Moon Child 4

This series keeps getting weirder and weirder.  The weirdness is what draws me to it in the first place, but it keeps doing things that are just more and more out there.  For instance, I knew that Teruto, Seth, and Jimmy all lived on the moon together, but showing a scene of them with two mermaids frolicking on the bare rock surface by themselves is kind of odd.  Similarly, it keeps making bizarre jokes that you have to laugh at.  At one point, Shonach wants to have a serious talk with Jimmy and Noera.  Most of what he says is directed at Noera, and to escape the uncomfortable situation, Jimmy tries to excuse himself to go buy chocolate.  Shonach has brought some along though, so Jimmy has to stay put.  He eats it with a red face as the dialogue with Noera continues.  After a bit, Jimmy tries to excuse himself again by saying he’s going to go buy ice cream.  With no comment, Shonach says he’s luckily brought some of that along as well and produces an ice cream cone.  Jimmy questions the moment in tiny letters with “did you have that in your pocket,” but there’s just something hilarious and weird about it that makes you laugh.

Lots of stuff is going on at the same time now.  The Chernobyl threat looms in the background, but is only addressed briefly by the mermaid people as a solution to the Benjamin situation is tossed around.  Teruto reaches the Sea Witch and begs her to bring Seth back to life, saying he’ll do anything for her in exchange for Seth’s life back and a few other things.  What precisely he’s drafted into doing is an interesting thing, and a new character related to this pops up at the very end of the volume.  A lot of what goes on deals with a comeback for Art though, and he rehearses and debuts in the huge new show he’s in, and Jimmy tries to help him with that as well as deal with the jerk who was cast in the same role.  Benjamin and Art meet again, but just as Benjamin’s about to tell Art the truth, Holly shows up and is a jerk to Benjamin again.

It’s so easy to get drawn into the plot of this series, even with all these different things going on.  While there are definitely threads I prefer (this volume had a lot of my preference, which is focus on Art and Jimmy), everything that’s currently going on is fascinating and, despite the fact a lot of the subplots are really random and seem unrelated, they all fit together nicely.  It’s an extremely well-crafted story, and seeing how everything unfolds and spreads out is a lot of fun.