Review: RAVE MASTER

During Tokyopop's prime, they struggled to get their hands on big-name shonen manga titles.  They really only managed to do so twice.  One of those was Love Hina.  The other was this.

RAVE MASTER (Rave: The Groove Adventure), by Hiro Mashima.  First published in 1999 and first published in North America in 2003.

PLOT:

Haru Glory has spent sixteen idyllic years on Garage Island alongside his sister.  Then he fishes a strange, snowman-like creature out of a pond, inadvertantly setting into motion the renewal of a battle between the forces of darkness and light, of Dark and Rave.  An ancient warrior stumbles into their village proclaiming that only Haru can wield the powers of the Rave, so now Haru must master his new weapon against the the forces of Demon Card while searching for the four remaining Rave Stones that can bring this battle to an end.

STORY:

Ever since Fairy Tale got big here, its fans have been clamoring for this series to get a re-release.  Based on what I've seen in this first volume, though, I don't understand why anyone would bother.  Rave Master is as basic as shonen manga gets, lacking any sort of distinct personality or charm.

There's certainly no personality to be found within the cast.  Haru is the same sort of dopey, good-natured boy you've seen in these sorts of stories.  The same is true for his overprotective sister, the local shopkeep, the old mentor, or the paper-thin villains.  The only characters that did manage to make an impression were the most random ones, be it the talking sunflower on the side of Haru's house or Plue, the bizarre little snowman...dog...thing that kicks off the whole plot.  Even then, randomness will only get you so far in a shonen manga.  If you go too far, it just devolves into wacky chaos a la Bobobo-Bo-Bobobo.

The plot is equally uninspired.  It's literally a battle between darkness and light using magic transforming stones against villains who are motivated only by their own inherent wickedness.  Even then, Mashima seems afraid to let any seriously villainy stick, going so far as to make a narrative asspull to ensure that a murder doesn't stick.  Of course, Haru turns out to be both an action messiah who is innately talented at fighting despite no training whatsoever and happens to have a missing parent whose disappearance is tied to the main story quest, so that's all the motivation he needs for what will surely be volumes upon volume of adventure!

At every point while reading this, I was waiting for Mashima to employ one singular idea that hadn't been done a million times when this was new (much less now).  This is a shonen manga you could read in your sleep and not miss a beat.  I can only hope that his later works tried even a little harder than this.

ART:

I guess Hiro Mashima's art is more memorable than his storytelling, even if it can never avoid similar accusations of being derivative.  He swears that his stylistic influences were artists like Akira Toriyama and Yudetamago (of Kinnikuman fame), but it's uncanny how even at this early stage in his career his characters still end up bearing an strong resemblance to what Eichiro Oda was doing with One Piece.  He definitely favors the sort of cartoony, bug-eyed, slack-jawed overreactions that both Oda and Toriyama liked to use.  That's not even getting into the fact that he clearly recycled some of these character designs (with minimal alterations) for Fairy Tale.

At the very least his linework is very strong and clear and he can make use of dramatic lighting for great effect.  That said, you can tell he's still working out the kinks in his visual style.  Much of the shading in this volume is flat, the poses are stiff, and his use of speedlines in action sequences only ends up spotlighting the stiffness instead of camouflaging it.  

RATING:

There is nothing worth raving about with Rave Master.  It's derivative and dull as hell, outclassed by virtually any other shonen manga you can find on the shelves.  It's telling that not even his later fame and fandom have been enough to motivate modern-day publishers to save this one from the dust heap of manga history.

This manga was published by Tokyopop and Kodansha Comics.  This series is complete in Japan with 35 volumes available.  32 volumes were released by Tokyopop, with the final 3 published by Kodansha.  All are currently out of print.