Monday, April 25, 2022

Review: SHIRLEY

This month has mostly been full of duds, so thank god that there's still one good maid manga out there that I hadn't talked about yet. 

SHIRLEY (Shari), by Kaoru Mori.  First published in 2003 and first published in North America in 2008.



PLOT:

In this short story collection, we follow three young maids.  The first is Shirley, a 13-year-old girl who is hired by a widowed cafe owner to be a housemaid only to become something closer to a friend or a substitute daughter.  There's also the story of Nellie, who serves as a constant companion to her lonely young charge.  Finally there's Mary Banks, who must deal with the fallout of her former master's prank well after his death.

Thursday, April 21, 2022

Review: MAID SHOKUN

I was hoping to find a shojo maid manga when I picked this one up.  What I got was...certainly something else.

MAID SHOKUN, written by Nanki Satou with art by Akira Kiduki.  First published in 2006 and first published in North America in 2011.



PLOT:

Chiyoko came to Tokyo from the countryside to study, but instead finds herself roped into helping out at the Akihabara maid cafe Mille Fille.  It turns out that some of their new waitresses just quit, and Chiyoko turns out to be a natural at the maid role.  Things get complicated when one of the girls has to deal with a stalker, two of the staff are outed as lesbians, Chiyoko finds herself starting to fall for a patron, and a sensationalist news story puts the cafe in peril.

Monday, April 11, 2022

Review: ENMUSU

More often than not, maids are used as fetish fuel in manga, and today's review is one of the more unfortunate examples of such.

ENMUSU (Renai Shusse Emaki En X Musu), by Takahiro Seguchi.  First published in 2002 and first published in North America in 2004.



PLOT:

Gisuke Arakawa is a high school senior down on his luck.  He's constantly bullied, struggles to maintain his grades, and his brilliant but icy classmate he's crushing on won't give him the time of day.  Then a tall, busty Russian maid named Sonya shows up at his door bearing a special good-luck charm just for him.  This charm grants Gisuke a chance at inheriting a vast fortune, but to do so he must defeat the other charm bearers at a series of punishing academic tests.  Worse still, the other boys and their maids want Gisuke out of the way and are prepared to do that by the dirtiest means possible.

STORY:

Looking at Enmusu, you would presume that this is just another shonen battle series, and you would be half-right.  It is a shonen ecchi battle series, so you get this weirdly off-putting mix of childish earnestness with fetishes a-plenty.

Seguchi wasn't even trying when it came to writing the cast.  Gisuke is downtrodden, Sonya is a ditz, Shizuku the love interest is as frigid as the Arctic, and the villains Tendo and Satoshi are sadistic creeps.  Nobody really changes save for Shizuku, and that's only because she's torn down to nothing in the kinkiest way possible first.  Gisuke is meant to be endearing with his perseverance and innate decency, but mostly he comes off as a blank, reacting to fanservice moments and spouting platitudes about The Power of Friendship (tm) like a shonen-manga-themed robot.

The characters may be simple, but the plot is needlessly convoluted.  It's like Seguchi and his editor picked tropes out of a hat or threw darts at them at random, and what they got was "dead business mogul," "maids," "Japanese good-luck charms," and "competitive academic testing."  If that sounds like a random and nigh-impossible collection of ideas to tie together into a coherent story, you are absolutely correct.  That's why Seguchi doesn't even bother, relying instead on shoving in as many fetishes as possible.

Some of the fetishes are obvious, like all the focus on maids.  Every boy that gets a charm also gets a maid of their own, and Seguchi clearly savors every opportunity he can get to have these boys bathe with their maids, molest their maids, or in some other way sexually exploit them.  Others are less expected, like the heavy focus on submission, bondage, and other S&M stuff.  We're talking dog leashes, demeaning nicknames, verbal and physical abuse, and so much more, and all of it is piled on Shizuku before volume's end for the terrible crime of not beating a sadistic little kid on a practice test.  She's clearly traumatized by this, and all Gisuke can offer is a pep talk.  To say that this is tonally out of whack with everything else in the book (including the other ecchi scenes) is an understatement.  It felt like an unwelcome peek into the mangaka's mind and BOY did I not like it one bit.

ART:

The art for Enmusu might somehow be worse than its story (which is saying a lot).  The character designs are all weirdly short and squat, which makes most of the characters look like children.  Looking at Gisuke on the cover, you'd sooner presume he was 10 than you would 18.  Their faces are like a teen's caricature of an anime character drawn on a squashed jellybean.  The only thing Seguchi seems to draw competently are nudes, so not only are there are a lot of fanservice scenes with the girls and Gisuke but also a surprising amount of man-ass.  The panels are framed uncomfortably close to the action and at low angles to best capture both the frequent panty shots as well as to emphasize the looks of scorn and hate thrown at Gisuke and Sonya.  

RATING:

I can't figure out what possessed ADV to pick up Enmusu in the first place.  It's a gross mix of random ideas and overly intense fanservice, shoved awkward into a shonen manga mold.  It's not amusing, it's not sexy, it's a mistake that was mercifully stopped by the end of ADV's manga division.

This manga was published by ADV Manga.  This series is complete in Japan with 6 volumes available.  1 volume was published and is currently out of print.

Thursday, April 7, 2022

Review: MOE USA

It's time for a spring cleaning before our big TENTH ANNIVERSARY, so let's do a month of maid manga!  Sadly, I reviewed the best maid manga out there in English nearly a decade ago, so what's left is often a lot of garbage.  That being said, few of the maid manga out there are as bad as this.

MOE USA, by Atsuhisa Okura.  First published in North America in 2007.



PLOT:

Ruby and Patty are two young eager weeaboos anime fans ready to enjoy their first trip to Japan.  They take in all the sights (and shops) that Akihabara has to offer but their plans go awry when the cosplay costumes of their dreams turn out to be too pricey for their budget.  They decide that their only option is to go home make their own damn costumes work in a maid cafe to earn the necessary funds.  They get off to a bad start with a haughty employee, but when they discover a pair of magical maid uniforms they set out on a path to fame, fortune, and attaining the ultimate level of moe.

Friday, April 1, 2022

Review: REVOLUTIONARY GIRL UTENA - AFTER THE REVOLUTION

Despite the date on this review, this is no trick - it's not only a sequel manga to my favorite anime (and its rather underrated manga adaptation), but it's one of the rare ones to do so in a really substantial sort of way. 

REVOLUTIONARY GIRL UTENA: AFTER THE REVOLUTION (Shoujo Kakumei Utena: After the Revolution), by Chiho Saito, based on the original concept by Be-Papas.  First published in 2017 and first published in North America in 2020.



PLOT:

20 years after Utena brought an end to Akio's endless duels, the former members of Ohtori Academy's student council are still grappling with old problems.  Touga and Saionji are working as art dealers, but still find themselves in competition with one another.  Juri's an Olympic fencer, but can't shake the insecurity she feels about her troubled relationship with Shiori.  Miki is an accomplished pianist, but can't understand why his comatose twin sister Kaoru has been rising from her bed to complete his unfinished composition.  In turn they all find themselves back at Ohtori and caught up in mysterious duels, where a strange pink-haired girl is waiting to help them.