Review: THE PALETTE OF 12 SECRET COLORS

THE PALETTE OF 12 SECRET COLORS (Juni Hisoku no Palette), by Nari Kusakawa.  First published in 2004, and first published in North America in 2007. 

PLOT:
Cello lives on the remote South Seas island of Opal.  Opal is renowned for its beautiful native birds and for its 'palettes.'  Palettes are magic user who can extract the color from those birds and transfer them to other materials, turning plain cloth into brilliant brocades and ordinary rocks into colorful gemstones.  Unfortunately, Cello is the worst palette on the island, to the point where she is being held back a year at palette school.  Her failures often mean that she has to be sent to the school doctor, Dr. Guell, to bring everything back to normal.  Still, she strives to pass her training, especially once she learns that she can wield colors over long distances and even write with them.  Cello often finds herself putting these skills to the test, whether it's to foil bird thieves or bring snow to a tropical island.

STORY:
This story is so bland that it practically erases itself from your memory the moment you put the volume down.  Nobody in it is terribly distinctive, save maybe Dr Guell.  He at least has a touch of snarkiness, along with his longing to return to his snowy northern home.  Mind you, they never do explain how a 21 year old gets enough teaching and training to become a doctor, much less what a snowbird like him is doing in a place like Opal.  Even the villians are spectacularly weak and dull.  The one distinctive thing is how goofy the character names are, names like Cello, Guell, and Mousseline.  Really, reading this is like eating cotton candy.  It's sweet, light, and inoffensive, but ultimately without any substance.  It spurs neither love nor hate, but instead a mere 'meh.'

ART:
There's a touch of Arina Tanemura to Kusakawa's character designs, with their oversized eyes, but that's where the resemblance ends. Kusakawa's designs are much more flat and simplified, which makes distinguishing ages on characters nigh impossible.  The backgrounds are simple but handdrawn, sometimes concealed with screen tones.  I will say that this is one of the few times where a manga has suffered for NOT being printed in color.  After all, this is a story about magicians who can wield color like water, and we're often told how bright and beautiful these colors are.  The only place we get to see those colors are on the watercolored cover.  The rest is nothing but shades of gray, and that more than the plainness hurts the artwork. 

PRESENTATION:
There are some author's notes in the back, including an amusing little omake presented as a poll between the characters and their companion birds. 

RATING:

There is nothing of substance here worth noting, much less worth reading. 

This series was published by CMX.  All 6 volumes were released, and all are now out of print.

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Review: GRAVITATION

GRAVITATION (Gurabiteshon), by Maki Murakami. First published in 1996, and first published in North America in 2003.

PLOT:
Shuichi Shindou is a hyperactive high school student who has formed the band Bad Luck along with his much more mellow friend Hiro.  It's a rather apt name, as when the story starts Shuichi's computer crashes and he's forced to come up with new lyrics in a hurry.  As he finishes up his latest song late one night in the park, the lyrics fly out of Shuichi's hands and towards a severely rude blond man by the name of Eiri Yuki.  He harshly criticizes Shuichi's lyrics, then leaves.  So naturally Shuichi becomes obsessed with finding this man to prove what a good musician he is.  Thanks to his sister's reading habits, Shuichi learns that Eiri is in fact a popular romance novelist and finally tracks him down.  Eiri continues to be rude, insulting Shuichi left and right.  Things come to a head and Shuichi all but dares Eiri to come to their debut concert.  Bad Luck manage to score a record deal, and Shuichi returns to Eiri to boast.  Instead, they end up making out.  Now the poor kid is in love with Eiri, and the wackiness has only begun.

STORY:
So this is one of the great classics of shonen-ai, one of the first of the genre to be published here and one of the pioneers of the yaoi genre in the US.  I have to say that at best, I'm mildly amused by Gravitation.

I don't mind the mostly comedic take on the plot, with the heavy emphasis on Shuichi's homelife and work on his band.  Sure, Shuichi is hyper to the point of annoying but he's so earnest and emotionally open, and he wants to succeed so badly that you can't help but feel for the kid a little.  It's when things take a turn for the romantic that the story stumbles.  While there is plenty of tension in this part, none of it is the sexual variety.  There is utterly no chemistry between Shuichi and Eiri, mostly because of the fact that Eiri is one of the biggest douchebags to ever grace the pages of  manga.  He barely has a kind word for anyone, be it Shuichi, his editor, even his own sister.  He even uses said sister to manipulate Shuichi into coming back to him.  I cannot figure out why on earth I should be rooting for these two to get together.  It's doubly baffling when you consider that could have made the love interest Hiro, who is already present, not a psycho, and has already confessed to being gay.  Ok, so history has shown us time and again that it's a bad idea for bandmates to sleep together, but for Shuichi it would honestly be the better alternative.

I do have to briefly note the translation here.  Tokyopop tended to favor translations that were more casual and colloquial, ones that sacrified accuracy for readability.  While Gravitation's translation is no exception to this, there are a lot of pop culture references (mostly musical) that are thrown in too.  I have my doubts as to whether they were present in the original, but for once I don't mind because they are additions that are relevant.  I dare say that they're kind of a nice touch.

Gravitation's story falls short because it asks the reader to invest itself in what is already an unbalanced and even somewhat abusive relationship.  While it gives us a good grasp on who Shuichi is, it fails to give us any sort of understanding as to why he would fall for Eiri other than 'the plot demands it.'

ART:
The artwork is very typical for its time and genre, with everyone being long, lanky, and pointy.  I was a little amused by the heavily dated fashions and hairstyles.  I swear every guy's hair was overly long, tousled, and moussed, as if every man has an endless supply of hair product but not a single brush can be found.  When it is not dated and point, the art tends to be flat and superdeformed.  Backgrounds are minimal, tending towards screetones and effects (in particular, a weird flowery one that looks like a lace doily halo behind the character).  Page composition is pretty free and easy, and the characters are often bursting from the confines of their panels. 

PRESENTATION:
The only extra is a brief profile of Shuichi.

RATING:
Were this 2003, I might have let this slide into the yellow light range, when yaoi was novel and where it might have provided the fix for those craving a bit of yaoi that was a little silly or with a lot of belligerent sexual tension.  Time has not been kind to Gravitation, though, and now you can get that same sort of fix from actual yaoi stories without the dated look, better characters, and more balanced relationships.

This series was published by Tokyopop.  All 12 volumes were released, along with two tie-in novels.  It is currently out of print.

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Review: SWAN

SWAN, by Ariyoshi Kyoko.  First published in 1976, and first published in North America in 2004.

PLOT:
Masumi is a teenage ballet student from rural Hokkaido who wants nothing more than to be a professional dancer.  She trains hard at her ballet school, but often gets distracted by having to babysit the younger students or chasing out the odd farm animal out of the studio.  Her life is changed forever when she attends a performance of Swan Lake by the Bolshoi Ballet company in Tokyo.  She barges her way backstage to meet the principle dancers, and the only way she can express her joy and admiration for them is to perform an impromptu imitation of their performance.  This impulsive act impresses them so much that they recommend her to a national ballet competition, where students from all over Japan are competing to be trained and taught by professional dancers and staff from around the world.  There Masumi makes friends with a trio of fellow students: class clown Aoi, along with the popular and highly talented duo of Hisio Kusakabe and Sayoko Kyogoku.  Masumi passes the first round, but loses the second one and departs for Hokkaiko heartbroken.  She gets another chance to compete, but now must work hard under the tutelage of Russian dancer Alexei Sergeiev.  Will Masumi survive her training and get one step closer to her dream?

STORY:
You know, it's odd to think that for all its shoujo trappings, Swan is more tonally similar with shonen tournament fare.  Odder still is the fact that this is no way hurts the story.  It's kind of nice to find a shoujo where the drama doesn't come from love and relationships, but from competition where only one's innate skill and hard work determines if they will succeed.  Unlike shonen tournament series, though, Masumi doesn't succeed because she is the best dancer EVER, but because she is emotive and works hard at her art.

The characters are surprisingly strong as well, although the heroine is probably the weakest of the lot.  Masumi's enthusiasm for dance is palpable, and we do get a good sense of the natural lightness of her movement and the emotion she puts behind it, but she's also kind of immature.  She's very insecure, always comparing herself to others, and she cries at the slightest obstacle or offense.  She is likeable, but one can't help but hope that she will develop some self-confidence with time. 

Masumi's friends are also very likeable.  I do like that while Sayoko is an older and more technically proficient dancer, she is never a bitch or snob to Masumi.  She helps Masumi with her training, and even when Sayoko realizes that Masumi could become a true rival she never changes her behavior towards Masumi nor try to sabotage her.  I also like that Masumi truly is only friends with Hisio and Aoi; in any other shoujo story they would be her love interests and would end up in a heated rivalry for her hand.  Here, though, their only focus is on the competition, and their friendship is strong enough that they can celebrate one another's successes.  Even Sergeiev, who is the closest thing this story has to a villain, isn't all that bad.  Yes, he's very strict with Masumi, but he does it not out of cruelty but out of a desire to turn into a truly great dancer, even if that means taking down all that she knew before and rebuilding her skills from the basics. 

It's clear that Kyoko truly loves ballet and knows her stuff.  The story is LOADED with trivia and jargon about famous ballets, dancers, and techniques.  You need not fear that she bogs down the story with infodumping, though.  She weaves it into the story as it enfolds, so you learn as the cast does and thus can understand and appreciate what they do, right down to the translation notes for the position names in the margins.

Swan is something truly unique.  It's a shoujo series that is structurally and tonally closer to shonen, but it is wise enough to avoid many of the clichés of both.  Its cast is surprisingly well-rounded (or at least well-adjusted), and their victories are not a given thing, something which gives their struggles some actual stakes.  It is infused with the mangaka's love of ballet, and she is able to educate the reader on the art without losing story momentum.  Best of all, despite being written over 30 years ago, Swan's story isn't the least bit dated.  Its enthusiasm and maturity is as enthralling now as it was when the story was first published.

ART:
While Swan's story may not be dated, its artwork is another matter.  The character designs practically scream '1970s' with their dark, moist eyes., loooooong long legs, and occasionally dated hairstyles and fashions, right down to their leisure suits and the Fawcett-esque wings on the men.  Everyone, man and woman alike, are ridiculously pretty, but we do get some variety to the designs.  For example, the European characters tend to have larger, more aquiline noses with bigger, more squared jawlines. 

Kyoko takes an interesting approach towards drawing dances.  Instead of using speed lines to communicate motion, she superimposes a few selected poses in a splash panel or breaks down the moment in the manner of stop-motion photography.  She also makes some other interesting visual choices, like superimposing silhouettes over the characters at extreme angles or whiting out the character's eyes during moments of stress.  That last one took me a long time to get used to, and I still can't help but think that it makes them look kind of ghoulish.  Overall the composition is quite dramatic, with characters often bursting out of their panels.  There also plenty of large, sometimes page-spanning splash panels for the dances.  The artwork can occasionally verge upon the melodramatic and is sometimes a bit dated.  Nonetheless, once the characters start dancing the artwork truly shines.

PRESENTATION:
Aside from those plentiful translation notes in the margins, this volume is barebones.

RATING:

I'm really glad that CMX brought this over, even if it never sold well for them.  It may look old-fashioned, but the story is both timeless and surprisingly mature for its genre.

This series was published by CMX.  The series is complete with 21 volumes, but only 15 volumes were published, and all are currently out of print.

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Review: BLACK BUTLER

BLACK BUTLER (Kuroshitsuji), by Yana Toboso.  First published in 2006, and first published in North America in 2010. 

PLOT:
Ciel Phantomhive is a 12 year old orphan, an earl, and the head of a toy and confectionary company.  He's also a member of a secret organization that protects jolly old England from foreign criminals in the name of Queen and country.  He is not alone, though - he is aided by his butler, Sebastian Michaelis.  Most of the time, Sebastian is simply trying to wrangle the comically incompetent servants of the Phantomhive home, but when aiding his master he is a fighter of incomparable speed and strength.  How is that possible?  Well, as Sebastian would put it himself, he is simply one hell of a butler.

STORY:
Black Butler is one tonally mixed-up sort of manga.  It doesn't know whether it wants to be a wacky version of Upstairs/Downstairs or a supernaturally tinged shonen-style drama.  Now some manga can make this sort of duality work for them, but here it mixes as well as oil and water.

I admit that I kind of liked the darker, more dramatic parts of the story, if simply because I wanted to know more about Ciel and Sebastian.  Why is Ciel an orphan?  How did such a young boy get wrapped up in secret societies and international affairs?  Just how did Sebastian end up in Ciel's service?  All we get are tantalizing hints at answers for these and similar questions.  What I didn't want was more of the lame comedy with the rest of the Phantomhive servants.  There are four of them: Finnigan, the overly excitable gardener; Mey-Rin, the clumsy bespectacled housemaid; Baldroy, the fire-happy chef; and Tanaka, the silent steward who is often found doing silly things in the background.  They're all too broad and annoying to be of interest, and all of the time spent on them verges on painful.  The same goes for Ciel's fiancée Elizabeth, who is obsessed with all things cute, pink, and frilly. 

At least Ciel and Sebastian are tolerable.  Ciel struggles between his duties as an agent and as a Phantomhive and being a mildly sulky preteen.  Sebastian, on the other hand, is nothing but smooth and cool at all times, with a solution and genteel phrase for every situation.  Honestly, their relationship is so interesting that it honestly doesn't need the moments of fujoshi bait that Tobono throws in to keep the fangirls' interest.  What, you thought there was a plot-related reason that Sebastian has to waltz with Ciel?  Anyway, Black Butler is at its best when it's focused on its greatest strength - its two leads.  Now if only they would create a plot and supporting cast that could stand equally with them.

ART:
The character designs are clearly geared towards the shoujo crowd.  It's not the sort of style where everyone looks 13 and their eyes are threatening to eat their face - here, the kids look like kids, the adults look like adults, and everyone is distinct looking.  Still, all the young men have a case of bishies, and Sebastian's artfully tousled hair, cryptic smile, and dark, elegant uniform ensure from the first panel that this is a character destined for a million pervy pictures on DeviantArt, with or without Ciel. 

Now, in a historical setting like this it's crucial to get the details right.  Things like costume and backgrounds are important towards selling the time and place to the reader, and if something anachronistic slips through, the illusion is broken.  Black Butler succeeds pretty well on this front until the end, when we see both Ye Olde Cellulare Phone and facial piercings on an Italian thug.  These are such glaring, obvious mistakes, and it's clear that even before the first volume's end Toboso couldn't be bothered to think about it.  The backgrounds are nicely drawn when present, as they tend to share half their time with a lot of screen tone and effects.  The panels and pages aren't terribly remarkable, save for the fact that Sebastian gets more of the larger, showier panels.  Black Butler's art is overally quite confident and polished.  While it get some of the details shockingly wrong, the art suits the story well and sometimes verges on attractive.

PRESENTATION:
There are a couple of color pages in the front, and in the back there are some omakes about the creation of the manga (surprise surprise, Toboso got overwhelmed with research materials) and translation notes.

RATING:

Black Butler is at once a solid supernatural drama and a lame household comedy.  Hopefully future volumes focus on the former than the latter, because it's the former that gives the story its most interesting hooks and focuses on its best characters.

This series is published by Yen Press.  This series is ongoing in Japan, with 16 volumes available.  15 volumes have been published so far, and all are currently in print.

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Review: PRINCESS PRINCESS

PRINCESS PRINCESS (Purinsesu Purinsesu), by Mikiyo Tsuda.  First published in 2002, and first published in North America in 2006.

PLOT:
Kuono is the new kid at a private, all-male high school.  Right away, he can't help but feel that something is off about the place.  It starts when he gets an overly friendly welcome from his teachers.  It continues when he enters his classroom and everyone is all atwitter over him.  Things only get more confusing when he's seated next to the exceedingly feminine-looking Shihoudani, and it turns out he and a select few boys are practically worshipped by the student body.  Once at the student dorms, Shihoudani tells him the truth: to give the student body a sort of substitute for girls, a select few boys are chosen to become 'princesses.'  These boys are dressed in drag for school events to boost morale, and even out of costume are expected to support and cheer on their fellow students.  Those that accept the role get financial and academic benefits; those that reject it lose class units by school mandate.  Tempted by the prospect of free board and spending cash, Kuono agrees to become a princess.

Now Kuono joins Shihoudani, and the extremely reluctant and insecure Yuu in the world of the 'princesses.'  Bit by bit, Kuono learns to accept his strange new school life and try to bond with his fellow 'princesses.'

STORY:
Why was I not surprised to learn that this manga started life as a boy's love story?  It's pretty blatant, given all the bishie-laded cast, the crossdressing angle, and the fact that the story is about a select few pretty boys who are worshipped and adored by other boys.  Apparently the only reason that it wasn't a BL story was that it was published in a major shoujo magazine, and they did not want a BL story in their magazine.

Nonetheless, while this is clearly meant to pander to the fujoshi crowd, this story is neither drama nor romance, but instead a comedy based on getting the boys in drag in socially awkward situations and the differing reactions from the boys, with Shihoudani being the complacent one, Yuu being the angry one, and Kuono falling somewhere in the middle and often snarking on the situation through the fourth wall.  Those bits of meta humor were an unexpected touch, and sometimes were even enough to help save an otherwise weak concept.

It's not that the boys' situation doesn't have the potential to be humorous, it's just that said humor never really worked for me.  There's not much to it other than "They're boys in drag!  But they don't want to be in drag! And they have to appear in public like this!  Isn't that HILARIOUS?!"  Maybe the premise works better in Japan, but to this American 'guys in drag' isn't a terribly funny thing onto itself.

So, if the main comedic concept doesn't work, what (if anything) does?  I guess there's the burgeoning friendship between the boys, but of the three only Kuono has something approaching a personality.  The other two are much less complex, as Shihoudani is always calm and princely while Yuu just keeps rehashing the same "But I don't wanna be a giiiiirl!" joke.  The rest of the cast is not that notable, save for Natashou, the exceedingly fey president of the costume club.  He's the one who creates the costumes for the 'princesses,' and he clearly loves his job. 

So, neither the comedy nor the male bonding elements work  in Princess Princess because they're half-hearteded presented.  The only thing that does seem to work is the yaoi-flavored pandering, and ultimately if you want that, why not just read some actual yaoi?

ART:
The artstyle is very typical for shoujo, in that it's nothing but well-drawn bishonen as far as the eye can see.  The real detail for the artwork is save for the boys' costumes, particularly the gothloli dresses they debut in.  She clearly enjoyed drawing all the fancy, frilly, and fetish things the boys wear.  Backgrounds are rare, as Tsuda prefers to use lots of screen tones and effects.  In particular she seems fond of one that looks like lace doilies are exploding behind the boys.  Even the cover art isn't all that great.  Sure, those Art Nouveau style frames are meant to evoke the works of Alphonse Mucha, but there's no effort to make Kuono fit that style or pose him like one of Mucha's models.  Beyond that, there's not much to say for the art.  There's very little flair or personality to it beyond those costumes. 

PRESENTATION:
This is published in the thin, oversize volumes typical for older DMP works.  There are a couple of omakes after the story, one about the creation of the series and the other being a set of 4-koma strips where we learn that the mangaka is friends with notorious yaoi mangaka Eiki Eiki. 

RATING:
What few touches of cleverness or effort are present are sadly not enough to save this fujoshi fangirl fantasy from falling down flat on its face.

This series was published by Digital Manga Press.  All 5 volumes were released, and all are currently in print.

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Review: HERO TALES

HERO TALES (Jushin Enbu), written by Huang Jin Zhou, and drawn by Hiromu Arakawa.  First published in 2006, and first published in North America in 2009.

PLOT:
Long ago in some vaguely China-esque land, a wicked emperor rules over the land with an iron fist.  Mind you, that doesn't affect Taito all that much.  He's simply a headstrong kid living with his sister Laila in the local temple, trying his hardest to pass his initiation into manhood.  Upon doing so, he is given an ancient sword, which an Imperial operative tries to steal.  While fighting off the agent, Taito discovers that he possesses a strange power, and that he may in fact be one of 7 prophesized warriors who will take down the wicked emperor.  Now Taito and his sister must search the world to find his fellow warriors and save the country.

STORY:
This story is a familiar one, in that it's the same, Campbellian hero's journey that fantasy stories have been using since half past forever.  That onto itself wouldn't necessarily be a fault if the character were well developed, but Hero Tales has a story as generic as its title.

You've seen this cast before in every other shonen story.  You have the ultra-powerful, brash young man, the sweet yet bratty sibling, the snarky second banana who has a rocky and reluctant friendship with the lead, the blatantly evil villain and his equally evil and sneaky minions, and so on and so forth.  Everyone's personality is as deep as a puddle and never breaks from a moment from their given role.  As mentioned before, the plot is also very predictable, hitting all the usual 'hero's journey' stops along the way, and as such was extremely dull.  When combined with the shallow, stereotypical characters, the end result is a boring, distant story that is impossible to become invested in.  Such criticism alone is damning enough, but there's also a degree of disappointment in the writer himself...or should I say themselves?

You see, "Huang Jin Zhou" is merely an alias for a production crew, including two animation studios and the artist, one Hiromu Arakawa.  You've probably heard of her previous series, a wee little shonen series known as Fullmetal Alchemist.  In fact, she was working on that series simultaneously with this one, and it's not hard to see which of the two got the lion's share of her creativity and involvement.  You can see some of her touches here and there - there's plenty of her signature style of humor, for example - but what you don't see is her own brand of subtle, well-planned storytelling, character building, or world building.  It's a story and setting that has all the surface details of China, but none of the history behind it.  As such, it doesn't feel like an Arakawa work, but instead like the corporate creation that it is, something that has been boiled down to its simplest and blandest components.  Simple and bland make work fine for an anime production committee, but it does not make for good reading.

ART:
While Arakawa feels very absent from the story, her touches are all over the artwork.  The only problem with that is that it's all touches ripped off from Fullmetal Alchemist.

You don't have to look too far to figure out that there are a lot of similarities between the character designs here and those in FMA.  Taito and Laila are pretty much just dark-haired copies of Edward Elric and Winry Rockbell, Ryoukou is a long-haired Roy Mustang, the evil emperor is a carbon copy of Fuhrer Bradley, and so on and so forth.  Now, it's one thing to have recognizable character designs, and yet another to reuse said designs (after all, some people *coughLeijiMatsomotocough* have done so successfully for decades).  But in regards to Hero Tales, I suspect one of three theories on why the character designs are so similar to those of FMA:

     1.  FMA was/is a very popular and profitable series, therefore if the committee creates characters
          that look like FMA's characters, then their series in turn will be popular and profitable.

     2.  Since Arakawa was working on this series and FMA simultaneous, she saved herself time and
          effort by reusing character designs from her other work so she could just get it done.

    3.   Both 1 and 2.

As for the rest of the visuals, the backgrounds are a mixed bag.  The vistas are nicely drawn, but backgrounds are nigh nonexistent in closer shots.  The action's nicely drawn too, as Arakawa knows well how to draw action in a clean, crisp manner that maintain a lively sense of energy thanks to low panel angles and a touch of layering. 

PRESENTATION:
There is one of Arakawa's signature goofy omakes, where she discusses her research trip to China.  There are also translation notes and an honorifics guide in the back.

RATING:
While the artwork lives up to Arakawa's usual high standard, the story is weak and there is far too much in the story and art that is too derivative of other fantasy works, of other shonen works, or of Arakawa's other manga.

This series was published by Yen Press.  All 5 volumes were released, and all are currently in print.

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Review: CLUB 9

CLUB 9 (Heba! Heero-Chan), by Makoto Kobayashi.  First published in 1992, and first published in North America in 2003.

PLOT:
Haruo Hattori is a klutzy but sweet farm girl whose heart is as big as the great outdoors.  She's off to Tokyo to attend college, but the combination of the cost of big-city life and supernatural events lead her to move in with a couple of classmates.  They in turn urge to join them in a part-time job at Club 9, one of the most popular hostess clubs in its district.  How will a country girl like Haruo adapt to her glamourous new hostess lifestyle?

STORY:
Club 9 is a fun little series, one that balances its sauciness with sweetness and ultimately (and unexpectedly) is as innocent and good-natured as its heroine.

It's impossible to not love Haruo.  Sure, she's naïve and kind of a klutz, but she's shown to be a very loving person, and nowhere near as dumb as her thick rural accent (an affectation of the translation to try and get across how her particular accent would sound in Japanese) would suggest.  Admittedly, the klutziness is mostly there to lead up to moments of fanservice, but it's all played in such a light, even silly manner that it's hard to be offended.  You can only just shake you head as Haruo picks herself up and moves one.  There's also just a lot of great sources of humor in this manga, be it from Haruo's family (with her oh-so-serious father and her mother who is mid-midlife crisis) or from the contrast between her country ways and those of her friends, coworkers, and clients.  Her natural charm and unaffected kindness shines through the whole volume, and it makes her personality just as attractive as her figure does.

The story is casually paced, giving us plenty of time to get to know Haruo and her world before she moves to Tokyo, her time at college, as well as some oddly placed incidents with the ghost of an otaku that haunts Haruo's dorm.  They don't gel with the rest of the story at all, but it's mostly there just as a device to get Haruo off the campus and to steer towards becoming a hostess.  Once there, we see her struggle comically with her new job and yet still charm her clients (including a mangaka who is a self insert for Kobayashi himself) and make some new friends.  It's all just so charming and innocent, two words that I would not expect to use in an ecchi story about a hostess club. 

ART:
Club 9's art is as charming as Haruo as well, with a compelling mix of realism, fanservice, and rubbery cartoon.  There's a great variety of faces - long, short, square, fat, etc. - and while there's a touch of caricature to them (particularly with the men), they still manage to be rooted in reality.  The bodies are also rather rooted in reality, in that the ladies are much more voluptuous than what one usually sees in manga.  The aforementioned cartoony qualities don't come so much from the character designs, but from their expressions.  There's a lot of humor that comes solely from Haruo's big awkward smiles, guffawing laughter, or big surprised gasps.  There is also some degree of fanservice-based humor, but Kobayashi actually puts some effort into them, instead of falling into the "boy falls into boobs" sort of rut.  Here you have things like the running gag of Haruo falling into holes while getting someone's attention or the family dog pulling off her skirt before she leaves, and it's rare for the gag to lead to anything more racy than a panty shot.  It's both unusual and pleasing to see comedy based fanservice where the fanservice isn't the point of the joke, but merely a side effect.

Kobayashi puts a lot of detail into his art, be it the varied hairstyles and wardrobes of the hostesses or the well-traced backgrounds.  There's also some moments where there's a wonderful fluidity to the art - when the girls strut down the street, you can almost see the swish of their hips in real time.  I wish more ecchi-based works got this sort of effort put into them, because the artwork not only works well with the story, it adds to its charms.

PRESENTATION:
This is an older Dark Horse release, so like older Viz releases this manga was flipped.

RATING:
This is the kind of ecchi I can get behind, the kind that takes its time, centers itself around a charming lead, and one that uses fanservice as garnish for its humor and not simply as an attention-grabbing gimmick.

This series was published by Dark Horse.  5 volumes were released in Japan, but only 3 of those volumes were published.  All are currently out of print.

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Review: TRAIN_MAN

TRAIN_MAN (Densha Otoko - Nethatsu, Kakueki-Teisha no Love Story), by Hidenori Hana.  First published in 2005, and first published in North America in 2006.

PLOT:
One day a meek otaku manages to confront an abusive drunk on the commute home.  In doing so, he impresses one of the women the drunk was hassling, and she sends him an expensive thank-you gift in the form of some Hermes teacups.  The otaku relates these events to fellow posters on the internet message board 2chan, and they in turn encourage him to ask the woman out.  Soon these posters become not just a fount of advice on relationships and dating for the otaku, but his own squad of online cheerleaders, who follow his story eagerly as it happens.

STORY:
This manga is unusual, in that it is not based on a video game, light novel, anime, or even an original story.  This manga comes (mostly) straight from real life, a real thread that in turn became a novel, a live-action movie, and as seen here, a manga series (actually, more than one, but that's a different review).  In some ways, the fact that it's based on real events makes the events of the story all the more heartwarming.

Since real people were involve, we never learn their real names - indeed, they're never given names at all, but instead are referred by the handles that the 2chan members gave them, train_man and Hermess.  Most of our time is spent with train_man, so we do get some insight into his neuroses and extreme shyness.  Sadly, the same cannot be said for Hermess.  Hell, we get more insight into the other 2chan posters than we do her, and they're only ever seen in glimpses and speak mostly through their comments.  Still, that simplicity and lack of character depth does not dimish the story's charms.  It's incredibly easy for the reader to find themselves rooting for train_man to gather up his courage to speak to Hermess, and to try and improve his appearance so that he might impress her.  Anyone who has ever struggled with trying to approach a romantic prospect (regardless of gender) will likely find ways to sympathize with train_man's struggle.

It's also unusual to see Internet users portrayed so sympathetically.  Internet culture is rarely mentioned in manga, and 2chan is as notorious as its North American cousin 4chan for being a gathering of socially maladjusted, pedantic douchbags.  That's why it's so sweet and refreshing that we get to see these posters as they really are - ordinary people who become caught up in the enfolding drama.  While they will likely never meet train_man face-to-face, they are genuinely rooting for him and most of them give solid advice on how to approach Hermess and how to handle dating. 

Really, there's just an overall air of unironic sweetness and sincerity that pervades the whole volume, and it's that same tone that makes such a simple love story such a delight to read.

ART:
It's kind of funny that a real-life love story should feature such cartoony, exaggerated character designs.  Everyone tends to have long heads and simple, heavily exaggerated expressions.  In comparison, the backgrounds are much more realistic.  The page composition goes a long way towards injecting life into the story, a necessity considering that so much of it happens in phone conversations and internet comments.  Panels are lightly layered, with the online comments serving as the Greek chorus for the events as they occur.  Hana seems particularly fond of staggering an image over a triptych of downwardly diagonal panels.  It's an unusual sort of image, and serves as an interesting little personal touch.  Everything is laid out nicely and neatly, so it's never hard to follow and becomes attractive in its own simple way.

PRESENTATION:
The only extra is a page of translation notes explaining the background of the story and some of the internet slang and emoticons used.

RATING:
While it's a little simple at times, this romance had more charm, personality, and sweetness than most of the melodramatic shoujo romances I've come across.  Anyone seeking a change in pace from schoolroom romance should give this series a look.

This series was published by Viz.  All 3 volumes were released, and all are currently in print.

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Review: DENGEKI DAISY

DENGEKI DAISY, by Kyousuke Motomi.  First published in 2007, and first published in North America in 2010.

PLOT:
Teru is the sole poor scholarship kid at her high school.  The rich, snobby members of the absurdly powerful student council go out of their way to make her miserable, but not even their pranks can get her down.  Why?  Because she has Daisy looking out for her.  Daisy is a mysterious entity that Teru knows only through text messages, but ever since the death of her older brother Daisy has served as both confidant and protector.  Too bad that he can't protect her from the accident that leads to Teru being forced to become the lackey to the school janitor, Kurosaki.  He's a snide slacker, but this is merely a front for his true identity.  You see, Kurosaki is Daisy, and he uses his l33t haXX0r skills to get Teru out of all sorts of trouble, be it from her classmates or from shady figures from her brother's past.

STORY:
You know, the hardest reviews to write are not the ones for very good series nor for very bad series.  It's those that fall right in the middle that are hardest, as they cannot be called good by any means, but neither are they offensive or incompetent enough to be truly bad.  Such is the case for Dengeki Daisy.

The setup is all too familiar, where the character is forced to serve another to repay a debt.  Kurosaki's pretty familiar too, in that he's one of those love interests who pretends to be distant and douchey to the lead in order to conceal his true feelings because taking a grade-school approach to relationships is totally healthy as an adult (and in no way artificially stretches out the premise by having said love interest wallow in internal conflict).  Teru herself is...well, in all fairness, she's not a complete cliché, but neither was she all that interesting on her own.  She's not completely stupid, though, as she confronts Kurosaki at more than one point about his being Daisy (which he always denies).  There's also a genuine sweetness in her unwaivering belief and trust in Daisy, even if Daisy is serving more as a replacement goldfish for her dead brother than anything else.  That being said, there are far too many points where the connection between her cries of help to Daisy and the appearance of Kurosaki should be obvious to anyone, and she should be confronting or questioning Kurosaki more than she does.

The story does try for some more serious drama near the end, as people from her brother's past confront Teru to try and get her brother's programs.  Sadly, it's all too little and too late to inject some non-romantic drama into this thin premise.  I appreciate the effort, but it wasn't enough to elevate Dengeki Daisy from the realm of the mediocre.

ART:
Dengeki Daisy's art is no more original or distinct than its story.  The character designs are rather typical for shoujo, and the quality varies widely from doe-eyed and finely detailed to so simplified as to approach superdeformed.  Truthfully, between his messy, pointy dyed hair, mean-looking face, and choice of name, I wonder if Motomi wasn't taking more than a little inspiration from Bleach's Ichigo Kurosaki.  Backgrounds are nicely drawn but mundane, and screen tone and effects are kept to a minimum.  The pages are simply and neatly composed, breaking out larger panels for dramatic moments as necessary but not getting crazy with the stacking or layering of panels on the page.

PRESENTATION:
There's a mildly amusing side story after the main one, but it's mostly there for romantic fanservice than anything else.

RATING:
An inoffensive and mundane series deserves an equally mundane rating.

This series is published by Viz.  This series is ongoing in Japan, with 13 volumes currently available.  12 of those 13 volumes have been published, and all are currently in print.

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Review: RED RIVER

RED RIVER (Sora wa Akai Kawa no Hotori ), by Chie Shinohara.  First published in 1995, and first published in North America in 2004.

PLOT:
Our story begins with a kiss.  No, literally, the first page is our heroine, Yuri, getting her first kiss from the cutest boy in class/close male friend Satoshi.  Now not only are things awkward between the two, but strange things keep happening to Yuri around water.  It culminates when she is snatched by a pair of hands emerging from a puddle and emerges in a well in a strange land.  It turns out that it's not only a strange land, but a strange time - specifically, it's a well in the middle of Hattusa, the capital of the Hittite empire, sometime in the middle of the 14th century BC.  She stumbles into Prince Kail, whose tongue apparently doubles as a Babelfish as after a forcible kiss from him, Yuri is able to understand the local language.  Kail then turns her over to his stepmother the queen, who is secretly the same sorceress who brought Yuri to Hattusa.  It turns out that her son is last in line, and she needs blood for a curse to kill his elder stepsiblings, including Kail.  Kail manages to save her, but now Yuri must find a way to get home without either being caught by the Queen and a way to keep Kail from sexually assaulting her.

STORY:
This is a very old-fashioned shoujo story, and I don't mean that in a complementary sense.  This is one of the many "modern girl is sucked into alternate world" that popped up after the success of Fushigi Yugi.  It's also a very formulaic story, as it tends to follow the same five steps:

1.  Yuri is endangered.
2.  Yuri is saved by Kail.
3.  Yuri is given a nugget of info on how to get back home.
4.  Yuri puts herself into danger again
5.  See Step 1.

So, let's talk about Yuri.  If you want an intelligent heroine who has some idea how to defend herself mentally and/or physically, you are looking at the wrong manga series.  Yuri is proactive only in the sense that she repeatedly plunges herself into danger without a thought or a plan.  She's also a complete blank as far as personality is concerned.  She's mostly there to be a plot device, a catalyst to get the story going.  Her love interest, Kail, isn't much better.  All they did for him was crank the Lecherous scale to 11, and it's hard to be invested in a character when he spends his time either saving the heroine from her own stupidity or attempting to rape her.  Everyone else is as dimensional as a cardboard cutout.

In fact, the only interesting thing to be found in the story is the setting.  The Hittites are rather obscure as far as ancient civilizations are concerned.  They were a militaristic little culture tucked away in what is now Turkey, overshadowed by their larger, more prolific neighbors such as Greece and Babylonia.  They had a distinct language, a long line of kings, but not a lot of large, spectacular sites.  There is a lot about their culture which is still unknown, as it gives Shinohara a lot of room for invention without a lot of concern for historical accuracy.  I wonder if she ever uses what is known of the culture for more than the concept of storm gods to sacrifice to.  Based on what little effort she puts into her characters and plot, though, I sincerely doubt it.

ART:
The character designs are plain and generic for shoujo, where bodies are willowy, chins are pointy, and even the oldest characters look no older than 30 (which makes the king look especially ridiculous, like an actor with a cheesy beard glued to their face).  The only detail comes from the pieces (mostly accessories) which Shinohara clearly copied from real artifacts.  Too bad that the Hittites didn't leave much in the way of dynamic architecture or images of native clothing for her to copy as well, so expect to see a lot of mud-brick huts and plain robes, tunics, and loincloths.  Not even the water, which is the primary medium for magic in this series, is given any sort of flourish of movement or beauty.  Red River's art is so plain on so many fronts that it barely registers, save for the few bits of cultural plagiarism.  It's effective, but nothing more.

PRESENTATION:
Nothing to note here.

RATING:
It's weird to think that I would rather recommend Fushigi Yugi to someone over a lesser knockoff like Red River.  Sure, I hated the hell out of Fushigi Yugi, but at least it was a story with a personality of its own.  Red River has nothing interesting going for it save for the setting, and it barely does anything with that.  Since it has nothing interesting to note, there's nothing to be missed by skipping it.

This series was published by Viz.  All 28 volumes were released, and Viz is currently rereleasing it digitally through their website.  All volumes are currently in print, and 7 of the 28 volumes are currently available digitally.

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Review: NATSUME'S BOOK OF FRIENDS

NATSUME'S BOOK OF FRIENDS (Natsume Yujin-Cho), by Yuki Midorikawa.  First published in 2005, and first published in North America in 2010.

PLOT:
Natsume has always been a quiet, standoffish kid, in part because he has always been able to see yokai (demons).  Unfortunately, his abilities have tended to confuse his friends and alienate his guardians, so he has tended to be passed off from one relative to the next.  One day he encounters Nyanko, a yokai that has been trapped in a ceramic cat so long that he tends to stay in that form.  Nyanko tells Natsume about his grandmother Reiko, who has similar powers to Natsume.  Nyanko also recognizes the old book of hers that Natsume keeps.  This is the Book of Friends, where Reiko wrote down the names of yokai that she captured and enslaved.  Now yokai from far and wide are flocking to Natsume so that he might free them, whether it be by request or by force.  As he releases the yokai one by one, he learns more about them and about his grandmother's past.

STORY:
Natsume's Book of Friends is something of an odd duck in the world of shoujo.  Instead of being about the schoolroom romance of a young girl, it's instead a quiet, episodic tale of a loner boy learning to reach out to others, both in the real world and in the supernatural world.

Natsume himself is an appropriately low-key lead for such as story.  He tends to repress a lot and play things cool in order to not freak out his guardians (an unfortunate trend in his past) and to not attract attention from others for being weird.  He mostly justs wants to coast through life without a lot of notice.  Of course, that changes the moment that Nyanko-sensei (who insists on Natsume addressing him with the honorific) enters the picture to get the main conflict going.  Nyanko is admittedly less of a character and more of a collection of quirks assembled in a terribly cute (and highly marketable) form.  He spurs along the plot of the next chapter, he defends Natsume in his true form as needed, and the rest of the time is a source of snark and cute kitty antics.  There is something of a character arc for Natsume, though, as we see him gradually open up and trust in others, and this arc is interwoven with the yokai-of-the-week stories.

The rest of the yokai don't get nearly the amount of screentime (pagetime?) that Nyanko gets, as they tend to follow the same pattern: they come to Natsume with a conflict, Natsume resolves the conflict, returns the yokai's name to its owner, and the yokai moves on.  The forms of the yokai are heavily influenced by Shinto belief, so we see spirits that possess shadows or remote shrines, or those that are the dispossessed spirits of birds and other animals.  Oddly enough, the character we learn the least about is Reiko.  This is rather odd considering how often she's brought up, and you'd think that a lonely kid like Natsume would want to learn more about the ancestor that he so strongly resembles in looks and in powers.  Maybe this is something that's explored more in later volumes, but all we know of her at this point was that she was lovely, spiritually powerful, casually cruel, and deeply lonely.

Natsume's Book of Friends is rather atypical for its genre, being very quiet, heavily spiritual in its outlook, and focused on a male lead without the slightest bit of romance.  Still, it's those same qualities that make it stand out and make it so good in the first place.

ART:
Natsume's Book of Friends gets a lot of comparisons to Mushishi.  Part of that comes from the somewhat similar subject matter and tone, but part of it also comes from the artwork.  Natsume's art style is similar light and sketch-like.  The human beings are rather simply designed, but the yokai are much more fantastical, ranging from Nyanko's dual forms (as a cute ceramic kitty and a fierce, furry monster) to masked humanoids to huge, one-eyed kimono-wearing ogres.  Despite the difference in designs, there's a high degree of subtlety to their expressions, and some points are striking in their simple beauty.  The best example is during the scenes where Natsume returns the names, literally breathing the penstrokes off the page towards their owners.

The panels are also rather sparse and loosely composed, as if the images are drifting gently through them.  Backgrounds are rare and lightly drawn, augmented with just a touch of screen tone.  The pages themselves are lightly composited, complementing the panels beautifully.  There's just a general sense of airiness and simplicity to the artwork, which enhances the story's equally light, simple tone and is rather lovely in its own way.

PRESENTATION:
There are some chapter notes and a few brief translation notes in the back.

RATING:
This is a gentle, episodic story with an equally gentle, loose, and occasionally beautiful artstyle.  It's rather unique for modern-day shoujo and a series that I highly recommend.

This series is published by Viz.  This series is ongoing in Japan, with 15 volumes currently available.  13 of those 15 volumes have been released, and all are currently in print.

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Review: ARISA

ARISA, by Natsumi Ando.  First published in 2008, and first published in North America in 2009.

PLOT:
We begin with Tsubasa Uehara, the so-called 'Demon Princess' of Higashi Junior High.  If you asked Tsubasa herself, she would say that she simply has "more intregrity than most people."  Too bad that all Tsubasa really wants to do is hang out with the other girls in her class and do typically girly things.  In other words, she wants to be like her twin sister Arisa, whom she hasn't seen in three years due to their parents' divorce.

The sisters reunite, and Tsubasa can't help but be envious of her sister's perfect life.  When Arisa suggests switching places for the day, Tsubasa is eager to play along.  Tsubasa is stunned by her sister's school life, as she is not only class president but also has a girly-girl best friend in Mariko and a blandly attractive boyfriend in Midori.  Everything goes swimmingly until the end of the day, when Tsubasa finds a note in her sister's locker: "Arisa Sonoda is a traitor."  Upon seeing it, the real Arisa talks of disappearing from the world, and does her best to do so by throwing herself out a window.  Arisa survives, but is now stuck in a coma, and Tsubasa wants answers. 

Now Tsubasa must continue to play the part of Arisa, and only her best friend Takeru knows the truth.  Tsubasa soon discovers that the mysterious note may be tied to a class-wide game, where the students of the class send text message wishes to a figure known only as The King.  The King picks one wish at random to grant, and the wish is always fulfilled, be it getting the answers to a test or making a perverted PE teacher disappear.  Who is The King?  How can he exert such power over the class?  Where does Manabe, the class rebel, fit into all of it?  Is he a possible ally for Tsubasa, or the enemy?

STORY:  I was familiar with Ando previously as the artist for Kitchen Princess, a frothy little shoujo series with a cooking angle.  If Arisa is any indication, Ando should stick to working on her own, because what seems like another typical shoujo series at the start gets mighty dark mighty fast.  Arisa is more akin to something like Higurashi When They Cry than Kitchen Princess.

I think that comparison comes from the fact that like Higurashi, the tone can switch moods in a blink of an eye.  In a moment a normal, happy classroom can become a solemn cult.  In a moment, a single, ephemeral text message can alter the class's reality, and anyone who questions its power is shunned and driven to suicide.  The reader can't help but share Tsubasa's confusion and righteous anger when confronted with this strange sort of mass hysteria, much less the potentially supernatural forces behind it, and thus we are just as driven as Tsubasa to find the answers to these mysteries and make things right.  It goes without saying then that the pacing is perfect, giving out just enough information to keep things moving but never enough to make any obvious guesses.

I really like Tsubasa in a way that I rarely do with shoujo heroines.  She's proactive, but she has enough common sense to not plunge herself into danger without some sort of plan.  She's very outspoken and defends others as both Tsubasa and 'Arisa'.  Too bad that like so many shoujo heroines, she's made to feel guilty for not being meek, mild, and traditionally feminite.  That's a shame, because I honestly like her the way she is.  That might also explain why I also like Takeru, who knows and likes Tsubasa the way she is, versus the milquetoast Midori or the generic bad boy Manabe.  The rest of the cast isn't all that notable, although Mirako has some rather creepy moments when she starts talking about The King. 

Arisa is a solid shoujo mystery with a fantastic lead, a manga that uses its fluffy setting to manipulate the tone of the story masterfully.

ART:
Coming back to Kitchen Princess, I couldn't say that I was impressed with Ando's art before.  If anything, I would have said that she was trying way too hard to ape Arina Tanemura and as I've stated before, that is a style that is too disgustingly cute for my taste.  Arisa has something of a more rounded, refined art style.  Her characters designs are a little more rounded and realistic (even if they are sometimes a bit stiff), and overall everything is less angular and cluttered.  She does have a rather busy style of composition, as panels are divided up, stacked atop one another, and characters extend outside their panel borders.  It can get a bit busy at times, as Ando can get a little crazy with the screen tones and effects.  Overall, Ando's art isn't going to revolutionize the world of shoujo, but she does show improvement and refinement from her previous works as she finally develops a proper style of her own.

PRESENTATION:
There's a fairly long feature in the back where the characters critique their own early character models, as well as an okame about Ando getting a dog.  As typical for a Del-Ray/Kodansha release, there is an honorifics guide in the front and translation notes in the back.

RATING:
Arisa genuinely surprised me.  I expected fluffy sweetness, and got mass hysteria and mystery instead.  If you want a modern shoujo series with a strong lead and a strong story, this is a series well worth your time.

This series was published by Del-Ray, and continued by Kodansha.  9 of the 12 available volumes have been released with more coming this year, and all are currently in print.

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Review: D.N. ANGEL

D.N. ANGEL, by Yukiru Sugisaki.  First published in 1997, and first published in North America in 2004.

PLOT:
It's Daisuke's 14th birthday, and this is the day that he's finally going to confess his feelings to Risa, one of the prettiest girls in his class!  Too bad that he is thoroughly DENIED.  Depressed, Daisuke goes home and thinks about Risa, but then something strange starts to happen.  He starts to feel funny and things suddenly start to grow.  The next thing he knows, he has transformed into a tall, dark, and very confused bishonen.

His mother explains that this is simply part of growing up in his family.  One male per generation has the ability to transform into the Phantom Thief Dark, whose duty it is to steal stuff for..er...um...reasons.  He has also gained the ability to turn his weird rabbit-like pet into other things, such as a pair of wings for fast escapes.  During his first heist, he runs into Satoshi, a classmate of Daisuke's and a detective of such renown that a museum consults him to better Dark-proof their goods.  Afterwards, Dark runs into Rika, Risa's twin sister, and falls head over heels for her.  Too bad that she wants nothing to do with him, and that thinking of her turns Dark back into Daisuke.  Now Daisuke is stuck transforming back and forth unless he is able to convince Risa to love him (and not Dark) in return.

STORY:
Good god, I should not feel like I need a diagram just to keep track of the alternate identities and relationships in this volume.  It really shouldn't be that difficult, considering that the core of the story centers on three people and four identities, but it only seems to get more muddled and confusing as you go on. 

Of course, it doesn't help that the story onto itself is RIDICULOUSLY complicated and requires A LOT of suspension of belief.  After all, this story is asking you to buy into a kid who has a genetic condition which causes him to transform into an older, better-looking, and more talented person whenever he thinks about girls, and I'm sure this is NOT supposed to be some sort of weird puberty/boner metaphor.  Said new identity also possesses magic (or maybe it's just the pet...it's never made quite clear) because....well, just because.

Worst of all, the solution to Daisuke's problem is convincing Risa to love him, which is problematic for two reasons.  First of all, Risa wants nothing to do with Daisuke and everything to do with Dark.  Secondly, he's seriously fighting against the odds that his first crush could actually turn into true love.  What if it was to be forever reciprocated due to personality conflict?  What if Risa was gay and wanted nothing to do with boys, much less Daisuke?  I guess Sugisaki figured that if everything else had to be ridiculously complicated, so too must be the solution to the main conflict.

It's impossible to invest oneself in Daisuke because there's nothing there to invest in - he's a total blank.  At least Dark is smarmy; it's a one-note personality, but it's better than his alter ego's total lack of one.  The twins Risa and Rika are annoying, and Risa in particular lost me the moment she said that she wants a hot boyfriend only so that she can improve her social status and show off to her sister.  Honestly, if Daisuke knew about this side of her, I'd think he'd realize how much better off he was alone.  The only mildly interesting character was Satoshi, and I suspect modern readers would have a hard time not comparing him to similiar teen detectives from later series like L from Death Note.  It doesn't help that pretty much from the moment they meet, Satoshi has a very ho-yay heavy relationship to Dark.  Why else would Satoshi be pinning Dark to the floor in a highly suggestive position while breaking out handcuffs and declaring his lifelong desire to meet and capture Dark?  I suspect that Satoshi likes it when guys play hard to get, in a quite literal sense.  The weird subtext doesn't end there - Daisuke's mom is a liiiiitle  too happy about her son turning into Dark, which gets weirder when you realize that the last person with this ability was her father-in-law. 

D.N. Angel fails at so many levels where story is concerned.  Most of the cast is bland or unlikeable.  The plot itself is needlessly convoluted and loaded with weird subtext, and it's hard to say how much of it is intentional (well, how much outside of the ho-yay, which is as subtle as a sledgehammer).  I honestly couldn't tell you about the pacing or anything like that because it seems like the whole story just lurches on in a haze of confusion and hopes that you don't think about anything too long or hard .

ART:
The character designs are distinct, if rather shonen influenced and not terribly attractive.  The faces all seems a touch too large for their heads, and everybody has a matchstick-esque frame.  The panels are quite busy looking and the composition is rather hodge-podge.  Backgrounds are uncommon and plain, and most of the time are simple washes of black or white.  It's not incredibly hideous, but it certainly doesn't do the story any favors either.

PRESENTATION:
There's a side story in the back about a girl trying to summon a shikigami (a sort of magical familiar).  It's Ok, even if it feels like a half-baked series idea, but compared to the main story it's straightforward and charming.

RATING:
D.N. Angel is a mess of romance/phantom thief/whatever else this story was trying to be.  It's messy, it's unengaging, and tacky.  This is one angel that should be cast out of any sane manga reader's shelves.

This series was published by Tokyopop.  This series is ongoing in Japan, with 15 volumes available.  13 of those volumes were published, and all are out of print.

You can purchase this volume and many more like it through RightStuf.com!

Review: PRETTY FACE

PRETTY FACE (Puriti Feisu), by Yasuhiro Kano.  First published in 2002, and first published in North America in 2007.

PLOT:
Masashi Rando is a karate champion and all-around badass, but he has one weakness: Rina Kurumi, the pretty, quiet beauty of his class.  Rando's world is quickly turned upside-down when the bus he is riding plunges off a cliff into a flaming wreck.  Rando wakes up in a hospital only to receive shock after shock.

First of all, it's been a year since the crash, and he's been unconscious the whole time.  Secondly, he now looks like a girl - Rina, specifically.  It turns out Rando's face was so severely burnt that Manabe, the plastic surgeon who took in him in, has nothing to use for reference save for the photo of Rina in Rando's pocket.  Manabe's awfully proud of his work, though...maybe a little TOO proud, as he continuously offers to 'finish the job' and turn Rando completely into a woman.  Thirdly, Rando's injuries left his family unable to identify him, and have since presumed him dead and left their home. 

Rando barely has time to be despondant over his new situation once he runs into Rina on the street.  Rina mistakes Rando for her missing twin sister, Yuna.  Now Rando is caught between a rock and a hard area.  He doesn't want to hurt Rina by revealing the mistake, but he's still a man from the waist down, and thus fears discovery, shame, and possible jailtime every time she gets near.  It doesn't help that he has no experience with girls whatsoever, so the slightest glimpse or contact with girlybits or underwear sends him into blood-spurting ecstasy.  Now Rando must not only pass as a woman, but as the previous meek and brainy Yuna, all while trying to not beat up TOO many people.

STORY:
Pretty Face is a bizarre yet shockingly simple shonen story which is mostly goofy gonk faces and FAAAAAAANSERVICE!

Ok, so that's not completely fair, as there's something of a plotline of Rando tracking down his friends and family from his past life, as well as his pledge to not reveal his true identity until he finds the real Yuna.  You'd think this would be a more prominent plot thread, where Rando might forge a new identity from the ashes of his previous one where he was an unlikeable thug.  You might also think that the whole concept would serve as a sort of satire on gender roles, with 'Yuna's" brash, violent behavior serving as constrast to what others expect from 'her' as both a girl and 'Yuna.'

Of course, you'd be wrong, because as I said before, it's mostly just about broad comedy and fanservice.

Yep, this is a raunchy, episodic sort of story, where every time Rando is threatened with exposure (in both senses of the word) as a boy, saves himself through outrageous circumstance, and lives to fight another day.  I hope you like lots of nosebleed and boner gags, because that's the majority of the jokes to be found here.  Unfortunately, it gets to the point where that wellspring of gags starts to run dry, and the jokes become dull and repetitive.  It's ultimately a fast-paced, fun and breezy sort of read, but it's not a terribly deep one, and I feel like it misses some opportunities.

ART:
The character designs are typical for a shonen work, with very generic faces and lots of pointy hair everywhere.  Let's be honest, though, the characters are not the reason anyone is reading this.  They're here for the bras, panties, and the 1001 ridiculous faces Rando makes.  His faces are the driving force for the humor in this volume, and they are admittedly entertaing to behold.  Less entertaining (at least for me) was the constant stream of lovingly detailed bras, panties, and breasts.  Beyond that, the panels and presentation is rather plain and unremarkable.

PRESENTATION:
There's a brief author's notes and some nicely illustrated character profiles in the back.

RATING:
Pretty Face is an entertainingly raunchy sort of manga, but don't expect anything more beyond that and don't expect anything resembling good artwork.

This series was published by Viz.  All 6 volumes were released, but all are currently out of print.

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Review: BAKUMAN

BAKUMAN, by Tsugumi Ohba & Takeshi Obata.  First published in 2008, and first published in North America in 2010.

PLOT:
Moritaka Mashiro is an average student with no particular goals or ambitions in life. His only joy and talent is drawing, which draws the attention of class genius Akito Takagi.  Takagi proposes a bold plan for the both of them: join up and become mangakas!  Mashiro is reticent, thanks to a beloved (and now deceased) uncle who was a washed-up mangaka himself, but Mashiro's hand is forced after Akito confesses their plan to Miho Azuki, the cutest girl in class and the object of Mashiro's crush.  She turns out to have a dream of becoming a voice actress, and emboldened by her announcement and actual contact with a girl Mashiro makes a bold proposal: neither of them will see one another until they have achieved their dreams, and once they do they will marry.  Shockingly, Miho accepts, and now Mashiro and Takagi have to figure out how to draw a manga, with nothing to help them save for Mashiro's uncle's studio, his reference materials, and their own imagination.

STORY:
It's a manga about making manga.  When you say it out loud, it sounds like a joke or a meme (yo dawg, I heard you like manga, so I made a manga about makin' manga...).  What's truly strange is that the writer makes this concept work.  It's got a lot of shonen sensibilities, with that whole "I'M GOING TO BE THE GREATEST [insert occupation/activity/etc] EVER!" spirit, but it's tempered with real facts and perspective on the incredible odds of creating a successful manga and the fact that the boys have to learn their craft from the bottom up.  Unlike most shonen heroes, they are not the best right away and neither do they magically upgrade through ki or some other sort of BS.  Instead they have to learn through research, trial, and error.  That's a very healthy perspective for such a goal, and I'm pleased to see it here.

The problem with the story is that the plot points that involve the mechanics of making manga don't always match up tonally with the rest of the story.  There, those aforementioned shonen sensibilities run strong, sometimes to the point of ridiculousness.  Sure, it's a grand, romantic notion to propose to a girl practically from the moment you talk to her, but when it's put into action it's kind of crazy and more than a bit creepy.  It feels at points like things happen solely because the writer wills it.  Akagi becomes friends with Mashiro because the plot demands it.  He wants to be a mangaka, despite his superior grades and intellect, just because the plot demands it.  Maho wants to be a voice actress and accept a marriage proposal from a classmate she barely knows just because the plot demands it.  Are you picking up on a trend here? 

There are also some scenes where the writer clearly has some...interestesting ideas about women, like how blatant displays of intelligence lessen one's attractiveness.  I know that such sexist ideas are more common and more socially acceptable in Japan, but it bothers me.  Such moments are brief, which kept them from bothering me to the point of not reading the series (god knows I've seen worse in shoujo manga), but it is there and it's uncomfortable at times.  Also, while one reference to themselves or their previous work, Death Note, is fine, but a few in a single volume feels a bit too self-indulgent.

Bakuman, much like the boys' careers, have a lot of promise and an interesting hook.  It just needs to even out its tone and find a way to make the personal part of the boys' lives mesh better with the professional parts.

ART:
Like the story, the art style is a mix of shonen earnestness and grounded realism.  I understand that they probably wanted to do something different from the relatively realistic designs of Death Note, but putting that same level of detail onto a simpler face makes for a weird and occasionally off-model look.  It doesn't help that everyone's face is oddly flat, like someone smashed them with a shovel.  Obata clearly loves drawing clothes and hair, though, because he puts a lot of detail into them, be it the way a button-down shirt wrinkles whiles worn, the detail of the pattern on someone's sneaker soles, or the bounce of a woman's large sausage curls. 

The composition is fairly standard, but Obata does play with the visual angles within the panels, using odd, dramatic ones during major moments.  The backgrounds are also well detailed, even if they are not above breaking out the speed lines at times.  I do like that after every chapter, they include both the writer's and artist's storyboards from a selected scene in the previous chapter.  It's a nice touch, and thematically appropriate.

PRESENTATION:
No extras to speak of here.

RATING:
Bakuman  can be a bit uneven in art and tone, but the fact that they can make something as mundane and meticulous as making manga look exciting and fun has to count for something.

This series is published by Viz.  The series is complete in Japan at 20 volumes, and is expected to be completed in the USA this summer.  All volumes are currently in print.

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Review: FLOWER IN A STORM

FLOWER IN A STORM (Hana ni Arashi), by Shigeyoshi Takagi.  First published in 2006, and first published in North America in 2010.

PLOT:
Riko Kunimi is a super-strong teenage girl, but all she craves is to be perfectly normal and to have perfectly normal friendships (and relationships) like every other girl.  Unfortunately, she happened to have a chance encounter with Ran Tachibana, the young heir to a wealthy, powerful banking family.  From that moment, Ran is determined that she and she alone will be his bride and will win her through any means possible.  He literally storms her school to make his intentions known, and from that moment Riko must fend off both Ran and those who would exploit her to get to him.  Will Riko stand against Ran's bizarre romantic onslaught, or will she submit to his strange charms?

STORY:
Why does it seem so hard for shoujo writers to learn that obsessiveness and stalking DO NOT equal romance?  Not every series is guilty of such abuses, but this series makes it all too literal.

Flower in a Storm tries to balance out the inherient sexism of its concept by making Riko very strong, with the idea that she could physically defend herself from those who would threaten her.  That would be a fine idea, except that she's always complaining about her superpower and how some guy she had a crush on told her she was weiiiiird.  Worse still, her super strength always seems to conveniently disappear or end up negated through some plot device when the plot needs to her be kidnapped.  The story pays lipservice to Riko being a Strong Independent Woman (tm), but it counteracts that by having her complain about it and weakening her just so Ran can jump in and save the day.

Speaking of that weirdo, let's talk about Ran.  My god, what a messed-up character he is, and the mangaka is clearly oblivious to how weird he is!  Being rich beyond belief, he has no notion of restraing or limitation - he simply declares he will have something and does everything he can to get it.  He will slavishly research his target and wield any means at hand to win.  The mangaka wants us to think this as being romantic and devoted, but it's not so at all!  It's bizarre and creepy to fixate on a girl you only briefly saw after a car accident!  It's bizarre and creepy to burst into her school and declare a girl to be your bride, whether she likes it or not!  It's bizarre and creepy to transfer into her school and sneak into your home so that she can NEVER GET AWAY FROM YOU!  These are not the actions of a man in love.  These are the actions of a psychopath who should be in jail.  The mangaka tries to counter all this terribleness with quiet moments where Ran comforts Riko or tells her that he likes her just the way she is, but it's far too late and far too little to counteract all the creepy that came before it. 

Flower in a Storm is far creepier than any horror manga I've ever read, because it wants us to think of a rich, psychotic stalker as a white knight and that a girl can be physically strong until it's inconvienent for her to be so, and that's all the personality she needs, and the fact that something like this was popular enough to be brought over here depresses me like few things can.

ART:
The artwork is shockingly plain for shoujo.  Even the bishonen are simply drawn - more effort went into their stylishly tousled hair and wardrobes than their faces.  Riko's not much better, as she's just a skinny limp-haired blank of a girl.  The shading is light and simple, which makes everything look rather flat.  I will say that I do like how the mangaka used screentones and patterns to craft or suggest objects in the background instead of replacing the background altogether.  The composition isn't bad either, with a lot of variety in panel shape and layering.  The panels themselves are mostly a bunch of talking heads.  While the story is distinctive in its awfulness, but the art is more conventional in its dullness.

PRESENTATION:
There's a brief side story and an author's note.

RATING:

Stalking is not love, and it's not helped by a terrible story and plain art.

This series was published by Viz.  Both volumes were published, and both are in print.

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Review: MOYASIMON

MOYASIMON: TALES OF AGRICULTURE, by Masayuki Ishikawa.  First published in 2004, and first published in North America in 2009.

PLOT:
Tadayasu is the son of a yeast maker, who has an unusual gift: he can see microbes, or at least cute, cartoony versions of microbes.  He and his best friend/next door neighbor Kei have gone off to Tokyo to attend an agricultural college, with the instruction from Tadayasu's grandfather to find one Keizo Itzuki.  Itzuki turns out to be one of their professors who is obsessed with all things gross and fermented.  He wants to harness Tadayasu's skill, so he wrangles him and Kei into becoming his assistants.  They work under the strict supervision of graduate student Haruka, who prefers tight clubwear and high heels to safety goggles and labcoats and is highly skeptical of Tadayasu's gift.  The two boys also end up meeting with Kaoru and Takuma, two older students who try to find ways to use Tadayasu's gift to make money.  They too become assistants to Professor Itzuki after an accident involving a still of bootleg sake in an abandoned building.  Rounding out the group is Hazuki, who is a germaphobic freshman.  Together, this motley gang are ready to confront anything that the professor and the microbial world can throw at them.

STORY:
Moyasimon is not a staggering work of heartbreaking genius.  There's no real overarching plot and there are no villains to speak of.  If anything, it's something akin to a combination of Community and The Magic School Bus, where a group of oddball college students get into weirdly funny situations and teach the audience about various forms of microscopic life.  This is a combination that should not work, or at least come off as kind of preachy, as most 'edutainment' is.  The strangest thing about this series is that it totally DOES work, and is instead both amusing and interesting.

It helps that the cast is a great mix of personalities, from true scientific believers like Itzuki and Haruka, wacky newbies like Kaoru, Takuma, and Hazuki, and Tadayasu and Kei serving as the straightmen in the middle.  It's this mix of personalities that brings different perspectives (and sources of comedy) from any situation, be it one of Itzuki's experiments or just a regular part of classwork such as planting a rice paddy or palpitating a cow.  The best part is that as outrageous as it can get, everything is based on real science, so from disaster and comedy you can learn how bacteria can ruin a batch of sake, the various weird ways people have fermented food, or why yogurt is good for your gut.  There are even author's notes on the side of many pages that explain which little cartoony species of microbe we are looking at, which is incredibly helpful.

Moyasimon is a straightforward, amusing, and educational all at once.  It's a combination I would have never expected to find in a manga, but I'm so very glad to have discovered.

ART:
The character designs are pretty realistic, with nice shading, realistic hair and proportions, and normal fashion (save for Haruka and her BDSM-Lite wardrobe).  The more comedic character do tend to have simpler designs, such as Itzuki with his 5-line mustache or Takuma's perfectly spherical head.  You'd think such looks would clash with the others, but it all seems to fit together perfectly.

The microbes are also very simple and cartoony, downright cute with their little smiley faces and round, sometimes anthromorphic bodies.  Yet each is visually distinct, so that even without reading the author's notes you can distinguish one species from another.  A lot of time and care was put into the backgrounds, as they're not just traced from source material but meticulously textured, which makes them look great and serves as all the better contrast to the microbes.

Overall, this is a great looking manga.   Ishikawa put a lot of love and detail in the setting and characters, and manages to make both the mundane look lovely and the microscopic adorable.

PRESENTATION:
As typical for a Del Ray work, there is an honorfics guide in the front and translation notes in the back.  There are a couple of omakes about gut flora and and two bacterium discussing the idea of a collectible card game where the goal is to ferment and change foodstuffs into other items.  What, it's no crazier than any other collectible card game.

RATING:

It's a genuine shame that this series was cancelled after the big Del Ray/Kodansha buy-out, because it manages to balance being educational and entertaining without preachiness.  This is a manga for the biology geek in everyone's life.

This series was published by Del Ray.  This series is ongoing in Japan, but only 2 volumes were released.  Both are currently out of print.

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