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Off*Beat, Volumes 1 & 2

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Off*Beat, Vols. 1 & 2 | By Jen Lee Quick | Published by Tokyopop

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Christopher “Tory” Blake is a genius teenager in Queens, unchallenged in school, damaged by his absent father’s failures, and living with his well-meaning mom who worries that she gives her son too much freedom for his own good. After his parents’ break-up, Tory began keeping meticulous diaries of every detail in his life, minute-to-minute, including everyone and everything around him, which he keeps in file boxes in his closet. …

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Jack Frost, Volume 1

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Jack Frost, Vol. 1
By JinHo Ko
Published by Yen Press

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When Noh-A Joo is decapitated on her first day at Amityville Private High School, she isn’t terribly surprised. After all, it’s the same recurring nightmare she’s been having since she started high school. This time, however, the dream doesn’t end, and Noh-A finds out that not only has she died and left her real world forever but that she’s stuck for eternity in a burned-out wasteland where blood-thirsty creatures live in perpetual war. …

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Ikigami: The Ultimate Limit, Vol. 1

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By Motoro Mase
Published by Viz, 216 pp.
Rating: Mature

“Obedience is the key to happiness,” proclaims the government of this manga’s dystopian society–a tenet upheld by the National Welfare Act, a law that dictates standard immunizations for every first grader in the country (a country that greatly resembles modern Japan). What is special about these immunizations is that approximately one in one thousand of them contains a tiny capsule that settles itself in the recipient’s pulmonary artery. Then, on a pre-determined date sometime between the affected citizen’s eighteenth and twenty-fourth year, the capsule ruptures, killing the person instantly. Because nobody knows who has received a capsule, the law is said to make people value life more and conduct more productive lives, ever mindful of the shadow of death.

Anyone who opposes the law is injected with the capsule, as Fujimoto, the series’ protagonist, witnesses for himself on the first day of training for his new job. Fujimoto’s job is as a Messenger–a government employee responsible for delivering ikigami or “death papers” to those who are destined for government-mandated death, informing them of the exact date and time of their unfortunate fate. The ikigami are delivered to the person’s residence precisely twenty-four hours before the appointed time so that the individual may decide how to spend the last twenty-four hours of his or her life–one of the primary subjects of this volume. In the final chapter, Fujimoto’s manager explains to him, “Depending on how a person lives their last day, the ikigami can be a death sentence, or an invitation to really live,” and though on the surface, this might seem to make sense, it also highlights the most problematic philosophy presented in the story.

Fujimoto delivers two ikigami during the course of this volume, one to a store checkout clerk who is haunted by his past as a target of his former schoolmates’ intense bullying, and one to a musician just on the brink of artistically unfulfilling commercial success. The most interesting portions of this volume are the stories of these two young men and their individual reactions to receiving an ikigami. Though their choices in the last twenty-four hours of their lives seem quite different on the surface–one turns to revenge, the other to liberation–both are acting on their deepest regrets, and it is this that is the great tragedy of Ikigami.

Despite the government’s insistence that the National Welfare Act helps people value their lives, to a great extent this only seems to happen in these young men’s final moments, which begs the question of whether or not the “obedience” these people are so proud of is actually just the product of plain, ordinary fear, so deeply ingrained into their way of life that it is maintained unconsciously, with little thought given to its cause. After all, appreciating life and fearing death are not the same thing. Giving this very well-plotted manga its due, however, it seems quite likely that this could end up being the point, as by the end of the volume Fujimoto is clearly having non-government-approved thoughts about his role in all this, and there are enough hints throughout the book to suggest that he may not continue to walk the straight-and-narrow.

Everyman Fujimoto is the perfect guide to take readers through this grim world–part Death Note, part 1984 (though more starkly real than either of them). It is the government that is the serial killer in this story, doling out doom with a tight, corporate smile while failing to recognize (let alone address) the real suffering of its constituents.

That Yosuke Kamoi, the young man whose school years with a group of bullies left him permanently disfigured, could have lived the life he did in this “obedient” society, proves just how little part the government plays in people’s day-to-day lives. Yosuke lived his life tormented by his peers, with his negligent Big Brother only stepping in to deliver the final blow. For most of these people, the ikigami is something that happens to others–distant, anonymous people who have nothing to do with their lives. Despite the government’s best efforts, the darkest oppressor hanging over these people’s daily existences is that which they create for themselves and for each other. It is this that makes Ikigami feel so real and enhances its sense of horror.

Mase’s art is bold, stark, and heavy on contrast, effectively portraying the bleak reailty of its world. The characters’ faces are wonderfully expressive and specific, with a level of nuance one might expect from live actors, and the character designs provide the detailed realism found primarily in seinen manga.

This manga is smart, compelling, often chilling, and relentlessly dark though never for its own sake. With its fascinating concept, tense storytelling, and sharp, clean art, Ikigami is a real page-turner–impossible to put down through the very last panel.

Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at PopCultureShock.

Samurai 7, Vol. 1

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Remake or retread? That’s the question facing critics whenever someone updates a classic novel or favorite film, be it Pride and Prejudice or The Taking of Pelham One Two Three. A remake brings new urgency or wit to the original story, new clarity to its structure, or new life to a premise that, by virtue of social or technological change, seems dated—think of Philip Kaufman’s The Invasion of the Body Snatchers, which infused a 1950s it-came-from-outer-space story with a healthy dose of seventies paranoia, or Alfred Hitchcock’s 1955 version of The Man Who Knew Too Much, which featured a leaner, meaner script than his 1934 original. Retreads, on the other hand, evoke the letter but not the spirit of the originals, embellishing their plots with fussy details, slangy dialogue, or new characters without adding anything of value—think of Ethan and Joel Coens’ deep-fried version of The Ladykillers, which was louder, cruder, and longer than the 1955 film, yet decidedly less funny.

Samurai 7, a mangafication of Akira Kurosawa’s The Seven Samurai, falls somewhere between these poles, treating the source material respectfully without adding anything particularly new or interesting to the mix. The basic plot remains the same: a poor rural village hires seven samurai to protect them from a band of thugs who steal their rice and enslave their womenfolk. Though the manga takes minor liberties with the main characters—one is a headless cyborg, one is a bishonen who always seems to be falling out of his yukata—the samurai bear a strong resemblance to Kurosawa’s original crew, both in terms of their personalities and functions within the group. The manga also preserves the war-ravaged atmosphere of the original, substituting a robot-fueled world war for the carnage caused by sixteenth-century daimyo.

Such fidelity to the source material proves Samurai 7’s undoing, however, as it underscores just how lackluster this adaptation really is. The story unfolds in fits and starts, bogging down in lame comedy and windy speeches that stall the samurai’s inevitable posse formation. Though the fight scenes are competently executed, the artwork has a sterile, perfunctory quality, as if the layouts and character designs were traced from four or five different sources. The mecha elements seem especially incongruous when juxtaposed with the story’s sixteenth-century costumes, buildings, and weaponry; there’s never any compelling rationale for their inclusion, save a desire to surpass the original film’s “wow” factor.

I offer these criticisms not because I view Kurosawa’s original as a sacred text, but because Samurai 7’s creators made such a calculated, unimaginative effort to sex up the material for a new generation of fans. Alas, no amount of bitchin’ gadgetry can compensate for poor pacing, generic artwork, or flat characterizations, even if later volumes promise more samurai-on-robot action. My suggestion: skip the manga and rent the original film. Toshiro Mifune is much fiercer than anything in this samurai-lite adaptation.

SAMURAI 7, VOL. 1• BY MIZUTAKA SUHOU • DEL REY • 224 pp. • RATING: OLDER TEEN (16+)

Her Majesty’s Dog, Volume 1

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Good morning, folks! I’ve been on a bit of a crazy schedule, so I’m behind on answering comments to yesterday’s entry. I will work on doing so later tonight! Thanks for such a great response! In the meantime, here’s a quick review for today:

Her Majesty’s Dog, Vol. 1
By Mick Takeuchi
Published by Go!Comi

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Nodame Cantabile, Volume 1

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First, just a quick link to a review of mine over at Manga Recon’s Otaku Bookshelf column, for the second and third volumes of DMP’s The Guilty, a series of yaoi novels I had extremely mixed feelings about. And now, a quick review of something a bit more my style!

Nodame Cantabile, Vol. 1
By Tomoko Ninomiya
Published by Del Rey Manga

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Click 3 by Youngran Lee: B-

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From the back cover:
Joonha, the transgender headcase, and Taehyun, the hotshot rich kid, are actually becoming buddies—so much so that they even team up to take down a card shark at the casino Taehyun’s family runs. Is the friendship about to turn into something… more?

Meanwhile, figures from Joonha’s past keep popping up—and stirring up real trouble. His old friend Jinhoo, now a star piano player, is back in Seoul and not going anywhere. And former nice girl Heewon: is she really as nasty as she acts, or is it all a front? Could she be the reason why brainy Jihan suddenly isn’t wearing his glasses anymore?

Review:
I’m not sure what it is about Click that makes it so addictive. I think perhaps the emphasis on character relationships over anything else is partly responsible, because the plot itself is pretty much just day-to-day things, even though what passes for day-to-day in Taehyun’s life is his stepfather accusing him of being gay, plotting business takeovers, winning at high stakes poker games, et cetera.

Also, now that the mechanics of Joonha’s gender change are out of the way, the uncertainty of the other characters regarding her true gender is pretty interesting. Taehyun’s definitely attracted to her, but unable to really convince himself she’s a girl. Heewon, despite Joonha telling her outright that she’s a girl (though she made up a story about having been a girl all along) is in denial and insists to her friend that Joonha’s a guy. And Jinhoo is completely clueless, though the volume ends with a cliffhanger in which he seems poised to find out (or to at least spot Joonha in a girl’s uniform).

I also love the wordless reunion between Jinhoo and Joonha and the fact that when Joonha tells Taehyun she’s starting to like him, she doesn’t mean romantically (at least, I don’t think so), but rather means that she wants to be like him, a cool badass kind of guy. I can almost like Joonha now, but her nasty personality emerges once again when confronted with Jinhoo’s girlfriend. I also can’t stand Heewon, with her profanity, violence, and propensity for ordering people around like they’re her servants.

I think of a B- as meaning, “I enjoy this despite its flaws,” which fits Click pretty well.

Hitohira, Vol. 3

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By Idumi Kirihara
Aurora Publishing, 174 pp.
Rating: T (13+)

Timid Theater Research Group member Mugi takes the stage in her first leading role in the performance that will determine whether the club must be forced to disband. After a rocky start, she finally comes into her own as an actress even while club president Nono loses her voice onstage. Unfortunately, the club’s best efforts are not enough, and it is the official theater club that wins the fight for its existence. After the Theater Research Group’s members part ways, spunky freshman Chitose (an official theater club member still harboring a crush on senior Research Group member Takashi) suggests to Mugi that they have a Christmas party with the senior members of both their clubs to bring them all together again. The party is a success, but there is heartbreak in store for both girls, as Chitose is rejected by Takashi and Mugi finds out that her best friend, Kayo, is leaving to study overseas.

This volume is short on focus but this actually matches the emotional states of the characters quite well, ensuring that the reader feels keenly the shaky ground everyone is treading on for most of the volume. With all the primary characters at loose ends, it’s hard to see where things will go at this point, but fortunately the story is strong enough now to carry that kind of uncertainty and still compel readers to care what happens next. Though Nono’s voice has become a serious problem, her story takes a back seat in this volume, giving more attention to Mugi’s personal relationships (both with Kayo and love interest Kai) and the void left in her life after the dissolution of the club.

Despite the scattered feel of this volume, Hitohira continues to become more appealing as it goes along, providing more insight into its engaging group of characters as they struggle to discover their individual paths.

Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at PopCultureShock.

Crimson Hero 10 by Mitsuba Takanashi: B

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The six members of the Crimson Field High School girls’ volleyball team have come a long way and are now participating in the Newcomers’ Tournament, an important stepping stone to their ultimate goal, the Spring Tournament. They win their first two rounds handily, but are faced with a tough opponent for the third round. Meanwhile, Nobara and Yushin are still keeping their feelings for each other a secret.

Even though I am far from athletic myself, there is something about sports manga that I adore. Crimson Hero does particularly well at giving each teammate a moment to shine and in recent volumes, each of the supporting girls has improved her skills in some way or another. The matches are also a lot of fun and easy to follow. Frankly, I wish there were more of them.

I’m a little frustrated on the romance front, though. Nobara has liked Yushin for a long time, and was firm about this even when she realized that another boy, Haibuki, had feelings for her. Now, when Yushin has finally reciprocated, Nobara’s suddenly starting to be affected by Haibuki, thinking things like, “These days your smile messes with my heart.” I was really hoping this series wouldn’t go down this road; the fact that it seems poised to do so is disappointing.

Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at Manga Recon.

solanin

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Good morning, all! I’ve got a busy day ahead, but I wanted to point you to a review I posted last night, just barely making it in time for my self-imposed deadline (I love deadlines) in my column at Comics Should Be Good (reprinted here after the demise of CSBG), for Viz Media’s Eisner-nominated manga solanin.

I really liked this manga, but you know reading over my review again this morning… well, I think I said a lot of things I don’t actually believe. Heh. Because the truth is, I still do believe in following wild dreams. I don’t think adulthood is about accepting mediocrity and resigning yourself to a lifetime of meaningless jobs. I think maybe the only difference between me and the twenty-somethings in solanin is that I know it isn’t that simple. I know you sometimes have to endure the job you hate (or maybe find one you hate just a little less) in order to do the work and take the time required to pursue larger dreams. I know that letting go of the dreams of my youth isn’t the same thing as letting go of dreams in general–it’s just making room for new ones. I think it’s possible for dreams that appear crazy or unrealistic on the surface to actually be completely feasible as long as you’re willing to put in the work. And I don’t believe that we only have one chance in life to get things right, but that these chances turn up over and over again, ready to help us fulfill new dreams.

I guess I still believe that greatness is possible, and that I suppose I’m still clinging to my youthful notion that I was meant to contribute something meaningful to this world. I suppose that could be unrealistic, but I’ve never regretting believing it.

In any case… solanin. It is a beautiful manga with a lot to say, and I’d recommend it to pretty much anyone, and particularly to fans of western comics who I think might find it more palatable than a lot of other manga. Also, since it was just nominated for an Eisner, it’s a great time to encourage folks to pick this up! Enjoy. :)

solanin By Inio Asano Published by Viz Media

Twenty-something Meiko Inoue hates her office job, loves her underemployed boyfriend, and gets frustrated with the endless supply of vegetables her parents send her from home which just end up rotting in her fridge. After her boyfriend, Naruo, casually suggests she quit her job, she actually does (much to his surprise), though this brings her much less satisfaction than she’d hoped. Quitting provides relief but not direction, so amidst hours of mindless vegging and video games (while attempting to ignore impending financial doom), Meiko turns her focus on Naruo’s life by encouraging him to revive the rock band he left behind after college. Naruo’s child-like excitement as he finally lets himself indulge in an old dream is enough to invigorate both of them for a while, but eventually the reality of the adult world forces them to face their limitations head-on and evaluate what makes their lives worthwhile.

Solanin captures perfectly that particular time of life when each of us is first faced with the question of whether to pursue our heart’s wildest dreams or to instead seek happiness in less obvious places–that time when we determine whether we can (or must) succumb to a mediocre existence and what that even means in the first place. Is getting by day-to-day in the company of a familiar loved one enough, or must we strive for something grander–something that will outlast our meager human lifespan? These are issues that can (and do) persist throughout life, but there is something unique about those early years when it first becomes clear that it is even a question and the frequently paralyzing fear and uncertainty that goes with that.

While this could easily manifest itself in a self-indulgent angst-fest, fortunately mangaka Inio Asano addresses the subject with wry humor, simple honesty, and a real affection for his characters in their best and worst moments. He also avoids passing obvious judgement on their choices, letting their conflicted thoughts and frustrated lives stand on their own without (for the most part) inserting unnecessary drama into the mix. The downside of this is that the pacing occasionally suffers, particularly when the story shifts to focus on supporting characters, though this is a minor quibble at most. Meiko and Naruo are more than compelling enough on their own to sustain the story’s momentum, even through its slower patches. Asano’s understated sense of drama, bare-bones honesty, and thoughtful characterization take us back to a time when we all sought that intangible something–that soft, distant beacon in the murky haze of adulthood that, if only we could reach it, might somehow allow us to taste the exhilaration of freedom without leaving behind the comforts of home. He also reminds us of what most of us already know: the beacon is a mirage.

What this manga does not provide is escapism. There is no great purpose realized, no higher calling discovered, no deep secret revealed to carry the characters off into the sunset. Life’s perfect moments must inevitably pass into the mundane, and though this might suggest pessimism, that is not the tone of this comic at all, which is perhaps its greatest strength. If there is something profound to take away from solanin, it is that there is no universal measure for happiness or success, and that a life spent searching for something greater may ultimately have less meaning than one that is simply unexceptional.

One of the most striking things about this manga is the art, which is expressive, clean, and above all, distinctive. The character designs in particular display the same course honesty as the characters themselves, with realistic body-types and average looks. There is not a single overly-pretty character in solanin, which is surprisingly refreshing.

Originally published in two volumes in Japan, Viz’s release combines both into one double-length volume in the larger trim size characteristic of their Signature series, which includes two small sections of color pages, with a thick cover and high-quality paper, giving the book a nicely satisfying weight. Recently nominated for a 2009 Eisner award, this slice-of-life manga offers unique art, thoughtful characterization, and a refreshingly unromantic perspective on the transition to true adulthood.

Honey Hunt, Vol. 1

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By Miki Aihara
Viz, 192 pp.
Rating: Older Teen

Yura Onozuka is a mousy high school student whose father is a famous film score composer and whose mother is a famous actress, leaving Yura in an awkward position at school where the other students expect her to be more of a “celebrity” type. Constantly struggling to hide her loneliness and alienation in order to maintain the “perfect” image of her family as portrayed by the media, Yura’s situation is made worse when her mother announces that she is filing for divorce, revealing to Yura the real lie behind her family’s image. With her father out of the country and her mother preparing to sell their family home, Yura is thrust out into the world on her own with no emotional support or direction. It is only when she discovers that her only friend has been carrying on an affair with her mother that Yura decides to try to “beat” her mother at her own game: acting. Taken under the wing of her father’s manager and fighting her own timid nature, Yura throws herself into the entertainment world, determined to show her mother her true worth.

With its sensational plot and romantic intrigue, Honey Hunt is pure, trashy soap opera of the very best kind. It’s impossible not to get hopelessly sucked in to shy, lonely Yura’s ugly duckling story, especially when she’s got all of the entertainment industry’s sharks circling around her. Her down-to-earth nature makes her the perfect relatable heroine and after just one volume her story is already insanely addictive. Beginning from a moment in one of the early chapters when Yura finally cracks and proclaims to a yard full of reporters the truth about her family and her parents’ treatment of her, resistance is futile.

Of course, Yura’s journey is not the only draw. The story’s supporting characters are well drawn in every sense, and perfectly suited to the petty, shallow world Yura has entered into. Yukari Shiraki, Yura’s beautiful, cold mother, is poised and graceful as she deliberately poisons her daughter’s life with a casual spite that says more about her own insecurities than Yura’s supposed deficiencies. The two characters being set up as Yura’s love interests–a pair of rival twin brothers–are delightfully attractive while displaying their self-centered motives and fatal weaknesses for all to see. Even Yura’s manager, who benevolently welcomes her into his home, is obviously using Yura to advance his own ambitions. Yet running through each of them all is just enough humanity to make their stories compelling enough to keep up with Yura’s.

The volume ends with a cliffhanger revealing that someone is already trying to sabotage Yura’s career, or at least the success of the show she is working on. It’s the kind of soap-opera ending that keeps the reader desperately longing for the next volume. With its tabloid sensibility, attractive art, and absorbing characters, Honey Hunt aims to be the ultimate teenage fantasy and its first volume gets things off to a strong start!

Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at PopCultureShock.