shojo beat

High school student Asuka Masamune has a reputation as a cool and stoic guy. He’s ranked number one in the country for kendo, and has black belts in both judo and karate. His name alone inspires fear in the hearts of his would-be opponents. But Asuka has a secret. Beneath this carefully-crafted masculine exterior, he yearns to read shojo manga, make plushies, and fall in love. When he meets tomboyish Ryo Miyakozuka, his veneer begins to crack. He finds himself wanting to do things to help her, like finish a home ec sewing project, make tasty bento lunches, and teach her to make the perfect birthday cake for her father. After Ryo mentions that she prefers masculine guys, Asuka tries to be her ideal, but with some encouragement from frenemy Juta, eventually realizes that he wants to be his real self with the person he cares for.

It’s difficult to see exactly why Asuka falls in love with Ryo in the first place, but once they start hanging out together, her personality begins to come through. They’re joined by classmate Juta, whose playboy ways tick Asuka off, but whom he gradually accepts because Juta’s friendship is also important to Ryo. They develop a kind of xxxHOLiC dynamic, with Asuka preparing lunch for the three of them while muttering things like “why am I always making enough for this guy as well?” Unbeknownst to Asuka, Juta has another reason for hanging around. He’s actually Jewel Sachihana, the mangaka behind Asuka’s favorite shojo manga series, Love Chick, and Asuka is the model for his heroine, as no one else embodies true femininity so well.

One of best things about this subplot is that pages from Love Chick work their way into the story, and you can see how well Kanno emulates that generic shojo art style. Also, as events unfold, it becomes clear that Juta is using incidents from Asuka’s life in his manga, even nudging him into action a few times in order to get new material, and that the male love interest looks exactly like a boy version of Ryo. Asuka remains clueless so far, only mentioning that he “surprisingly identifies with it a lot.”

In addition to the glimpses of Love Chick, there are plenty of other amusing things in Otomen. My favorites include the panel where Asuka, after binging on girly items, thinks “I’ve got to control myself” then looks down to see he has unconsciously completed a teddy bear; the scenes in which Asuka and Ryo both declare their intentions to protect the other, complete with flowery background (an image later replicated in Love Chick); and the part where Asuka purposefully leaves a volume of Love Chick lying around in the path of a heartbroken guy, who proceeds to go all sparkly over it.

Lastly, I’m really enjoying the male perspective. While a male protagonist is by no means rare in shojo, you’ll usually find them in science fiction or fantasy works and not in a high school romance. Asuka’s not your average guy, of course, but neither is he simply a typical shojo heroine in male disguise.

With its quirky characters and comedic approach, Otomen promises to be a lot of fun.

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

If there’s one thing notorious criminal Zen can’t stand, it’s being controlled. At the end of the first volume, while he and his doctor companion, Hyakka, were liberating Amatan prisoners from a Galay Army facility, he fell into an involuntary trance after which he awoke with no memory of his violent actions. Now, he resolves to find the person responsible, which means finally getting some answers about his forgotten past.

Said answers are gradually revealed throughout the volume, and manage to be interesting but more or less what I had expected. Perhaps that’s why this volume, like its predecessor, was a little difficult to get into at first. Also, one major revelation that I hadn’t seen coming was telegraphed in advance. Alert readers get suspicious when you only show us parts of someone’s face, you know!

That said, I have to admire the economy of the storytelling—no extraneous information is offered nor is any essential detail lacking—as well as the way the series ends. Aspects of the climactic conclusion are melodramatic, but I like that we actually end up rooting for Zen, even after witnessing the evil of which he is capable.

Blank Slate presents an entertaining and thought-provoking story, even if the execution stumbles here and there. And at two volumes, it’s short and affordable. An afternoon spent on this series would not be wasted.

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

Zen has no memory of the last twenty years, and doesn’t much care. The back cover, with its line “he can’t remember if he’s a killer or a hero,” erroneously leads one to anticipate a story of an amnesiac’s quest for identity. In reality, Blank Slate is all about the action.

The story takes place in the country of Amata, which was invaded and conquered in a war two decades earlier. The occupying government honors justice and order and employs a fleet of bounty hunters to eradicate all manner of undesirables. Zen is a notorious criminal and has committed every kind of crime imaginable. His philosophy is, “I do whatever I want. If it gets in my way, I smash it.”

I had a really tough time getting into the first chapter. It’s the stand-alone tale of a bounty hunter sent to kill Zen who instead joins him on a murderous spree of destruction and ruin. It wasn’t the best introduction to the setting or characters, and I found it very dull. The real serialization of the story commences in chapter two, and the improvement is immediate. From this point, there is a continuous plot focusing on the tensions between the native Amatans and the occupying Galayans and featuring kidnappings, prison breaks, and lots of guns. It’s pretty interesting, and I was surprised by several twists in the story.

Aside from the abundant bishonen, there’s nothing stereotypically shojo about Blank Slate. Zen is as heartless as they come and kills casually. Most of his victims are aggressors or authority figures, but he’s not above threatening the life of a child who could expose his hiding place. His companions are more sympathetic, particularly Hakka, a righteous doctor who has fallen into evil to protect something important to him.

The art style is visually clean, a necessity in a title like this where the story is enough to be puzzling over. Most of the character designs aren’t anything special, but Zen is really quite spectacularly pretty. This isn’t achieved through any gimmick of flowing hair or sparkly eye but simply with a beautifully drawn facial structure that’s quite stunning. I’ve reviewed a lot of manga, and never before have I devoted three full sentences to how pretty some guy is. Trust me on this.

Blank Slate certainly isn’t the best thing I’ve ever read, but the story it’s spinning is entertaining enough that I will surely be returning for the second and final volume due out in December.

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