Phoenix 8
Posted: January 6, 2007 Filed under: Phoenix Leave a comment »I suspected I might like this one less since it was the second half to a historical piece. I know I said in the last volume that I kind of liked the Japanese history lesson, I revised my opinion in this volume. I was completely unfamiliar with the warring families/clans/whatever trying to take power, and it was annoying to keep track of them, especially when different members of each family would have different small parts. Though it does explain everything to you, it seems to rely a lot on politics and how the different families percieved each other and were percieved throughout history. And as I said with Yoki Koto Kiku, I don’t like it when I’m completely unfamiliar with the source material, which is becoming more and more a problem as the history in this series becomes more modern.
Anyway, this volume was also a lot more dark and depressing than the last one. Benta is forced to do a lot of things he doesn’t want to, so it is satisfying when he snaps at the end. It seems like life just kind of dumped on Benta, and I was also satisfied with the open ending. I also liked Obu less and less through this volume. Even after Kiyomori died and she was… can’t remember last volume… escaped? set free? She came back and hung out with the family, even though many people made it clear she was not welcome. Well. Yes. She got hers, though that was pretty depressing too, as I still would’ve liked to have seen a certain outcome from her as well.
This story was also too long… I do prefer it when they are kept within one volume. I wonder how Sun will work out now.
Robe of Feathers was very short and very cool. That’s about all I can say about it, and I’m glad the time travel element was included. I was wondering when that would happen.
