which is to say that it quite surprised me—and saddened me, actually. Not because I feel like loving Gundam a grave necessity in my life, but because the book is so, so stunning to look at, and so obviously created out of a deep love for the source material. One doesn’t even need to read any of the heartfelt essays in the back of the book to feel the sense of reverence and devoted fandom that went into the making of this manga. And Vertical takes that fandom seriously in their production of the book as well. From the bright semi-gloss paper to the gorgeous color pages, Vertical made sure that this labor of love was presented in the most reverent light possible. If I was a fan of the franchise, I’d feel that this was a tremendous gift, I’m sure. And honestly, I could look at the artwork all day long.

MICHELLE: The artwork really sells it for me, and I was especially impressed that the space battles are drawn with such clarity. True, I did weary of the space battles by the end, but at least they weren’t incomprehensible, as could easily have been the case. Too, I never got the sense with this that I was reading an adaptation. I wonder how it reads to those who have actually seen the anime.

Ultimately, though I get the sense that you’re not planning to continue with the series, I think I will. While I might not care about the characters much—though several of the female ones seem to have potential for awesomeness—I still like the story and the sheer scope of what mankind is facing.

MJ: I can see how you’d draw that conclusion, but actually I suspect I will continue with it. Despite my feelings of detachment at this point, the artwork alone is enough to carry me on, at least long enough to see if the characters might begin to really grab me. I like to give any series at least three volumes or so to pull me in, and Gundam surely merits that much. Who knows what might happen?

Note: MJ & Michelle will be taking a break from this column for the next two weeks, in order to prepare for the upcoming Yumi Tamura Manga Moveable Feast. Can you guess what they’ll be reading?

Fanservice Friday: Lovesick over Loveless

May 3, 2013 by MJ 17 Comments

By now I’m sure that every regular Manga Bookshelf reader is aware that I’ve fallen for Loveless, Yun Kouga’s supernatural fantasy series currently running in Ichijinsha’s Comic Zero Sum—a magazine known for action-heavy and often BL-tinged titles for female readers, like 07-Ghost, Saiyuki Reload, and the upcoming reboot of Wild Adapter. It’s notable that both Naked Ape’s Switch and Yun Kouga’s Gestalt moved to Comic Zero Sum after their original runs in Square Enix’s GFantasy, a shounen magazine known for its generous female-aimed fanservice.

Given my well-established fondness for both girl-friendly action series and Yun Kouga, it’s no surprise that I fell for Loveless (if a bit late). Even so, as I make my way through Viz’s new omnibus editions, I can’t help but be startled by the intensity of my own feelings. I threw myself into the latest omnibus just as soon as I’d acquired it—reading not at my usual breakneck speed, but at a deliberate, luxurious pace intended to truly savor each page. I even stopped from time-to-time to scan in pages that felt particularly meaningful, as if to assemble some sort of visual database of my own emotional responses.

The truth is, Yun Kouga’s work (and Loveless in particular) hits so many of my personal storytelling kinks in so many instances, it would be prohibitively time-consuming to catalogue them all. But perhaps more significantly, she manages to address several of my usual turn-offs (and at least one known deal-breaker) in a way that makes them somehow palatable, even to me. As a result, my reaction to Loveless has begun to resemble nothing more than a kind of romantic longing, characterized by ever-wandering thoughts and a persistent love-struck haze. in short, I’m lovesick over Loveless.

Of course, when you’re lovesick over something, the most satisfying thing in the world is to talk, talk, talk about it—generally up to (or even well past) the point at which all your friends wish to throttle you. Fortunately, it’s my job in this column to obsess over what I like, so let’s dig right in!

Yun Kouga’s greatest strength as a storyteller, in my opinion, is her ability to delve deep into her characters’ weakest, messiest personality traits and present them honestly and without apology. As I discussed at length in episode six of My Week in Manga, it’s clear that she not only loves her characters despite their flaws, but often because of them, and since I also tend to find people’s flaws to be as beautiful or even more beautiful than their strengths (both in fiction and in real life), this is an approach that works especially well for me.

Two characters who fit into this discussion particularly well are the series’ main leads—Ritsuka, a 12-year old boy who is thrust into a strange, supernatural underworld after the death of his older brother, Seimei, and art college student Soubi, whom Seimei bequeathed to Ritsuka at the time of his death. In this underground world, Soubi is a “fighter” in a two-person team that fights with the power of words, while Ritsuka (like his older brother before him) is a “sacrifice.” The sacrifice takes all the damage for the team, but this is not a passive role by any means, as the sacrifice directs the entire fight by giving orders to the fighter. Though each fighting team we’ve seen in the series so far handles that relationship a bit differently, it’s generally understood that the sacrifice is in charge.

Ritsuka and Soubi have a particularly complicated relationship, partly because Soubi was Seimei’s fighter first and is still bound to his orders from the past (the full nature of these we do not yet know) and partly because, though Soubi is trained to accept (and actually require) total domination by his sacrifice, Ritsuka is opposed to violence in general, leaving Soubi with a fairly serious conflict to contend with when confronted by dangerous enemies, especially early on. There is also the matter of their age difference, but let’s leave that discussion for a bit later.

Previously in this column, I’ve discussed two particular storytelling/characterization kinks of mine, one of which I referred to as “intimacy porn” (which is of course about emotional intimacy, and not porn at all), and the other as “the human touch”, referring to non-sexual or casual touches that reveal the intimacy in people’s relationships. Yun Kouga manages to ping both of these simultaneously in this scene between Ritsuka and Soubi, in which Soubi confronts Ritsuka regarding the fact of Seimei’s death, which has been challenged by Seimsei’s former colleagues—a group called “Septimal Moon.” Note Soubi’s body language—the way he desperately grasps Ritsuka’s arms—and the way Ritsuka lets him despite his verbal protests, betraying their closeness and their reliance on one another even under stress.

(read right-to-left)

Ritsuka’s inner monologue here is a great example of another of Kouga-sensei’s strong points—her willingness to reveal her characters’ weaknesses and doubts in nearly any situation. It’s not only these things that she focuses on, though. I’m also a big fan of her characters’ discussions regarding the nature of love (or “like” in some instances). Case in point: this scene between fighter Mei and sacrifice Mimuro.

Their relationship is complicated in its own way, as Mei clearly has a crush on much older Mimuro, and even tries to appear more boyish because she believes that he is gay. Also, I am surprised to note that this is now the second manga series I’ve read involving a defensive attack with rubber duckies. Who knew?

(click images to enlarge — read right-to-left)

Do I need to point out how adorable that is? I hope not. But it’s not even the most significant aspect of this scene for me. I’m struck more strongly by Soubi’s attack and the rare glimpse of his neck, revealing Seimei’s brand carved into it. Have I mentioned that Seimei’s “true name” was “Beloved” while Ritsuka’s is “Loveless”? I think little more needs to be said about how much it sucks to be Ritsuka, though I will actually say more, since it relates to one of the major aspects of the story that normally would be a real obstacle for me.

One of the story’s plot points that has yet to be resolved (at least where I am in the series—please don’t spoil me!) is that Ritsuka has suffered memory loss so great that he essentially became a completely different person at the age of ten, with no memory of the boy he’d been before that. While there are many questions one could ask regarding how this happened (my money’s on Seimei, but we’ll get to that in a moment), the most dire consequence for Ritsuka is that his mother has been unable to get over what she perceives as the “loss” of her son. While she, on some level, knows that Ritsuka is still her child, she has suffered some kind of mental break that has left her convinced that he’s also a stranger. She often abuses Ritsuka when he betrays himself as not “her Ritsuka” and because of this, he’s always injured (something that’s really finally noticed and acted upon by an actual adult with authority in this volume).

Whether deliberately or not, physical abuse of all kinds is often romanticized in manga—especially BL manga and other genres for girls—and for that reason, I’m generally leery of it as a plot point. Yun Kouga, however, manages to portray this abuse and even give us a taste of the mother’s own internal conflict over it, without romanticizing Ritsuka’s suffering or sympathizing with his abuser.

We are witness to his mother’s turmoil and her declining mental condition, but we’re not asked to excuse her or to identify with her own suffering. Instead, the focus is on Ritsuka’s desperate refusal to blame her and his determination to maintain her love, through the eyes of Soubi, who finds it all pretty horrifying.

Of course, Soubi has his own issues, and Kouga doesn’t let him off the hook for them, even here, betraying his secret desire to see Ritsuka cry in the midst of it all.

So, about Seimei… it’s pretty impossible to talk about him without revealing the fact that, in this volume, we find out for sure that he is, indeed, still alive. This discovery has a number of consequences (particularly for Soubi, and surely for Ritsuka, though he hasn’t yet been told). Meanwhile, we’re finding out a lot about the kind of person he really is, and especially how different he appears to be, contrasted with Ritsuka’s memories of him. I can’t help but wonder if Ritsuka’s memory loss has something to do with concealing Seimei’s true personality, but in any case, Ritsuka’s impressions of Seimei as a devoted, affectionate older brother don’t jive at all with anyone else’s—nor with ours as we see him in this volume do things like sending enemies after Ritsuka and trying to convince Ritsuka’s mother to kill him.

Here’s a bit of insight on Seimei from Seimei himself:

(click images to enlarge — read right-to-left)

Again, Yun Kouga gets right to the heart of the matter, revealing the truth of both his weakness and his ruthlessness in one short bit of dialogue.

Despite the cruelty displayed by his efforts to get his own mother to try to murder his brother and his other behavior in general (aside from his apparent brotherly relationship with Ritsuka back before he staged his death), the most obvious victim of his machinations so far is Soubi, who is devastated to learn that, not only has Seimei been living on without him, but that he’s even gotten himself a new fighter, which really cuts Soubi to the core. Before the scene in which Soubi found out that Seimei was still alive, it seemed like he might have known something about that himself, and that he was lying to Ritsuka about it. But Soubi’s raw reaction to this discovery makes clear that it was a surprise to him, too, and there is really nothing that could have hurt him more.

Though I suspect that there are still many truths—both about Soubi’s relationship with Seimei and Soubi’s past in general that have yet to be revealed (at least in the volumes I’ve read), at this moment, it’s impossible not to feel for Soubi, whose apparently fragile ego is absolutely shattered in this volume.

(click images to enlarge — read right-to-left)

This new truth affects Soubi so strongly that he goes to beg Ritsuka (who has been bound up and kept prisoner in his home by his increasingly unstable mother) to run away with him. It’s a pathetic and touching scene. What strikes me most strongly about it is the weight of Ritsuka’s realization that usually-flippant Soubi is actually being serious and how hard he struggles to formulate an appropriate response.

(click images to enlarge — read right-to-left)

And here we arrive at the ‘shippy fanservice that would normally be a deal-breaker for me. Minors in romantic/sexual relationships with adults is a pretty common trope in manga, and particularly in BL manga (which this is not, though I was surprised recently to find it shelved as such when I bought it at Boston’s awesome, manga-friendly comic shop, Comicopia) from which Kouga borrows many of the series’ tropes. Previously, there have been maybe two or three examples of manga that haven’t seriously skeeved me out with this kind of content (notably Alice/Rin in Please Save My Earth and Amu/Ikuto in Shugo Chara!—though in both cases the older characters are high school students and the relationships are very chaste), and I was pretty concerned going into Loveless, given what I’d heard. And though Ritsuka’s relationship with Soubi is currently relatively chaste as well (the most we’ve seen is some kissing), it’s made very, very clear that Soubi’s idea of being “dominated” by his sacrifice/master extends to physical domination as well.

What’s astonishing to me is the way Kouga is able to make this palatable by giving all the power in the relationship to the minor, Ritsuka. Thanks to the universe Kouga has set up here and the way she’s written the fighting teams—Soubi’s character in particular—the adult (Soubi) is actually incapable of taking any action towards Ritsuka that Ritsuka does not explicitly command, which puts all the power in Ritsuka’s hands. Soubi simply can’t make him do anything he doesn’t want to. I was surprised how dramatically this affected my view of their relationship, but then I thought about the reasons why I would consider that kind of relationship to be objectionable in the first place, and it has entirely to do with the sense that an adult in that situation is abusing his/her power over the minor, which is obviously reprehensible.

Kouga has managed to remove that issue from the picture, leaving us with something that is still unsettling but oddly relatable. Soubi’s anguish over Ritsuka’s denying him the total domination he seeks is strangely sympathetic, and not so far removed from unrequited feelings of all kinds—something we’ve all experienced at some point or another. (It seems significant that the only requited love in this series so far has been between the two Zero girls, Kouya and Yamato, who defy their leader and choose to “die” as Zeroes and be reborn in order to stay together, but I am not sure yet exactly how.)

Still, she doesn’t let us off the hook. We find ourselves sympathizing with and caring deeply for both Ritsuka and Soubi, and even rooting for them somehow, on some level, but it’s decidedly… uncomfortable. And Kouga just leaves us like that.

(click images to enlarge — read right-to-left)

Incidentally, I think it’s notable, too, that Seimei apparently still has his cat ears and tail (which characters in this universe lose along with their virginity), suggesting that he never offered Soubi total domination when he was Soubi’s master, either. So that’s an interesting character note.

Going back to Soubi’s “Beloved” brand for a moment, another thing that struck me particularly in this volume was how completely the fighters submit to their sacrifices’ identities. The way Soubi announces their team when entering a fight, “We are Loveless,” hit me hard in this volume, but not exactly in a bad way. While I admit to being horrified by Beloved’s name etched into Soubi’s neck, there’s also some part of me that is fascinated by and drawn to the idea of a two-person unit so completely bonded that they become a single identity. I’ll admit, also, to being pretty uncomfortable with my own fascination, and again, Kouga just leaves me like that. There are no warm fuzzies to soften the blow.

Later, when Ritsuka wants to ask Soubi to take him to Septimal Moon, Soubi tells him, “Then don’t ask. Order me. Don’t treat me like a human being. I want to be treated like an object.” Ritsuka gives him the order, but I can’t help worrying about where this ultimately goes. So far, Ritsuka has resisted treating Soubi the way he wants to be treated, but he’s a kid with a strong will. How long before that power goes to his head? How long before he becomes like Seimei? Whatever the answers to these questions turn out to be, I bet they’ll be messy—and that’s the way I like ’em.

More than anything, though, I’m just blown away by how compelling Kouga-sensei’s characters are, and how completely they’ve engaged me. I read this volume nearly a week ago, and I’m still thinking about them now. Kouga’s characters lie to each other (and sometimes, themselves), they tell the truth, or often something in between. But whatever they do, they do it with a core of emotional truth that is simply stunning to behold. That’s Yun Kouga—and that’s Loveless.

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