Cheeky Angel 10

Now!  To counterbalance that disturbing Confidential Confessions review, here’s the beginning of my 6-volume deficit of Cheeky Angel volumes!  I’ve got three of them under my belt so far, I’ll probably get to the other three before the end of the weekend.

This series never quite gets over being one of the most absolutely mediocre series I’ve ever read.  There are parts where it drops waaaay below the average mark, and there are parts where I kind of like it, but those parts are probably only likable because I’ve been reading this series so long and I’m desperately trying to find something good about it since I’m only about halfway through.

But this volume was pretty good.  It was very character-driven once again, and we get some more backstory about Genzo, who has none.  Meg chats with an old girlfriend of his, who spills the beans about how he uses women.  The fact that Genzo was a thug who hated or used women in the past wasn’t that big a revelation, but for some reason all the characters took it as one, and there are several chapters dedicated to finding the real Genzo.  Ugh.  He is who he is, and it’s annoying that they thought that somehow there was another persona hiding.  Clearly Meg brought out all this good stuff about him… I thought that had been established fairly early on.  Maybe I misread.

Anyway, we get a story about Genzo’s scars in a backstory that involves both Meg and Miki.  Later, they pin the change in Genzo on the devil clown, so the group goes to Genzo’s house and meets his sister, who is totally awesome.  She even LOOKS different from other characters!  Wow!  Unfortunately, she is described as a Genzo in drag, and she really looks nothing like him… doesn’t even really act like him, except for being slightly Meg-obsessed and only a little over the top.

So another round of stuff from the Devil Clown in the wish book, which I thought had somehow been rendered useless.  Meg has to fight about whether or not she does or doesn’t want to be turned back into a man.  She finds something out that will make the rest of the series AWESOME if it sticks, and she is a bit conflicted about it.  The end of the volume ends with the cutest scene between her and Genzo EVER.

It was a good volume, and I liked it, but again, a powerfully mediocre series.  The next volume’s kinda good, but the volume after that one stinks again.  More on that later.