Reviews

By Reki Kawahara and Shimeji. Released in Japan by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen On.

The first volume of this series introduced us to Minoru, a broken young man who wishes to live his live with minimal emotional contact with anyone – and has secret suicidal thoughts. In this second book, he seems much better, even if the reason for that is because he hopes to achieve his goal, which is to erase the memory of him from everyone who knows him. Of course, as he finds out, this is not going to be as easy as he thought. Even those who already had their memories erased, such as last volume’s victim Tomomi, still feel drawn to him for reasons other than memory. And, as he grows closer and bonds with the new Superhero Organization he’s a part of, he finds that new emotional experiences are just impossible to avoid.

It’s rather surprising how serious-minded this book is. Sword Art Online has lots of amusing comedy bits sprinkled throughout, and even Accel World throws in some light relief from Haru’s worrying and low self-esteem. The Isolator is grim, though, and even the odd joke or two (such as Olivier’s otaku-ish jokes) highlights how depressing everything here is. We meet the team leader of the troop, and she’s… a fourth-grader whose black gem gave her super analysis powers, so she’s now a scientific genius. Bored as I am of the ‘loli genius with an adult’s mindset’ type in this sort of series, the book does not let you forget that this was still an elementary school girl, and due to the nature of how gem powers work my guess is she was doing badly in school as well. I suspect she’s not a happy camper.

But the winner of the bleakest past here goes to Yumiko, who I had mentioned last time looked like she had hidden depths. Indeed, I think Kawahara overeggs the pudding here, as we get not one but *two* tragic backstories. It does serve to show Minoru, though, that he is not a special tragedy snowflake, and remind him that there are other ways to cope with grief and loss besides isolation. As with the first volume, the villain also gets a well-thought out backstory. Sadly, though, his personality is identical to all of Kawahara’s other psychopaths – you can give depth and tragic history all you want, but when the villain in the end is still laughing madly and going on about fools and his grand plan to destroy the world, it’s still not working.

The best reason to read this series is still the action scenes, which cry out to be animated at some point in the future. I’m not sure where the series is going from here – the book ends very abruptly, as if the author was working to a set page count. But I do know that while it’s gripping and a quick read, I wish it were more fun. I feel like isolating myself after reading it.

By Mamare Touno and Koyuki. Released in Japan by Fujimi Shobo, serialization ongoing in the magazine Dragon Age. Released in North America by Yen Press.

Given that Log Horizon contains a huge cast with at least a dozen named guilds, set over a wide area, it is not particularly surprising that we’re seeing spinoffs about some of those guilds. This also allows the series to show the same events, such as the moment when everyone realized they were in the game, with different viewpoints, and see how crises are solved when the lead is not Shiroe. Most importantly, it also allows us to try out a different genre, as Shiroe, as a harem protagonist, fails miserably. Soujiro, meanwhile, is not only an excellent oblivious harem protagonist, but he even has a guild that has become famous as a “harem guild”.

In many ways this is played absolutely straight. The guild is almost entirely female, with the one non-Soujiro exception appearing to be a gay man (or is he trans? it’s unclear, and I doubt the manga will bother to get into that sort of thing anyway). The girls all have various feelings of love for Soujiro, none of which he acknowledges in the slightest, at least romantically – he’s the sort to charge in, say he will protect everyone, etc. the polar opposite of someone like Shirou, in fact. When they first discover they’re trapped in the game, we see his reaction, and it’s one of complete and total delight, contrasting with almost everyone else. As for the girls, the two that get the most attention are Isami, who is the cute girl with no confidence type, and Nazuna, who is the cool big sis type.

But I doubt readers are reading this for harem antics – or if they are, they’ll be disappointed. Where the series succeeds is in showing off new aspects of Elder Tales, or in giving us different perspectives on the same events. Sometimes this can be chilling – we see Touya and Minori getting taken into the Hamelin guild, with none of our heroes really seeming to notice the danger yet. There’s also a moment when Soujiro, defending his teammate against a guard who’s trying to dole out justice, is killed, and everyone has to frantically rush to the temple to see if they can be revived like they were before.

Mostly it’s what you’d want to see – a band of adventurers bonding like a family and looking out for each other. One of the maid NPCs, Sara, is fleshed out as well, and we see her perspective on things – these adventurers, who used to barely give them the time of day, are suddenly opening up and being friendly and rescuing them from attempted rape. (I am starting to get weary of the hints that attempted rape is rather common in this world, though I agree that this would be depressingly realistic. Thankfully, it is averted here.) If you enjoy Log Horizon and want to see a simpler, more shonen take on the world, this is a very good place to start.

By Ichigo Takano. Released in Japan by Shueisha and then Futabasha, serialized in the magazines Bessatsu Margaret and Manga Action. Released in North America by Seven Seas.

I always feel a certain need to geek out when reviewing titles like these, such as explaining that it’s not a typo in the header, orange really is meant to be spelled with a small O. Or talking about the odd move from a shoujo magazine (Betsuma) to a seinen one (Manga Action) when the author switched publishers. Or that the complete series is out digitally via Crunchyroll (though I haven’t spoiled myself). But honestly, there’s enough to talk about in this title so that I don’t need to go into that at all. (cough) This is three volumes in one, and tells us the bittersweet story of a group of friends, struck by a tragedy from their youth, who unite in order to stop it happening. It’s a chunky book, but is absolutely worth the time.

orange, for the most part, reads like a shoujo romance, as you’d expect for a series begin in Betsuma. Naho, our heroine is cute but shy, and Kakeru is cute but troubled, in the best manga tradition. There’s a guy with an obvious crush who suppresses it in order to support his crush’s true love, and those two girls who exist to contrast with the heroine; one spunky, one grumpy. It honestly reads a lot like Kimi ni Todoke in many ways, but there’s a twist: Naho has a letter from herself ten years in the future, telling her she has to prevent a tragedy; the fact that Kakeru killed himself when he was just seventeen. It’s the science-fiction premise that’s what really drives this book.

The doubts and self-awareness that comes from teenage love meshes well with the doubts and self-awareness that comes from changing the timeline. It’s all the more poignant when we see flashes forward to the future, the one without Kakeru, and see that Naho and Suwa are married with a child. It weighs so heavily on the two of them that they’re willing to sacrifice everything in order to save their friend. Of course, it’s not all angsty drama, there’s a lot of fluffy humor and fun here. Everyone’s basically a good kid. The issue is Kakeru has a huge amount of stress in his life – he’s moved from the city, his mother just killed herself and he takes the blame for it, and of course he’s also falling for Naho, even as he tries dating someone else.

We get the first three volumes here, and by the end you realize that Naho is not the only one who got a letter from her future self. This of course makes you want to go back and reread what you’d just seen, to see if it’s now more obvious that everyone was acting based off of future knowledge. And there still remain the question of whether or not they’ll succeed – these sorts of series can also be tragic, and it would not surprise me if things ended with Kakeru dying in any case. I certainly hope not, though, as I want to see everyone here happy. In the meantime, fans of shoujo should absolutely make orange a must buy.

By Jin (Shinzen no Teki-P) and Sidu. Released in Japan by Enterbrain. Released in North America by Yen On.

After two volumes of being very confused, I think I am finally starting to get a handle on Kagerou Daze, and elements of the plot are now coming together in ways they hadn’t before. As with the second volume, this book is divided into two parts, which interlock in alternating chapters. One details the struggle of a young boy in the city and his hopeless crush on a girl his age who seems to be using him as a baggage holder. The other continues to show us Shintaro and Momo getting involved with the Mekakushi-Dan, and dealing with the eye powers – which now have one more member, as the boy from the first story shows up with red eyes and a desperate need to save the girl he loves.

I’ll be honest, I found the Shintaro plot a lot more interesting – almost the reverse of the second book, where it was Takane who held my attention. Part of the problem is that Hibiya and Hiyori are both not very likeable kids – Hiyori deliberately, as she’s written as very much a stereotypical arrogant rich girl (complete with a “Mean Girls” sort of accent, with lots of ‘likes’ interspersed), but I suspect we’re meant to sympathize with Hibiya’s somewhat stalker-ish obsession with her more than we do, and the doll he creates that can speak n her voice is just icing on the cake of creepy. That said, he fares much better in the second story, where he’s allowed to be what he actually is away from his crush, a confused and emotional young kid.

Shintaro and Momo also grow over the course of this volume, although I have a sneaking suspicion that Shintaro may regress soon. The scene between him and Kano is the most powerful in the book, both to show the pain and despair that Ayano’s death sent Shintaro spiraling into, and also to show the reader that Ayano is somehow connected with this group as well, and not just Shintaro’s dead friend. It also shows us a cruel and vicious side to Kano, which I had suspected was there but hadn’t seen till now. As for Momo, she and Hibiya get off on the wrong foot (he calls her “Gran”, which I suspect is Oba-san in the original, and she understandably freaks given she’s still in high school), but quickly develop a sibling-like relationship. He seems to have seen her teacher before, too…

The writing here is quite interesting. It’s rare to see a Japanese book with English wordplay – the title of the book, The Children Reason, and one story within, The Children Record, could have multiple meanings, and the original Japanese used the English words. (The author does need to get better at remembering how he’s numbering, though – going from 01 to 02 to 03 to IV was jarring, and that was also in the original Japanese.) There’s also some subtle callbacks, such as Ene having a complete freakout when she sees Konoha, which sounds so much like her old self that Shintaro almost figures it out before she distracts him. Overall, I remain interested, despite a majority of the characters having serious character flaws, and will definitely pick up the next volume.

By Tetsuo Uesu and Miyakokasiwa. Released in Japan as “Shinmai Maou no Keiyakusha” by Kadokawa Shoten Shoten, serialization ongoing in the magazine Shonen Ace. Released in North America by Seven Seas.

First of all, that is one awkward title. I’ve accidentally written it sa “New Sister Devil” at least twice, and it is very much in the genre of ‘random words strung together’ that we’ve seen so often these days. Looking at the title, you’d immediately guess it was based on a light novels, and you’d be correct. As for the manga itself, it shares similarities with a few other titles released over here lately. The premise could be vaguely interesting, some of the characters are promising, and there’s a whole lot of non-consensual sexual assault as fanservice that makes me ultimately rejecting recommending it to others.

As I said, I did enjoy the basic premise and backstory. Each of the main characters is introduced as a normal person to whom wacky plot points keep happening, only it turns out that they’re actually far from normal and have been hiding secrets of their own. Basara is actually from a village of heroes who are there to fight demons – a fight that he’s run away from after his powers got out of control as a child. His father, who appears to be the one complete dupe in the series, turns out to have also known all along. the one innocent in this, ironically, is Mio, who is the daughter of a demon – a fact she was totally unaware of until her entire family was slaughtered one day. Each of them has a very good reason for wanting nothing whatsoever to do with the war to see who gets to rule Hell, and yet they’re drawn into it anyway, because they’re fundamentally decent people. This is a good premise.

Sadly, we also get fanservice, to the point of near explicitness here, mostly due to Mio’s attendant Maria, who is a succubus, and who uses her powers “accidentally” to bind Mio as Bassara’s underling. This means she has to obey his orders, and if she doesn’t, her body gets more and more aroused. The only way out of this is, of course, to grope and otherwise assault her till she climaxes. Add to this and we have the usual ‘waking up with my fake sister lying on top of me’, ‘bath scene with lots of jiggling and bouncing’, and ‘let’s lick the arm in suck a way that it resembles giving head’. Honestly, half the time I’m amazed this isn’t in Young Ace instead of Shonen Ace. But to be fair, this is exactly the sort of thing that would interest teenage boys.

So if you can put up with the humiliation of the female lead (Maria seems to have no shame, so no worries there) and enjoy fantasy along the lines of Devils and Realist and some of the other ‘war in hell’ titles we’ve seen, this may be for you. As for me, I feel I can resist the call.

By Gakuto Mikumo and Manyako. Released in Japan by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen Press.

I’d mentioned in my review of the first volume that Strike the Blood reads like a series that was written in anticipation of being made into an anime. Having now completed the second volume, I’ll go a little further – it reads almost like a novelization, as if the anime had come first. This is actually good in many respects – the fight scenes are excellent and highly easy to visualize, and the normal pauses you see in these sorts of series where the plot is slowly explained are kept to a minimum. It does mean that I have the same issues I had with the first volume, though – the character types are all too predictable, as are the plot twists.

As a case in point, we have Sayaka, Yukina’s former roommate and friend and the orphanage devoted to taking girls and making them into magical superstars. She has a giant hate-on for Kojou, of the sort that we know will turn to love by the end of the book, because of course he’s not like those *other* evil vampires. She also has a pseudo-lesbian obsession with Yukina, which I expect will be promptly dropped now that it’s fulfilled its function as minor yuri bait. It’s disappointing, because while Yukina and Asagi also have elements of cliche written into their characters (elements which are exaggerated a bit more in this second volume), they both manage to feel like read young teenage girls, while Sayaka reads like a caricature.

The worldbuilding here fares better, as we once again see a series that knows it won’t be cancelled for a few volumes, so is content to spin out a few interesting subplots and not actually do anything with them. Koujo’s younger sister is clearly possessed by something, but we never quite find out what. Likewise, Asagi’s hacking abilities are starting to go beyond ‘teen genius’ and into legendary abilities. We meet another powerful vampire here, Vatler, and while he also has his share of cliched behavior, his smug “I did it for the lulz” attitude is more tolerable than Sayaka’s angry not-lesbian.

I will likely be reading more of this, despite my grumping. The prose is some of the smoothest we’ve seen in a Yen On release, with very little of the awkward narrative stuttering you see with a lot of first-person light novel narratives. And as I said earlier, the action scenes are genuinely exciting and not confusing, which is impressive given how much destruction is racked up here. The villain is a terrorist, and you get the sense that the author had seen Die Hard before writing him, as he’s very much in the Alan Rickman vein of “polite yet murderous”. There’s also a character from the first volume who returns – that did surprise me, though sadly it also involved maid fetishism. So it’s a good series, but I do wish that I wasn’t able to see the blueprint it works off of so easily.

By Eiji Masuba. Released in Japan as “Jitsu Wa Watashi Wa” by Akita Shoten, serialization ongoing in the magazine Weekly Shonen Champion. Released in North America by Seven Seas.

I’ve been a little wary of the recent influx in “monster girl” manga, even though I do enjoy several of the titles. It can be a fun genre, but its nature lends itself to a sort of fanservice that I’ve grown out of over the years, and so I always approach new titles wondering how many of them are all large-breasted succubi and accidentally spilling milk all over someone’s face. Thankfully, there are also exceptions, and to its credit Seven Seas has not really leaned one way or the other in licensing the monster girl genre, but simply spread its net wide to gather up everything. And this means that we have titles like My Monster Secret, which has the subtitle “Actually, I Am…”, a literal translation of its original title. Which is just a fun silly comedy with no fanservice in sight.

The literal title is presumably meant to be followed by a fill-in-the-blank, with the first girl on the cover conveying “Actually, I Am… a Vampire.” She’s Shiragami, who is supposed to be cool and aloof, and who our hero has totally fallen for. In reality, she’s mostly cool so that people don’t see her fangs, and the aloof becomes goofy fairly quickly, though at times you can see the author struggling to see how “ditzy” he should make her. Acting as her foil is Asahi, a boy whose poker face is entirely absent, to the point where he’s actually shunned a bit by the class for his total inability to keep anything a secret. The trouble is that Shiragami’s secret isn’t just a love letter, she’s in big trouble if it’s found out. What’s a boy who can’t lie to do?

The plot and characters spin out as you’d expect. There’s the teenage newshound girl we’ve seen in many an anime, only this time she’s portrayed as straight up evil, which is refreshing. We also see another supposed stoic cool girl, only this one turns out to be an alien – something that should have been more obvious from the giant screw on the back of her head, which opens up to reveal her much tinier self. If you think all of this leads to over the top reactions and lots of falling over, you’re absolutely right. The goal here is comedy, with I expect some heartwarming interspersed as the series goes on.

The main reason I really enjoyed the first volume of the series is the art style, which is appealing yet odd. It’s somewhat reminiscent of Lucifer and the Biscuit Hammer, with very wide mouths and expressive screams. No one’s really attractive here, which is not what I was expecting – I’d thought the vampire and alien would be standard “beautiful”, but even they’re drawn to look strange more than anything else. Basically, the art helps the comedy. If you’re looking for a “monster girl” title just to say that you’ve read one… well, wait a month and get Franken Fran. But if you want two, this is a good choice. It’s relatively clean, especially for a Champion series, and genuinely amusing.

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

Ranma fandom these days is a different beast from where it was in the halcyon days of 1996-1997. Then it was striding the anime world like a colossus, at least in North America, and not even Sailor Moon seemed to have quite as many people discussing or writing fanfics about it. Nowadays it’s a small fish in a big pond, somewhat forgotten but retaining a nostalgic glow. This has, however, allowed some newer aspects of fandom to infiltrate, notably the BL fandom. Back in the day there was BL, but it seemed to get drowned out by all the male fans arguing about which girl Ranma should end up with. The idea that the best man for Ranma might be Ryouga is something that is dealt with in this volume, albeit not in a serious way.

Ryouga comes across yet another magical item that will help him to win Akane, this time a fishing rod whose mark on a body leaves it with ever-increasing feelings of love. To be fair to Ryouga, he does seem to have moral qualms about using such a device to win Akane over. To be unfair to Ryouga, he tries it regardless. And when it hits Ranma, Ranma starts feeling very friendly indeed towards Ryouga. It starts off as washing his clothes and cooking for him, But as the mark expands, things get more serious, to the point where Takahashi feels obliges to urn Ranma female for the rest of the story. Akane, of course, becomes convinced that Ryouga is using the rod on Ranma because he can’t confess to him. Not exactly progressive, but honestly, this is exactly the sort of plot hook that many a BL story could work with. It’s also the best story of the first half of the book, which otherwise deals with annoyances such as Pantyhose Taro’s return (boring), Akane’s cooking (very boring), and Gosunkugi winning an enchanted suit of armor (really super boring and bad).

Luckily, the second half of the volume, is fantastic, and consists of one long story – indeed, there’s a cliffhanger, so it will carry over to the next volume. Herb is a villain who gives Ranma a challenge that he hasn’t really had to face in a long time, and his goofy yet deadly sidekicks Lime and Mint are just as dangerous – Ryouga is even brought to the point of death, though thankfully is able to triumph due to his super-depression. It allows Ranma to be clever and analytic again, one of my favorite sides of him, as he’s unable to see how Herb’s martial arts works – and how it’s actually LESS powerful than expected – without knowing the secret – like Ranma, Herb changes to female in cold water. This is the first time we’ve seen someone with the same exact curse as Ranma, and it helps to showcase their different styles – Herb has modesty, for one, something Ranma does not care about a bit. We also briefly see Ryouga and Mousse work together with Ranma, even if they have murderous motivation at the start. They make a good team.

Ranma sometimes seems a bit hoary and sexist (and homophobic as well) compared to some of the more popular works today, but Takahashi’s creativity usually shines through, and fans of the series will find most of this omnibus highly rewarding.