Embalmer 4
Posted: December 17, 2008 Filed under: Embalmer 5 Comments »Hm, I didn’t realize this series was still running in Japan. Apparently volume 5 came out a couple months ago after a break of… three years? That’s a shame, I was hoping the story concluded in this volume.
There was definitely a shift towards more romantic stories. In particular, I liked the story of how Shinjyurou and Azuki met, which was a really long and sad story about Azuki’s grandfather and how Shinjyurou came to start his business in Japan. It seems that Azuki and Shinjyurou have always had a somewhat juvenile relationship, but we do get to see what it is that Shinjyurou likes about her so much. It was quite touching, and I liked the dramatics of the story after having gotten to know the characters so well. Actually, one of my favorite details in that story is the fact that Shinjyurou follows Azuki around on a loud, squeaky bike. It’s just one of those things that’s easy to imagine, and it fits perfectly into Shinjyurou’s slightly antagonistic personality.
There’s a couple stories which are only a few pages long. One of them I was not so fond of, if only because it did not contain any of the main characters. The other was a cute moment in the rain between Shin and Azuki, once again showing the great lengths Shin goes to in order to get close to Azuki (in this case, pretending he didn’t have an umbrella upon seeing her).
There’s two other long stories that don’t have a great deal to do with the main characters, but I liked both of them. One of them is about a famous pianist who does not get along well with his daughter and what it is that he can’t forget, even in an amnesiac state. The other is one I actually liked a lot more, which was a really great story about a woman who was sure she was going to die alone of cancer, so she requested the three-person team of Shin, his… manager (?), and a person skilled at dressing the dead for wakes attend her funeral, since nobody else will. It’s extremely sad, but with an excellent ending. It’s not so much that I didn’t see the ending coming, but I like this type of bittersweet story a lot, so I probably enjoyed it a lot more than I should have.
I still liked the continuous plot running through the last volume a little better, but I’m definitely quite attached to the characters now. I like the ones dealing with Shin and Azuki most, especially when they show Shin’s job contrasted with his crush on Azuki. But even the one-shots with minimal involvement from those characters are quite good.
I’m pretty well sold on Mitsukazu Mihara, I think. Embalmer was just dark and quirky enough to fit my tastes. Even if the story wasn’t quite right, I would have a hard time hating Shinjyurou in any context he appeared. He’s quite an excellent character, and it’s a shame his story isn’t resolved.
[...] Dan Polley checks out vol. 6 of Le Chevalier d’Eon at Comics Village. Connie reviews vol. 4 of Embalmer, vol. 16 of Iron Wok Jan, and vol. 7 of Let Dai at Slightly Biased Manga. James Fleenor shares his [...]
I’ve really enjoyed reading your reviews of this series, and it’s really cool to hear that a fifth volume exists. Sadly, I don’t imagine Tokyopop will be bringing it over since sales on the first four volumes were pretty modest. Mitsukazu Mihara has always been more of a cult favorite than a mainstream one, which is a shame because I think she’s a brilliant writer whose work deserves to be read. I’ve always felt that if there were a way to get The Embalmer or particularly Doll into the hands of Western comics readers who don’t usually read manga, Mihara-sensei may very well find the success which has eluded her out here for so long. After all, Doll has many similarities to the short fiction of Ray Bradbury and Isaac Asimov. Two authors who inspire much devotion in Western comics circles.
Yeah, I figured the chances of seeing the fifth volume of Embalmer were slim. I’m surprised to hear that Mihara’s works were not well-received, though. I thought she must have been very popular for that many different titles to be released.
I hadn’t thought about it, but it’s true what you say about the similarities between some of her stories and a writer like Ray Bradbury. I didn’t really get into Doll until the very end (I absolutely fell in love with the last volume), but I definitely see it in IC in a Sunflower. Doll seems reasonably popular (or at least I still see it mentioned occasionally), but I’m always surprised that nobody seems to follow it up by reading the excellent one-shot volumes. The stories in Doll and the one-shots I’ve read seem like they would fit in with the indy comics crowd quite easily, but I guess there might be a bit of a bias against manga there.
It’s a review that I just wanted to read! I feel the same about the Embalmer, so your text was a really nice follow-up for me.
I didn’t think Embalmer isn’t so popular. Such a pity…
Actually, there is 6th volume coming next year. It would be great if you could write some reviews of 5 and 6 volume.
I’m glad you liked the review! I’ve been reading a couple more of Mihara’s one-shots lately, and it gets to me more and more that the Embalmer probably won’t be finishing up in English. It’s a very unique story, and it’s so easy to like the characters and get drawn into their weird world.
Thanks for letting me know about volume 6, too! I may wind up buying the rest of the volumes when the series finishes up (it doesn’t seem to be in the current issue of Feel Young, but that doesn’t really mean anything, I guess), but I can’t read kanji that well, so I probably won’t be able to understand enough of them to cover them on the site here. Thank you for the thought, though.