Iron Wok Jan 17
Posted: February 20, 2009 Filed under: Iron Wok Jan 1 Comment »I’m just going to do a couple quick posts tonight. I’m up way too late and am way too sick for this.
Thankfully, I’m not too sick for Jan, and I thoroughly enjoyed this volume. I had put off reading what I have of this series because I started getting burned out on the tournament plots last volume, but this one somehow made it awesome again. Of course all the competitors that we thought would go ahead advanced to the next round, but Jan made a big spectacle of himself, and I enjoyed every minute of his groveling and bowing to Otani in order to get his dish tasted. It did seem odd that the judges rejected him without tasting the whole dish, though. To be fair, he is a jerk, and probably didn’t ask nicely.
Not as much was made of Kiriko and Celine’s dishes, which was also nice. I was expecting big, drawn-out chapters about the struggle to make their dishes, but they were just mentioned, along with anyone else who will be a prime contender in the competition. Surprisingly, Okonogi is also still around, which is nice. I like the inclusion of Okonogi as a sort of everyman, and I also like the friendship between he and Jan since it makes Jan seem like more of a real person.
I also really liked that Jan’s next round finished up at the end of the volume, too. There were some flashbacks to his grandpa’s training, which entertain me because they’re so over-the-top, and even Kiriko’s grandfather told a cautionary tale about a potential opponent in the competition. I’m looking forward to reading more now, which is no less than what this series deserves. It is pretty fun, if a bit repetitive, and I love its over-the-top nature.
I Shall Never Return 5
Posted: February 19, 2009 Filed under: I Shall Never Return | Tags: BL 1 Comment »I’ve got a bit of a flu this week, so I apologize if my posts have been less frequent. I’ve been sleeping instead of reading, which is a true tragedy.
I did get to read this, which is the conclusion to a rather nice BL series. On one hand, I felt it drug things out a little long, but that may be because it waited so long to address what appeared to be a car crash at the end of last volume. It makes up for this by filling in a story about Ritsuro getting drawn into Ken and Kazuyoshi’s old lifestyle. Some thugs that were after Kazuyoshi actually pick up Ritsuro to get to him, and when they find out Ritsuro is the one who Ken straightened up for, they basically rape him. In the aftermath, Ritsuro’s parents find out about his and Ken’s relationship, and his father doesn’t take it well.
Meanwhile, Ken and his stepdad have a minor crisis on thier hands in India, which only gets worse when Ken’s dad loses one of the things most important to him. Ritsuro gets a call from Ken’s mom about Ken and his dad being lost somewhere, and she goes to India to track them down.
Of course the two meet up once again before the end of the story. It felt pretty great, but it drove me crazy that they were both willing to be apart and were rather amiable about it. Not so much because of Ken’s whole family situation, which is understandable, but because of his career. It ends on a slightly better note, though.
There’s a short story at the end about Kazuyoshi and Ken meeting and how Ken first got into selling himself. It’s interesting, and it was interesting to see that side of Ken again after watching all the effort it took him to straighten his life out and find what it was he wanted to do.
It was an easy series to read and like since I liked all the characters. The relationships are sincere and the drama intense, which is about all you can ask in a series like this. It was written quite a bit better than most romance stories, but I wouldn’t call it among the best. It is a good read, though, and someone looking for a great BL story wouldn’t do badly reading this one.
Hotel Africa 2
Posted: February 19, 2009 Filed under: Hotel Africa 3 Comments »Again, nothing would make me happier than seeing Tokyopop resume Hee Jung Park’s series, specifically this and Martin and John. This was one of the most unique series that came out last year, in its own subdued way. I enjoy the framing devices used, the two different times and places its set in, and how you need to consider the feelings of all characters involved at both ends of the time periods in the story.
In case you’re not familiar with Hotel Africa… it’s difficult to explain, but I believe the series is set in the present, with most stories starting with situations that arise around Elvis, the main character, his roommate Ed, their friend Jul, and one or two other people. The situations are usually not very serious, and can be anything from a haircut to pet-sitting, whatever. Just common, everyday things. These trigger Elvis’s memory, and he tells stories about growing up at his mother’s hotel, Hotel Africa, in Utah. These memories are the bulk of the volume.
My favorite story in the volume was probably the one about Hillie, the dog Elvis took care of for that sad old man. That was a sad story in general, and as much as I hate to admit it, it almost made me cry when I read it on the bus. It’s really well-told, and it’s one of those “After School Special”-type stories where Elvis learns what death and to say goodbye means at a young age. Though it’s weird that he knows the dog is dead, but his mother doesn’t bother to tell him about the dog’s owner. The whole thing with the owner coming back for the dog was what did it for me, really.
I’m not sure what the next best one was after that. I did like the story that focused on the roommate Ed’s memories of his first love, which was also very tragic. I liked the slow way the relationship developed in that one, even if you could sort of see that the two of them would get together, and you could tell what Ian was going to do in the end, too. This story was only made better by the subsequent Ian chapter, which was an entirely visual representation of what went through Ian’s mind in the end.
There’s a bunch of other good stuff in here… a kind of weird one about a pair of lovers that I wasn’t clear on whether or not they were actual siblings or were just raised by the same person, one about Elvis changing his hairstyle, one about his mother’s friend coming back to the town and her life in the city (which was also quite good, now that I think about it, even though the character wasn’t sympathetic at all), and one about a blind boy and his mother that closed out the volume.
It’s the character development more than anything that does it for me. Very few of the stories are actually about Elvis and his mother and grandmother. Mostly they are all stories about the travelers passing through the hotel, their jorneys, and how their lives go from then on. It’s a really nice idea for a series, and like I said, it’s a true tragedy that we probably won’t get to see more. But who knows, maybe we’ll see a revival. Hee Jung Park’s series certainly deserve it more than a lot of the other series that were cancelled, I think.
Pastel 11
Posted: February 19, 2009 Filed under: Pastel 1 Comment »You know, I put off reading this series because I know it sucks, and I know I don’t want to read it, but my obsessive-compulsive nature makes me continue to buy it, and I feel guilty if I buy something and don’t read it.
I thought to myself “Maybe I’m just being too hard on this series. Maybe it’s not as bad as I think it is.”
Then I remembered Mako. Mugi’s new mom.
The volume starts out with Yuu and Mako weighing their breasts on a scale. Literally, this is on the first page of the volume.
Then my mind turned to mush as I read through the next two stories. I counted. There are 93 pages in the first two stories. On these 93 pages, there are 66 instances of breasts being lovingly drawn, many times with a “boing” speech bubble coming out of them. This is only counting when the cleavage or underside of the breast can be seen. Sometimes they are obscured. Sometimes there are three instances per page.
There is a large two-page spread of Mako and Yuu having a hula-hoop contest which is the biggest cheesecake shot I’ve ever seen in any manga, ever. And please keep in mind I’ve read Video Girl Ai and parts of I”s by Masakazu Katsura, who is some sort of king when it comes to this type of fanservice. To be fair, I didn’t get to the twister scene in I”s, though, so maybe that’s more cheesecake.
Mako may be gone as of the next volume. That would be so great.
Hoshin Engi 11
Posted: February 19, 2009 Filed under: Hoshin Engi Leave a comment »I reviewed this volume for the minis column at Manga Recon that went up on Monday. You can read it here.
Yeah. I like this series a lot. It does some bad things, but then when I get volumes like the past couple, I forget that there are 500 characters floating around that may re-enter the story at any time. All I care about is Taikobo.
Berserk 25
Posted: February 17, 2009 Filed under: Berserk 5 Comments »Guts seems to have derailed the nice classic shoujo manga marathon I had going on. That’s okay, because I’m pretty sure Guts can derail whatever he wants.
Lots of magic in this volume. I’m not too sure if I like the mix of magic and Serpico, only because there’s something I vaguely dislike about him anyway. Schierke doing what she does is pretty awesome though, and when she finally pulls off all her amazing feats, seeing everyone in awe of her is pretty great. Even Guts is impressed, and it seems like nothing could impress Guts anymore. He actually calls her “boss” at one point, which I thought was interesting, but may only be referencing the fact that she’s head of this particular troll slaying operation, or maybe he was being a bit of a jerk about her giving him orders after he’d been singlehandedly killing all the trolls up to that point.
Isidro’s role is also an interesting one. He really, really wants to be the hero, but he’s just too young. He worships Guts and seems to take pride in everything awesome that he does. In a fight, Isidro himself does little more than divert attention since he’s too young or small to swing a sword effectively. It hurts his feelings to see everyone from Guts to Schierke to Serpico help the fight and be of so little use himself. While the comic relief between him, Puck, and Ivarella is a little much at this point, I like Isidro a lot and I’m looking forward to him being a hero.
And just in case you had missed it after all this talk of magic, next volume looks like it will feature some massive troll slaying in a monster den. Not that Guts didn’t cut an Ogre in half and do all sorts of slicing and dicing in town in this volume. Serpico actually got one of the best jabs in. He was fighting a kelpie, and after piercing upward through its head, it fights him for a little while longer with its eye hanging out of its socket. It’s kind of gross, but it’s also the ugliest kelpie I’ve ever seen. Usually they’re a little cuter.
B.O.D.Y. 3
Posted: February 17, 2009 Filed under: B.O.D.Y. 1 Comment »Oh man, is this series ever silly. That can be the point in a shoujo series like this, and it is a fun kind of silly, but the heroine here is getting into some ridiculous stuff.
Most of this volume features her intervening on behalf of the president of the host club. That’s right, the same person that told her she’d have to sell herself if she wanted her boyfriend to stop dating other people for money. He’s a bad guy. Ryu tells her to stop hanging out with him and interfering with his business. She doesn’t listen. She actually keeps doing exactly the opposite of everything anyone tells her here, except in the doormat heroine kind of way where she weakly tries at something, then someone swoops in to save her and help her succeed.
Somehow, she infiltrates a huge corporation and happens to run into the wife of the president while dodging security for five floors. The wife listens when she tells her she shouldn’t have dumped her old boyfriend. Huh. This scene is also far lamer than I have made it sound, since literally Ryoko and Ryu just bolt for the inside door after bungling security and vaguely run around a little before happening upon the person they’re looking for.
While I do like the characters, this volume was just too ridiculous even by shoujo standards. The story wraps up at the end and we are promised new and better things not involving host clubs next time, so I’m pretty open to whatever direction it wants to take from here.
This was a review copy provided by Viz.
Human Club 7
Posted: February 17, 2009 Filed under: Human Club 1 Comment »Ah. This was a satisfying volume. To be honest, I read half of it two weeks ago and half of it this week. The first half of the book was the conclusion to the Hong Kong story. There are some plenty weird twists and whatnot in there. The family tree gets a little twisted as Shinobu’s lineage is explained. We also get to know what happened to him and his mother when they were both sold to the brothels in Kowloon City, something that’s been hinted at for several volumes now. The ending is suitably epic, with explosions and the deaths of many characters and whatnot. The elder Li brother also just… well, he crosses too many lines. The younger Li is a pretty likable guy, though, for being an underworld boss and all that.
The conclusion to Ron and Shinobu’s story is a little ridiculous. I liked it, though. It was shoujo manga ridiculous.
The second half is either starting a new storyline in Rome with the Sicilian mob or is a one-shot about Shinobu and the son of one of the families. It’s not like the earlier one-shot stories where Shinobu drives him crazy, but he lets himself get caught and seems to play into one plan and engineer another as a favor. It’s kind of cool, and I do like the elaborate webs the story seems to spin for the characters.
This series still isn’t the best in the world, but I can’t help but like Shinobu and Ron. What can I say. It also helps that it is dirt cheap and online, though like I said, the adaptation is way sloppier than it would be if it were in book form. Read it at Netcomics.com.
Vagabond 2 (Big ed.)
Posted: February 17, 2009 Filed under: Vagabond 2 Comments »I actually read this a couple weeks ago, but the review I wrote up for it was swallowed and I’ve been mad about it ever since. It was a long one, and I haven’t been able to coerce myself into re-writing it with the same enthusiasm, which is no less than what this series deserves.
I wasn’t sure how I would feel about this if it kept going just as a story with Musashi fighting stronger and stronger opponents in order to better himself. Something like that can get old fast. But the magic of this series is that every fight, every scene just looks so fantastic that it draws you in. You HAVE to know how the battle finishes, how the psychological impact of the fights affects each of the men, and how other people are going to react to the fights.
I do find it strange that each of the fights so far seems to have gathered a crowd. I suppose that’s just how these things work.
I actually prefer the rural setting in the monastery to the school that we saw last volume. I also prefer the characters that are populating the monastery to the ones at the school, too. They just have more personality, both the disciple that Musashi wound up fighting and the legend he set out to meet. The crazy guy from the school also follows him there, I’m not entirely sure why since it’s clear that Musashi didn’t burn down the school, but he’s up for a fight, too.
I’m always slow to start a big volume like this, but I honestly don’t think there’s anything that reads as fast as this series. I don’t normally comment on artwork, but it is fantastic here. All the battles look amazing, and there is a powerful story told even when there is no commentary. The reason it reads so fast is because there’s not a lot of dialogue, but the art more than makes up for it.
These editions also continue to be amazing. I can’t tell you how much I enjoy the huge size and the color pages. I’m definitely getting this series for a real deal buying it in this format.
Berserk 24
Posted: February 15, 2009 Filed under: Berserk 22 Comments »Oh Berserk. Last volume I thought to myself “Yes! Trolls!” because horrible beasts like trolls fit in with the themes of monster slaying, and it seemed like something good to divert Guts and company while they were on their journey. Even better, we learn this volume that the trolls are sentient, so they’re harassing villiages by stealing their food and killing men and women et al. So slaying trolls then has a purpose, and promises to be very violent.
But then the series goes and starts talking about witches. Witches don’t really seem to fit, not as well as trolls. Were you to ask me what I would rather have traveling with Guts, I would probably say a troll, because that would be really awesome.
But then, after awhile, I am convinced that Berserk should have had witches in it all along. There is a long conversation about the “astral world” and the way magic and spirits work that would have been boring, nonsensical, and long-winded in any other series, but made a lot of sense in Berserk. The Cenobites are explained in the context of the whole spiritual realm, and we are told things we already know about the Behelit, but then we are led to wonder whether or not the Behelit Guts has is actually his (or if it’s Puck’s, for that matter, which would be exceptional since you totally wouldn’t see that coming).
Then we see how magic can be used in battle, how its used in weapons, and how it can be used to ease the call the sacrifice brands have on the night creatures. I like that a lot, too.
I’m not convinced about the size of the party at the moment, though. It just seems like there are too many people traveling with Guts. I do like Schierke, and I wouldn’t mind her and Isidro traveling with Guts since both seem to have goals in mind. I would like for them to drop Casca off somewhere though, and then quietly kill Serpico and Farnese in the night. They just… serve no purpose. But judging by the rest of the series, those two will pull off some epic rescue or some major victory in battle that will make me both love them and make me wish that they would never leave the main party. That just seems to be Berserk’s way: convincing me of things that don’t make good sense.
